Rock N Roll Nightmare – SLUMBER PARTY MASSACRE II

Formula is not necessarily a bad thing.  Like a recipe, a formula can reliably provide just the thing you are in the mood for.  Just because a formula promises certain results doesn’t mean it has to be predicable or unoriginal.  Rollercoasters have a very established formula.  Go up, go down, the faster the better.  Within that framework, however, is room for almost infinite variation.  A good rollercoaster gives you the thrills you were expecting but doles them out in innovative ways.  The same is true for movies.  Slashers, for instance, thrive on formula.  A vulnerable group ends up in an isolated place were, unbeknownst to them, some nasty fellow bumps them off one at a time.  The fun—if that’s your bag—lies in the who, what, and especially how the mayhem goes down.  Nothing says you can’t find a creative way to travel from A to B to C (usually standing for Alcohol, Blood, and Corpses).

Slasher sequels can fall into a tricky position of having to double down on formula.  Not only do they have to follow the basic roadmap, they also need to tie in to the previous film.  Some play it safe, like the FRIDAY THE 13^TH movies (the loony JASON GOES TO HELL not withstanding).  Others try to mix it up.  Then there is Deborah Brock, who was tasked with intersecting pillow fights, sexy shenanigans, and power tools for 1987’s SLUMBER PARTY MASSACRE II and did so in a way no one could have seen coming.

The Capsule:

Years after surviving a horrific night with a slumber party crashing driller killer, Courtney (Crystal Bernard) has put the past behind her and is living the life of a normal teen.  She plays guitar in a band, is all about pastels, and is getting attention from the dreamy and frequently shirtless Matt (Patrick Lowe).  Sure, she has the occasional post-traumatic nightmare, but she’s in better shape than her fellow survivor and older sister, Valerie (Cindy Eilbacher), who is wrapped up tight in the nuthouse.  Courtney is so confident in her emotional recovery that she agrees to join her bandmates, Sheila (Juliette Cummins), Sally (Heidi Kozak), and Amy (Kimberly McArthur), at a secluded beach house, for what could be considered a party of the slumber variety.  Sure, her nightmares are becoming more vivid, and happening while she is awake, but that’s all just her imagination.  She isn’t going to let a few hallucinations ruin her fun, especially when her not-so-secret crush shows up.  One night in Matt’s hunky arms makes all of Courtney’s dreams come true.  Unfortunately, one of those dreams was about a demented, leather clad rock n roller with a wicked drill-tipped electric guitar (Atanas Ilitch), and he will turn this slumber party into a nightmare for everyone involved.

Growing up in the days before online databases and on demand movie consumption meant living with unsolved mystery.  Without easy access to every film ever made, tracking down obscure films took considerable leg work.  Who has time for that?  This left me fruitlessly pondering things like, what the hell was that movie I caught a few minutes of on HBO where a Stray Cats reject was chasing a bunch of girls around with a cherry red drill guitar?  Did I dream that shit? 

While this particular driller killer was unique, a killer with a drill was not.  There is THE TOOLBOX MURDERS, the first SLUMBER PARTY MASSACRE, and plain old DRILLER KILLER, plus that drill murder through the ceiling scene from BODY DOUBLE.  That is a lot of drilling to keep track of.  I finally stumbled upon the answer after falling down a click-hole in IMDB which led me to the poster.  Thank you, Internet, for helping us sort out all the various drill killing films 

There might be a lot of driller killer movies, but I’ve never seen a story structure like this one.  The first SLUMBER PARTY MASSACRE was your standard maniac hunting high school girls’ affair, with a slight feminist turn.  The sequel is a supernatural thriller more akin to A NIGHTMARE ON ELM STREET, yet not quite that, either.  Aside from Courtney’s escalating—and nutso—hallucination (a hand-burger, being mauled by a raw chicken), nothing much happens until the Rockabilly killer literally bursts forth from out of nowhere, completely unexplained.  The last act is a brilliantly mad dash, tearing through Courtney’s friends in record time.

