I saw SLASHER in Germany last year and, while competently filmed, it has major problems that will unfortunately pull you out of the film before you have a chance to have fun with it.
First, the positive: The cast is uniformly good, and all of them are amazingly attractive. There is ample nudity from foxy women, and there is no shortage of bloodshed. The locations are beautiful and nothing seems forced. A cameo from Timo Rose regular Thomas Kercmar is also great fun.
But, as the blood begins to flow, the problems arise: First, the blood is a wee bit too pink-ish, and there are too many deaths that don't take full advantage of the gore. An experienced German FX pro like Olaf Ittenbach could have made mediocre effects into something special - and that's what we want from a movie called "Slasher".
The final chase scene is staged very poorly, with day turning to night, and vice versa, within seconds. One can argue that the heroine was running for days, but it doesn't come across like that and just elicits laughs.
On top of that, the film tacks on a twist ending that makes absolutely NO sense. It doesn't leave you wanting to re-watch the movie and feels extremely awkward. It turns a fun slasher movie into a convoluted mess, leaving myself and everyone else in the crowd rubbing our heads in utter disbelief.
But if you can get past the let-down of a final act, the film is shot quite beautifully and tries to be true to its 80s roots. Had the film just continued on as a straightforward slasher film without any twists, it would have been fantastic. When will filmmakers realize that we don't always need a twist - and sometimes its okay to just have the emotionless killer be an emotionless killer? For German horror fans, I think this film is actually a step in the right direction. It brings much higher production value to the horror scene than films by Andreas Schnaas, Timo Rose, or Heiko Bender, but could take a cue from their straightforward gore (a tried and true method of success). For American fans, you might be put off by how "Hollywood" this seems, but its still worth a viewing - just to see what the German horror filmmakers are up to these days.
6 out of 10. Let's see what the makers of this film come up with next.
First, the positive: The cast is uniformly good, and all of them are amazingly attractive. There is ample nudity from foxy women, and there is no shortage of bloodshed. The locations are beautiful and nothing seems forced. A cameo from Timo Rose regular Thomas Kercmar is also great fun.
But, as the blood begins to flow, the problems arise: First, the blood is a wee bit too pink-ish, and there are too many deaths that don't take full advantage of the gore. An experienced German FX pro like Olaf Ittenbach could have made mediocre effects into something special - and that's what we want from a movie called "Slasher".
The final chase scene is staged very poorly, with day turning to night, and vice versa, within seconds. One can argue that the heroine was running for days, but it doesn't come across like that and just elicits laughs.
On top of that, the film tacks on a twist ending that makes absolutely NO sense. It doesn't leave you wanting to re-watch the movie and feels extremely awkward. It turns a fun slasher movie into a convoluted mess, leaving myself and everyone else in the crowd rubbing our heads in utter disbelief.
But if you can get past the let-down of a final act, the film is shot quite beautifully and tries to be true to its 80s roots. Had the film just continued on as a straightforward slasher film without any twists, it would have been fantastic. When will filmmakers realize that we don't always need a twist - and sometimes its okay to just have the emotionless killer be an emotionless killer? For German horror fans, I think this film is actually a step in the right direction. It brings much higher production value to the horror scene than films by Andreas Schnaas, Timo Rose, or Heiko Bender, but could take a cue from their straightforward gore (a tried and true method of success). For American fans, you might be put off by how "Hollywood" this seems, but its still worth a viewing - just to see what the German horror filmmakers are up to these days.
6 out of 10. Let's see what the makers of this film come up with next.