Happy Death Day (2017)
[5] Happy Death Day is Groundhog Day meets Scream, but not as interesting as either of those films. Jessica Rothe stars as a sorority girl who relives her birthday over and over again, each time ending in her death at…
The Forest (1982)
[3] A cannibal stalks campers while the ghosts of his two children haunt the forest in this goofy wannabe slasher flick that, despite having nature at the ready, lacks any atmosphere whatsoever. There's a nice scene where a bad actor…
A Nightmare on Elm Street (2010)
[3] I dislike remakes in general, but Michael Bay can kiss a special place on my ass for remaking and homogenizing every horror classic from my childhood. His Platinum Dunes company is a shit factory, and A Nightmare on Elm…
Scream 4 (2011)
[6] You really aren't supposed to return to a well too many times. But in the case of the Scream franchise, I was still thirsty. So I drank... and the water's still good! Of course the novelty has worn off,…
Maniac (1980)
[7] More of a verite, psychological approach to the slasher genre than most of the '80s slasher windfall, William Lustig's Maniac rises above its exploitation roots by putting us inside the killer's mind and keeping us there, even as his sanity…
The Prowler (1981)
[6] When a WWII vet returns home to find his true love in the arms of another man, the town scores a legendary double-murder. Thirty-five years later, the town decides to throw the same dance... and the killer decides to…
The Burning (1981)
[7] This stand-alone slasher flick from Bob and Harvey Weinstein (the first Miramax film production) rivals the best of the Friday the 13th fare. The requisite nubile flesh and gory kill scenes are here, but the teen protagonists are more…
Friday the 13th: The Franchise (1980-2009)
#12: Friday the 13th Part VIII: Jason Takes Manhattan (1989)Â [2] This is the worst of the Fridays. The subtitle is a misleading marketing gimmick, as Jason only arrives in Manhattan for the last twenty minutes. Those twenty minutes are…
The Collector (2009)
[3] A man decides to rob the home of a client, unaware that a psycho-killer has already laid claim to the family and has booby-trapped their entire house. If you'd never ever seen a home invasion or torture porn flick,…
Halloween II (2009)
[2]
When Rob Zombie re-booted Halloween in 2007, trading Michael Myers’ boogeyman mystique for a more pointed psychological explanation for his behavior, I didn’t hate it. While I much prefer not to see the man behind the mask or to understand his motivations, I thought Zombie’s remake was a somewhat interesting experiment. But his version of Halloween II is a whole different and far worse endeavor.