It’s a good thing, because the rest of the cast is hands down the blandest bunch of white people ever put in front of a camera.  Crystal Bernard, or as she is better known, that chick from Wings, does a decent job when freaking out, otherwise she is Pastel Barbie.  Amy and her boyfriend, um, Jeff (Scott Westmoreland, thanks again IMDB) practically blend in with the beige wallpaper.  If you thought Courtney’s flare-free fashion sense was bad—and you should--Amy dresses like a zoo tour guide.  Sheila is only interesting because she is a perv, but she shines compared to the others. 

Matt, the dreamy, mid-twenties teen that Courtney constantly fantasizes about isn’t anything more than a hunky face, but I appreciate how Deborah Brock inverts the typical expectations by having the camera ogle the himbo rather than the bimbo. Not only is he always shirtless in Courtney’s daydreams, the scene where he is talking to her on the phone is shot like a Calvin Klein ad, only with ‘80s color gel lighting.

The only notable personality in the group is T.J. (Joel Hoffman), and it is for all the wrong reasons. T.J. is a remarkably obnoxious take on the California surfer dude horndog. At least half of his lines in the script must have just been “uh-huh-huh-huh” stoner laughs. Every single time he opened his mouth I wanted to punch him in the face. His death scene takes forever to arrive and is not nearly satisfying enough, though I doubt any death could be brutal enough for this guy. True to character till the end, he manages to get out one last “Whoa,” before shuffling off the mortal coil.

Placed against these clowns, Atanas Ilitch’s long delayed entrance as the Rockabilly Driller Killer is absolutely electric. Iltich, who only did a couple of films after this, chews the hell out of every scene he is in. His delivery and swagger remind me of Billy Zane in DEMON KNIGHT, despite being saddled with mostly song lyrics for dialog. Not as pitch perfect as Zane, but with similar chaotic energy. It becomes a completely different movie after his arrival, and all lulls are forgiven. Pulling off a plot twist like this takes an actor with crazy confidence, and even more to wield a weapon of this caliber.

Keep your machetes, pitchforks, hedge clippers, and knife gloves, the silver horned, cherry red, drill tipped electric guitar is unquestionably the most impressively ridiculous killing device ever. It’s even more ludicrous than the flying guillotine. For one thing, it is huge. With all its twisted hooks and fangs, it's the size of a cello, yet Rockabilly wields it like a psychotic Eddie Van Halen. It’s also very versatile, great for slashes, bashes, and,of course, impalings. And how many other murder weapons allow the killer to pause in mid-pursuit for an impromptu music video?

The feminist angle is harder to pin down here than in the first SLUMBER PARTY MASSACRE, where the girls banded together to overcome (and castrate) their murderous male stalker. The most notable thing with this one is that all the girls have a genuinely close relationship. None of them are catty or bitchy with each other. At first it seems like Sheila will be the diva of the faux Bangles band, maybe even having eyes for Matt. Nope, she’s just a bit of a nympho (with her own boyfriend, only). Given how clearly nuts Courtney is acting, all her bandmates are notably supportive of her. Sally is a bit oblivious, always equating Courtney’s hysteria with her acne breakout (to the point where Courtney hallucinates Sally’s face is one giant zit), but otherwise, they are very protective.

The funny thing is Courtney does not return the favor when the shit hits the fan. Rockabilly chases a wounded Sheila back to the house, where Courtney and Amy have barricaded themselves in a bedroom. When Courtney hears Sheila banging on the door, they try to let her in, but Rockabilly gets her while the door is still closed. At first I thought they were just comically bad at moving the small dresser blocking the door, but rewatching the scene, Courtney actually moves the dresser back when she hears Rockabilly is out there, too. She lets her friend get skewered rather than risk opening the door. The door that Rockabilly busts through in about 30 seconds. Later, another friend tips over the edge at a construction site and dangles above a three-story drop. She pleads with Courtney “Don’t let go!” Guess what happens at the first sign of danger? They should really vote Courtney out of the band. Posthumously.

