Strictly average movie

just watch it!

While it is a pity that the story wasn't told with more visual finesse, this is trivial compared to our real-world problems. It takes a good movie to put that into perspective.

It is an exhilarating, distressing, funny and profound film, with one of the more memorable film scores in years,

Troubled and neurotic artist Kay (a fine and sympathetic performance by striking redhead Sarah Kendall) suffers from frightening recurring nightmares about gruesome murders that begin to come true after she decides to spend a vacation on a barren island with her protective husband David (well played by Frederick Flynn), her jerky brother David (a nicely irritating turn by Alan McRae), and David's wife Brooke (a solid portrayal by Carol Kottenbrook).Director J.S. Cardone, who also co-wrote the compact script with Bill Ewing, relates the engrossing story at a steady pace, ably crafts a supremely spooky and unsettling atmosphere, takes time to develop the characters, maintains an appropriately gloomy tone throughout, delivers several strong moments of graphic gore, and ends things on a haunting grim note. The remote island setting projects a potently unnerving feeling of isolation and vulnerability. Karen Grossman's polished cinematography makes neat use of a smooth gliding camera. Robert Folk's lush orchestral score hits the shivery spot. A worthwhile fright film.

I have toyed with the idea of renting this obscure "Video Nasty" from my local DVD shop for years but only now – that I have watched Nucleus Films' exemplary VIDEO NASTIES: MORAL PANIC, CENSORSHIP AND VIDEOTAPE (2010) documentary and have been going through a handful of them for this ongoing "Halloween Challenge" – have I finally bit the bullet and went for it. Unfortunately, THE SLAYER turned out to be one of those titles in that much-discussed list which does not deserve its inclusion, being far too slowly-paced to compel one's full attention and, ultimately, far too tame to satisfy the gorehounds' tastebuds. Sure, there is a bizarre beheading (sort of), a beating-to-death with a paddle (to a completely peripheral character!), a human 'hooked-up' like a fish, a flare being shot into a man that subsequently catches on fire and an impalement-by-pitchfork but, for the most part, the four lead characters spend the time talking in circles (about the artistic female protagonist's current frame-of-mind) or wandering around the abandoned island they are ostensibly vacationing on looking for one another! Apart from a few welcome humorous touches present during its earlier stages, the best part of the film is decidedly the concept – originated in the classic sci-fi piece FORBIDDEN PLANET (1956) and clearly picked up and improved upon by Wes Craven for the original A NIGHTMARE ON ELM STREET (1984) and the consequent "Freddy Krueger" franchise – of a murderous being from the id, created by the lead character in her dream-state, eventually materializing in the real world to violently dispose of her unbelieving friends. However, the film-makers end up fumbling that asset as well because, not only is the talon-sporting titular character hardly seen at all, but when he does appear in close-up towards the end, his merely skeletal visage leaves one underwhelmed. To add insult to injury, the film leaves off with one of those stupid cop-out endings where it is revealed that all the events that had gone on before were only the nightmare suffered by the leading lady who, in this case, even goes all the way back to her childhood trauma of receiving a black cat as a gift…WTF?!

Before Wes Craven came up with the classic dream slasher movie Nightmare on Elm Street, there was the lesser known The Slayer directed by J.S. Cardone. I have to admit, this movie is actually a pretty good build up to Wes Craven's movie, unfortunately that's all this movie. It's simply a build up to another movie. While this movie having a more surreal and less cheesy atmosphere as Nightmare on Elm Street, it is also disadvantaged with a less competent director and of course, the inevitable low budget.The story is about an artist named Kay (Sarah Kendall) who is plagued with horrifying nightmares of being killed by a ghoulish being called The Slayer. As an attempt to relax and unwind from everyday life, she decides to go on a vacation with her husband, along with her brother and his wife to a beach house on a little remote island. Little did Kay expect, the demonic Slayer that lingered in her artwork and her dreams are more than ready to face off with her and the others one by one.I seriously didn't expect much out of this movie when I first heard of it (for some reason, there are less than three damn stars for this movie on here!) but this turned out to be a pleasant surprise. While I was expecting the average gory slasher film, this movie is actually a really scary movie and relies more on atmosphere and the characters than the blood (despite some fairly gory murder scenes). While the murders are an important role in the film, the actual scenes themselves are disturbing and even a little bit downbeat due to some of the characters being admittedly likable. While the movie alternates between reality and nightmares, you begin to wonder which is which as the film closes into a neat little downbeat ending in which we truly see an extremely scary vision of the monster that is terrorizing Kay. This ending is topped off with a creepy little circular epilogue that could've easily started an entire franchise for the movie but ended up being an open ending all on it's own.

This is one of those odd little films which isn't particularly good but does stay in the mind long afterwards.I originally saw it in the 80's and its core idea of fate and misaligned time really appealed to me. And the pitchfork murder was highly effective, although the 'hook' killing didn't quite come off. Also the entire ending was quite effective in 'looping' the movie.Watching with an older eye the idea strikes one that the killings could actually be the lead character herself, her inherent psychosis triggered by the trip (she certainly is portrayed as 'strange' throughout) and the 'Slayer' simply a manifestation of that madness.But thats if you want to analyse it, otherwise enjoy it as a straightforward Friday night horror romp.And don't go exploring noises in the cellar after ;-)