Now that the busy season of the hubby’s business is over and October has wrapped up, I can get back to my reviews. And I’m excited to jump back in with a film from the most tubular of decades - the 80s!
The Mutilator (original title Fall Break) begins with the most unfortunate of events. Little Ed Jr. decides that the best birthday present he can give his father is to clean all his dad’s guns. We’ve all been there. Checking down the sight of a rifle and pulling the trigger to make sure everything’s clean and accidentally killing our moms, amirite?
Needless to say, Ed Sr.’s cheese slides a little off his cracker when he comes home to find his wife dead and his spawn responsible.
Years later, Ed is in college and the relationship with his father is basically nonexistent. Until now. He wants Ed to close up the beach condo for the winter. And how convenient because Ed and his friends are on fall break (ahhh…now the original title makes more sense!) and have nothing to do. So why not help close up the place while enjoying time at the beach?
Because Ed’s dad is a fucking nut job and wants them all dead!! Particularly Junior, of whom he dreams about killing all the time.
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| But it's just so haaaard and I'm hungry and I didn't sleep well and I'm cold and... |
You all know how much I love 80s camp and so-bad-they’re-good movies. But I’m sad to report this one was just…meh. I expected the acting to be lackluster. It was slightly worse than that but nothing I couldn’t tolerate. I knew the writing/dialogue would be bad. They didn't disappoint there (or perhaps they did...). But the worst was the pacing. So much exposition and extended shots that just felt like filler. It took forever for the first kill and even THAT was boring as fuck.
And did I mention the absolute PLETHORA of foreshadowing? Christ, they tell us everything that’s gonna happen looooong before it does. Seriously, they could have cut out 45 minutes of this film and it still would have been tedious.
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| And if I just apply a little pressure...*CRACK* |
However, the kills were pretty fucking cool. Very imaginative and gory, my favorite being the giant gaff to the cooch of one of our hapless college beauties.
Unfortunately, the practical f/x kills don’t make up for the rest of the lameness of this film. It’s nice background noise while you’re doing something else (crochet, painting landscapes, organizing your toenail clippings) but you don’t really need to waste too much energy on paying attention.
1.5 Hatchets (out of 5)
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