Brock also gives the stereotypical slasher attitude on sex a twist. Instead of the “have sex and die” model, in Courtney’s case, it’s “have sex and everyone else dies.” Even before the bodies start dropping, all of Courtney’s bloody hallucinations occur after someone brings up the topicof sex. The girl clearly as some serious hang ups. Once Courtney and Matt finally go all the way (against dream Valierie’s express warning), Rockabilly jumps straight out of her repressed nightmares and into the real world, via a very phallic drill through Matt’s chest. There is zero explanation about why or how this happens. All I know is that I am grateful it does.  

Okay, that is not entirely true, since we find out that [Spoiler] the rampage was all a dream. Courtney wakes up in Matt’s bed and everything is fine. Lame. But wait,that was just a dream, too! Courtney really wakes up in the same nuthouse as her sister, screaming and hallucinating (?) a giant drill ripping through her rubber room. A popular theory is that she went nuts after the events of the movie, but that makes no sense because the events were entirely supernatural. I prefer my own theory, in which Courtney has been in the nuthouse since the end of the first movie, and Valerie is the sane one. We can only hope that Rockabilly was merely a figment of Courtney’s cracked imagination, and more importantly, so was T.J.

SLUMBER PARTY MASSACRE II didn’t make Deborah Brock a household name, though it did lead her to direct RETURN TO ROCK N ROLL HIGH SCHOOL, which I’m sure is great. I would like to have seen what other horror tricks she had up her sleeve, but if her legacy turns out to be a nightmare Elvis impersonator in fringy leather, wielding a drill guitar, that’s something to be proud of. I don’t know if she is, but I certainly am.

C Chaka

Bonus: More shots of Rockabilly, because I love this guy.

Exploitation Paradise - TERMINAL ISLAND

As regular readers may have picked up on, I’m a fan of the ladies.  So it may seem like my feminist leanings go against my love of exploitation cinema, a genre that can be seen as not a fan of the ladies.  True, there are a lot of them out there that heap abuse on female characters, and even more that handle them as shallowly as possible.  The great thing about exploitation movies, though, is the amount of freedom the director has.  As long as a few key elements are included that the producers need for marketing (mostly involving blood and boobs), they can go into crazy and unexpected places.  They can even sneak in legitimate social commentary, if no one is looking too hard.  For example, 1973’s TERMINAL ISLAND, which sticks four beautiful women on an entire island full of violent male convicts, would seem like a misogynistic nightmare, but actually turns out to be pretty enlightened.  Plus, there is blood and boobs.

The Capsule:

After the nation outlaws capital punishment, California seeks to humanely deal with their incorrigible inmates by chucking them all onto an uninhabited island and letting them fend for themselves.  The newest arrival, Carmen (Ena Hartman), discovers this grand social experiment has its drawbacks when she finds she is one of only four women on an island full of men.  Her companions, Joy (Phyllis Davis), Lee (Marta Kristen), and the mute Bunny (Barbara Leigh), are subject to the whims of the camp’s Jim Jones style leader, Bobby (Sean Kenney), and are kept in line by his muscle, Monk (Roger E. Mosley).  Their hellish lives change when they are liberated by another group of inmates who rebelled against Bobby’s sadistic rule.  This group, led by A.J. (Don Marshall) is far more hospitable, but the ladies have had enough of Bobby’s shit and convince the others to stop running and start fighting.  Between Carmen’s ferocity, Lee’s smarts, Joy’s cunning, and Bunny’s… well, Bunny is kind of useless, but the other three are going to give Bobby a war he never expected.

You might think that California is filled with bleeding heart liberals, but the person-on-the-street opinion polls at the start of this movie will change your mind.  When asked about the morality of dumping a bunch of convicts on an island to create their own Lord of the Flies society (except with murderers instead of kids), most of these concerned citizens just bitch about not having the death penalty anymore.  The general consensus is that if we can’t just kill them, at least we can toss them out of sight like garbage (they don’t have a very ecologically responsible view on garbage removal, either).   

