Word: slasher
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...Dead Ringers, he never matched the shocks of his early, amateurish offerings such as Rabid and They Came from Within. The Texas Chain Saw Massacre, directed by Tobe Hooper in 1974, was almost comical in its killer-on-the-loose hysteria, but it set a new standard for slasher films to come. The masterpiece of the genre remains John Carpenter's Halloween (1978). Despite some Hollywood credentials (including a couple of name stars), it was shot for a mere $325,000 and had the deep-focus single-mindedness of a true horror exploiter. Imitators came thick and fast after that...
...tent can drive people nuts. This isn't last summer's type of teen-scream movie. The new films, a dozen due for release this year, are essays in mature terror, for and about grownups, with big or serious stars and a few A-list directors. For the moment, slasher films are deader than a naked cheerleader. Horror is going both artsy, in the Method madness of The Blair Witch Project, and adult, in the domestic suspense of Stir of Echoes. Renouncing sicko-kid melodramas for a mix of ghost stories and satanic parables, Hollywood is pursuing subtler demons, deeper...
...Rage: Carrie 2 is a decidedly unnecessary movie that surely was made only to cash in on the revived popularity of teen slasher flicks in the post Scream age. But even the teen audience may not fall for this uninspired and unoriginal clunker of a film...
Assembling the right group is a delicate business; as with any ritualized art form, from Kabuki to slasher films, one must follow rules but with a whiff of originality. Pearlman and his staff look at everything--the proportionate size of group members, their height, their weight, their hair color, their personalities onstage and off. Who will be the prankster, like 'N Sync's Chris Patrick? Who will be the lead sex symbol, like Backstreet's Nick Carter? Who can make a credible dangerous guy, the one who dresses more "urban" and maybe even has tattoos...
...this is a nearly shot-by-shot recapitulation of the film and an almost verbatim rereading of Joseph Stefano's terrific screenplay. Why do it? One reason: it's never been done. Another: Psycho, which spawned a festering genre of slasher films, has been ripped off a zillion times--surely it can be remade just this once. And finally: let's set a test for today's actors, encrusted with decades of Method mannerisms. Can they assimilate the smooth delivery of the 1960 cast...