This is a suiting love story for Valentine’s Day, right?? *

Here’s a funny story – well maybe anyway. When I first started writing here at Film Miasma I wanted to revisit this thing because back when it came out – WAY back when – I absolutely loved it. I even wanted to go steady with it but, hey, it never worked out. So, however many months ago I tried to find this and couldn’t – anywhere and then hey – what happened? It popped up today in my ‘things you might like’ list on Prime so – I win! Right?

If we look back in my time capsule, THIS was the thing that gave me the “I’m going to write a movie” sense of purpose and fulfillment – I had this great idea! I even enlisted help to try and make sure things didn’t get bogged down in my extreme laziness and wrote up a big plot and timelines and started writing the screenplay and worked it into a trilogy and then — the person who signed up to help me never did other than give me some advice about lighting and to make sure I feed the cast if it ever went to production. WOMP WOMP WOOOooooooommmmppppp.

So then I signed up someone else to keep me honest and we got a little further and things seemed back on track and then ffffiiiiiiiizzzzzzzzz nope and it just kind of died out there. Twice. It was going to be a 70s / 80s sorority slasher style thing with tons of blood and boobs and it was going to be from the point of view of a possessed knife. It was going to be called – dum ta dum – KNIFE! and I worked it into a sequel called POPE! and then even a third called CHRIST! but… wah wah wah I suppose. Poor old me.

But here we are today with no scripts and no worries about feeding people and things never worked out for Raising Hell either so – I lose – but we can still talk about this thing if we want to.

It’s 1981 and it’s pledge time at a snowy landscaped college. There’s some chicks who want some new sorority members and one night they have a party! Or is it a social? *shrugs* Coincidentally – someone keeps calling their house on their rotary phones and –>> crying in to the other end. Nice! Sounds like me crying about my unwritten movies up above but with more sobbing. Anyway – the night of the big get together, someone gets laid and then gets – murdered! A hammer to the head! Smasho squisho all over the place!

Since her body just goes missing and there’s no trace of brains or blood anywhere to give suspicion, life goes on like she’s just off studying somewhere because it’s finals and everything. Then someone else gets the hammer and someone gets their head popped off with an axe and there’s some line dancing and questionable acting all around and characters just kind of disappear and never come back and the sound is pretty iffy often and nothing is ever really explained or anything but….

… I can’t come out here and say that I loved it this time around. There are some good and fun concepts in here – like the guy crying on the phone and – the line dancing – and some practical effects but it probably could have been a lot better. Did you ever move out of your mom’s and have an apartment by yourself? Maybe a 300 dollar a month job that had one bedroom, a shitter, a shower and place for your couch and your TV? Maybe you slept on that couch all of the time because you could watch your small tv and go to sleep? Maybe you had a rack full of old videotapes with things like Mercury Rising and The Adventures of Baron von Munchausen and Blade Runner and good god what else – Trust was a favorite and After Dark, My Sweet and Red Rock West and The Unforgiven and shit like that? Maybe? But that tiny thing wasn’t that great and eventually you find a nicer place for you and your cat to live with a little more room and less stompy neighbors upstairs but you have reminiscent good memories of that first place? That’s kind of how I feel here.

I wouldn’t say it’s bad whatsoever – it’s just kind of – I don’t know – like a starter apartment. It’s got a heater and enough room for a card able a word processor to do your papers but… maybe something else would be a little better.

For years and years I’ve been dogging on Millennials but maybe it’s time to leave them alone. Maybe it’s time to put the heat on Gen Z. So – hey Gen Z! If you don’t know what a rotary or even a payphone is – look elsewhere – they might blow your mind!

Otherwise – what else is there to say?

FILED UNDER: AT LEAST THEY TRIED

*So – what does this have to do with Valentine’s Day? Well. I think the killer loves these girls. He draws hearts on their pictures of them and lipstick too. I don’t think he wants to bone them since he kills them all so maybe it’s that kind of undying love that Russ T had in the Sorority House Massacre (s). “Do you know how much love it takes to kill you?” he used to say (or something like that). But, there’s no real motivation here. I don’t think he loved those smooth moves they did in that line dancing segment because, as far as could tell, none of the cast were swishing around in that bar. It seemed like it might be the crew that got together after a day’s worth of shooting and did some of those Mind Eraser shots where you put a shot glass in a girl’s cleavage, stick your face in there and then whip your head up like you just got fryer grease splashed on your face. I also don’t think it’s a love like when you go to your favorite restaurant because you just love the fajita meat nachos they have there. “Man I fucking love these things” you mention, cheese juice dripping into your beard. Or when, after about five years you find your old tee shirt you bought in Santa Barbara and it’s got a design of a chick surfing on it with a sunset behind her and you put it on and oh jesus fuck you’ve gone up from a L to something much larger and you’re all “Man I loved that shirt” and…. yeah…

So let’s go with that undying love one and HAPPY VALENTINE’S DAY if you believe in that holiday and if not – happy Monday and if you’re reading this on the toilet –> it’s time to go back to work.