It’s the same basic premise as ESCAPE FROM NEW YORK, but more realistic and considerably more economically sensible.  Seriously, I know those were tumultuous times in 1988, but couldn’t the government find a cheaper island than Manhattan to turn into a prison?  Dystopia or not, that is prime real estate.  It’s like converting the Taj Mahal into a Denny’s.  They should have followed California’s example.  The only things on Terminal Island are trees and a few goats.

Notice the title isn’t ESCAPE FROM TERMINAL ISLAND.  This is because the focus of the movie is far more on survival and the social—and sexual—politics of this ad hoc society.  No one has time to think about escape.  The authorities get just close enough to shore to boot out the new inmates (after declaring them legally dead).  There are occasional supply drops of tools and essentials, but otherwise, everyone on the island is left to their own devices to survive.  They don’t even get a “So It’s Your First Night On Terminal Island” pamphlet.  

Aside from the bodies Carmen sees floating around like seaweed when they drop her off, things don’t seem that bad.  She makes a fire, spends the night under the stars, and meets the disgraced doctor turned homeopathic junkie, Norman Milford (Tom Selleck, who along with Mosley and Davis form a Magnum P.I. triumvirate).  He tells her about the camp where the island’s remaining inhabitants live (the one time population of 200 is now down to 40).  The next day she walks into camp with her best foot forward, full of pluck, determined to make the best of her situation.  And her world immediately turns to shit.

She’s greeted by Monk, who promptly smacks her down and puts the boot to her.  Literally, he steps on her head.  It’s an extremely disturbing image, made worse by the uncomfortably real grindhouse aesthetic.  I actually winced when he awkwardly hops over her while keeping his boot in place.  This was no stunt boot, he could have seriously squashed that lady’s head.  Ah, the magic of ‘70s filmmaking.  He gives her the basic breakdown: she has no rights. She will do what she is told, when she is told.  He doesn’t bother with an “or else” option, that is simply how it will be.  She will take her place with the three other women in the camp, and she will make her contributions.

All this is decreed by Bobby, who is like a sleazy hippy version of Immortan Joe, but worse (better complexion, though).  Instead of ruling with the promise of water, Bobby uses the women as the precious resource.  If the men stay in line and maintain the camp, they are given periodic access to the women.  It is all very regimented and structured; each woman has a roster of which men she is assigned to and when.  As if that wasn’t bad enough (and it is), the women have to work just as hard as the men, doing harsh manual labor and demeaning shit like washing the clothes. 

Thank god—and director Stephanie Rothman—that we don’t have to see what they have to go through on the night shift.  TERMINAL ISLAND is a 100% exploitation movie, and it isn’t shy about nudity, but it doesn’t wallow.   Aside from one mild but uncomfortable encounter between Bunny and Bobby, who is covered only by a chess board, Rothman avoids scenes of sexual violence or coercion.  Instead, she uses very harsh scenes of oppression, like the boot on Carmen’s head, or Carmen and Lee pulling a plow, to punch home how intolerable the conditions are for these women.  The scene where Joy pauses her farm work long enough to politely ask for a sip of water only to have it spit into her face is more emotionally impactful than the standard grindhouse rape scene this type of movie would  typically roll out.

Now, not every man in camp is a horrendous asshole john.  Dr. Milford is clearly unhappy with the arrangement, and one guy offers Joy his canteen after she gets spit on (and immediately finds himself in a knife fight for it).  The decent ones are just too weak or outnumbered to be of any real help.  

Rothman packs on the misery early, because only a half hour in, the tables are turned.  The women get liberated by A.J.’s much smaller group of nomads, inmates who got sick of Bobby’s rule and took off.  A.J.’s plan was to remove Bobby’s source of power in hopes that the camp would collapse into chaos.  The real motivation, though, seems like they just didn’t want the women to have to live ike that anymore.  Things are immediately better with this group.  They are respectful and accepting, making the women feel welcome and safe.  

Well, except for Dylan, who is a convicted rapist.  Even before he goes after Joy (and is quickly thrown off by the others while they are tussling), Dylan is set up as the one big conflict within the group.  It’s a given that he is going to be the one to betray the others, try to kill one of them, or fuck things up in some way.  The strange thing is [spoiler], this never happens.  After Joy gets her revenge by publicly (and painfully) humiliating him, Dylan falls in line with the group.  He even cooperates with Joy during the hectic climax and lets her take the lead.  Sure, he probably would have reverted to his scumbag ways after all the conflict died down, but luckily he gets killed at the end so we never have to find out.  It’s a win/win, he gets to go out like a hero, and he's dead.

