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Released by: Vipco
Released on: 10/13/2003
Director: N/A
Cast: N/A
Released: 1982
The Movie:
The eighties were a decade ruled by the slasher film. The success of the Friday The 13th, Halloween, and Nightmare On Elm Street franchises spawned multitudes of imitations - some good, some bad, and some downright terrible. Sadly, The Slayer falls face first into the latter category.
The story revolves around two couples who head out of the big city to a remote island for a little rest and relaxation. Despite the warnings of the oddball pilot who gets them there, the group decides to stick around in spite of the nasty storm that is heading their way.
Cut to an unknown lown fisherman type who gets smacked outside the head with a paddle and then back to the story.
One of the ladies in the group, Kay, is a painter. She claims that she gets inspiration for her art from the disturbing and unusual dreams that she has that more often than not tend to come completely true shortly after she wakes from them. She becomes quite preterbed when she dreams of her husband being decapitated and low and behold, when she wakes up, he's missing.
One by one, the unseen killer stalks and kills off the remaining tourists until only Kay is left. Will she be able to stop him? Will she make it out alive? Will you give a flaming shit by the time the movie is over?
The Slayer commits the worst sin that a horror film can possibly commit. Sure, it's poorly acted, the direction is uninteresting, the score sounds recycled, and the effects are average at best, but this can be said about most horror films made on a lower budget. What really drags the film down is the fact that ultimately, it's dull. The movie lacks any real suspense and isn't so poorly made that it resonates with any interesting camp appeal. It's predictable, has plot holes in it the size of uranus (when you get to the end and see the killer and then get hit with the twist ending, you'll see what I mean - no more details from me here, otherwise I'd be spoiling it), and doesn't really go anywhere. Aside from one stand out kill scene involving a perky girl and a pitchfork, there's really nothing to recommend about this film at all.
Video/Audio/Extras:
The fullframe video presentation was obviously culled from a VHS source that itself was taken from a beat up print. There's print damage evident constantly, the darker scenes are almost impossible to make any sense of because they're so washed out, and the colors fluctuate all over the place and are usually either to bright or too dull. There are at least two spots during the film that you can see tape rolls and tracking lines on the picture.
The Dolby Digital Mono track is presented in it's native English and sounds slightly better than the video looks. There is background hiss present throughout most of the movie and the entire mix is flat, but at least it's comprehensible and you can understand what's going on most of the time.
Vipco has provided their usual trailers for other products on the disc, as well as some basic cast and crew biographies, and a still gallery consisting of screen captures from the film itself.
The Final Word:
The Slayer is truly bottom of the barrel material and Vipco's horrid DVD presentation doesn't make it any easier to stomach. I can't, in all honesty, recommend this film to anyone, not even hardcore eighties horror fans.