A.J.’s group may have gotten the women out of their dire situation, but it’s the women who lead the call to action.  A.J. is a clever guy and a good strategist, but overly cautious.  He is perfectly content to keep running from Bobby’s patrols and to wait and see what happens.  Carmen and Lee are having none of that bullshit, though.  Carmen rallies everyone to take Bobby on directly (she also knows how to make poison blowgun darts).  Lee, the scientist, starts cooking up homemade grenades to even out the camp’s numerical advantage.  Joy pitches in on the war plan and keeps up the morale.  And Bunny… is still pretty much useless, but at least she’s on board.  

Incidentally, all the women and the new group call her Rabbit, presumably because it’s less sexist.  

I’m not sure if it was by design or just how the script played out, but the movie has a strong egalitarian message.  From the beginning, it seems like Carmen is going to be the lead.  She’s the feisty, take-no-shit, Pam Grier type, and the most dynamic character.  Once she gets incorporated into the new group, things take a more ensemble focus.  She is still vital to the story, but so are Lee, and A.J., and Cornell (Ford Clay) and his fly fur-lined jacket.  Milford joins the group to provide medical assistance and deliver some dreamy Tom Selleck monologues.  Even Rabbit (née Bunny) gets to contribute.  It isn’t about one person’s struggle, it’s for everyone’s benefit.  Everyone who isn’t a misogynist shitbird, at least.

The end comes down to an all-out guerilla style assault on the camp, very reminiscent of the end of TURKEY SHOOT (minus the werewolf, unfortunately).  Things are made that much more difficult because Bobby stole a few machine guns (with unlimited ammo) when he ambushed the supply drop.  Bobby has already shown signs of cracking up, having blown away one of his lead henchmen (James Whitworth, Papa Jupiter from THE HILLS HAVE EYES) in what started out as a joke.  He loses it completely during the fight, barricading himself in a stone bunker and shooting randomly at his own people as well as the enemy.  It doesn't end well for him.  [Spoiler]

After the dust settles, the survivors hobble together a harmonious society where everyone works together rather than exploits each other.  Even Monk, now blind, has been rehabilitated into a productive member of the camp.  So screw you, callous Californians, your little social experiment was successful after all.  All it took was the death of 90% of the island’s total population.

C Chaka

Not Ladylike – Punisher: War Zone

I'm not a big believer in the concept of masculine and feminine traits, that men and women inherently behave differently.  Once you get past the physical differences, the behavioral differences are more from the thousands of years of social conditioning.  There aren’t hard and fast rules.  I’ve known some big, scary looking men who were complete softies, and quite a few women without a nurturing bone in their bodies.  It’s not that men and women aren’t different, it’s that everyone is different.  Societal expectations guide us, but we are all capable of going our own way and being successful. 

The clearest evidence of this, in my opinion, is that female directors can make completely kick ass action movies.   There are plenty of examples, one being an Oscar award winner, but today we'll go with one of the most ass kicking; Lexi Alexander, director of PUNISHER: WAR ZONE. 

The Capsule:

A witness-killing crime boss celebrates his latest court victory with a lavish dinner party for his family and mob buddies.  The party ends suddenly when walking tank Frank “The Punisher” Castle takes the boss’ head off and slaughters everyone else at the dinner table.  The boss’ slimeball nephew, Billy, escapes the scene, but Castle catches up with him later and sends him swimming in a recycled glass grinder.  He also unknowingly shoots an undercover cop posing as one of Billy’s toadies.  Guilt and flashbacks of his own murdered family lead him to protect the cop’s wife and little girl from Billy, who survived the glass bath and is now a Frankengangster called Jigsaw.  The dead cop’s ex-partner is looking to arrest Castle, but they begrudgingly team up, sort of, when Jigsaw kidnaps the wife and little girl. To get them back, Castle must fight his way through a dilapidated hotel filled with an army of street goons and Jigsaw’s even crazier brother, Looney Bin Jim (or LBJ).  Yes, there will be blood.  And exploding heads.

This is my favorite of the three completely separate Punisher movies, mostly because of the lead, Ray Stevenson.  The huge actor radiates destructive menace as well as any horror villain.  In this movie, he is like a bull in a china shop, except with people instead of china.  He doesn’t just punch a guy in the face, he punches him through his face.  That in itself would be fine, but Stevenson has a secret weapon, he is also a fantastic actor.  He has a Shakespearean depth of emotion and thoughtfulness, juxtaposed against his scary appearance.  He elevates any role he’s cast in.  Even his scummy henchman character from BOOK OF ELI is more quietly reflective than you would expect.  Stevenson plays Castle as a man hollowed out by grief, long after the fire of revenge was quenched.  Exterminating criminals seems like less of a mission for him and more of a protracted suicide.  He knows how it will end for him.  Protecting the mom and the little girl rekindles a bit of life into his shell. He once again has something worth fighting for.  Stevenson conveys this mostly through his eyes.

The movie has a few of those kind of weird moments I love.  When Castle tries to leave mea culpa money with the family of the undercover cop, the mom (Julie Benz) tells him to “step the fuck away from my daughter.”  The girl gasps and says, “Mom, that's a dad word.”  Not a bad word, but a dad word, like only her dad was allowed to say “fuck”.  They also play against type by having Newman from SEINFELD playing Microchip, Castle’s sad sack gun supplier who spends his days looking after his elderly, mentally vacant mother.   It’s like he’s paying penance for being such a dick in JURASSIC PARK.

As grim as the story is, it also has a wide streak of dark humor.  The violence is so over the top that it is clearly done tongue in cheek.  Almost every death is an overkill, to ridiculous proportions.  When Castle is faced with an acrobatic, parkour using hoodlum, he just shoots him with a heat seeking missile.  Some bad guys actually get double deaths, killed in two separate, increasingly brutal ways.  It’s impossible to take seriously. 

Despite all the blood and guts and brain chunks, the movie still has a distinct comic book feel (it is part of the Marvel Knights series, after all).  The lighting, colors, and set design are subtly stylized, just slightly off from the real world.  It has one of my favorite gags, when bizarre or dangerous situations are completely ignored by normal people.  At several points, Castle walks the streets in full battle gear and no one reacts with any interest.  “Hey, gun toting psycho, who made you king of the sidewalk?  I’m trying to get to the deli.”

Dominic West plays Jigsaw a little too cartoony for my tastes.  With his goomba accent, he was a bit much even before his accident.  Once he gets a Picasso face, he really goes overboard.  It cancels out the menace.  Doug Hutchison does better as his brother, Looney Bin Jim.  He has this jackrabbit fighting style that makes him seem more dangerous than his diminutive frame would suggest.  He and Castle’s big, bathroom demolishing fight at the end of the movie is pretty spectacular.

The action and mayhem comes to you courtesy of director and noted woman, Lexi Alexander.  I only realized the movie had a female director after watching the DVD extras. It never dawned on me during my first viewing.  Alexander is a former world karate and kickboxing champion and still practices martial arts, so she knows her way around a fight scene.  There is nothing stereotypically “female” about the movie.  Stevenson has his sensitive, even vulnerable, moments, but so did Bruce Willis in DIE HARD.  It’s the sign of a good character, not the gender of the director.  Alexander was completely capable of making a balls-out action movie, no literal balls necessary.

Alexander is perhaps more known for being a vocal supporter of diversity in the world of filmmaking (and the world in general), and writing several articles and emails criticizing Hollywood for its shocking under use of female directors.  She hasn’t followed up WAR ZONE with another big action movie like I hoped, but she has recently directed an episode of ARROW and SUPERGIRL, so she’s still in the game.  This is a good thing, because the world needs more kick ass movies, and kick ass women to direct them.  

C Chaka