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After several attempts to resurrect the flailing horror genre, both from Hollywood ("The Haunting," and "The Sixth Sense") and from the underground ("The Blair Witch Project") it seems like everyone has their pwn take on the future of horror films in America. This past week I had the occasion to see an extremely rough cut of a horror movie shot in New York called "The Slasher." The screening was for a limited group, and the director - a fellow by the name of Jim Haggerty who hosts a local New York rock music show, who also wrote, produced, and co-starred in the film - seemed a little wary and reluctant at anyone seeing the movie so much in its infancy. Some of the edits were extremely rough, some of the sound was poorly mixed, and there was no background score. So this short, shoddy print of a yet-to-be finished movie was shown to myself and a small handful of v.i.p.'s in this little screening room. The verdict? I have seen the future of American horror films.
Considering that no less than three persons at the screening had to walk out bug-eyed with terror mid-way through the movie was a true testament to the film's sheer power as a scare machine. Another indicator would be the grand moment where one of the women in attendance let out a blood-curdling shriek in the midst of one of the movie's most shocking scenes. And yet another would be my own reaction, being something of a horror movie buff whose filled his sub-concious with the most frightening and disturbing images from hours and hours of horror movies for the past thirty-two years. I found myself sweating profusely through the intense air-conditioning by the movie's end, I felt my jaw drop down many times, I cringed, I clenched my fists with anger, I smiled with uncomfortable bemusement at a humorous sparring between two characters about "Gilligan's Island" immediately after a blood-drenched murder scene, and I felt myself applauding wildly at the outlandishly barbaric ending. This movie worked me over like Mike Tyson, George Foreman, and Rocky Balboa all at once. And I'm still punch-drunk from the exhilliration.
Clearly, Haggerty - a pleasant enough fellow with a good sense of humor who seemed visibly relieved at how well we'd all taken to his movie - established himself as a director who knows no boundaries. This is the movie that we all always feared but were never delivered. It goes places visually and in its story-line that horror movies have always shyed away from. Haggerty knows nothing of moderation and everything about excess. Everything in this movie is wonderfully excessive - the characters are big, larger than life and storm through scenes; Haggerty's use of color is dazzlingly over the top - from a radiant green forest to red blood splattering in front of antiseptic white walls; and the violence is unrelenting and shocking.
After bowing down to the mighty "Blair Witch Project" this Summer, and its 'leave it up to your imagination' style of scamming its audience, Haggerty brings real horror back to the screen. After an over-splattered 80's where gore lost its impact through endless Freddy/Jason sequels where the body counts were likened almost to sporting events, horror films of the 90s have disintegrated into the whole 'good taste' "Scream"/"I Know What You Did Last Summer" genre of less-is-more, epitomized by the nerve-racking but empty "Blair Witch Project" which didn't just show less, it showed nothing.
How refreshing it is to suddenly be thrust into this engrossing blood-feast where all of our nightmares come true. What the directors of "Blair Witch Project" would have us 'imagine,' Haggerty has fully realized in bright, glaring colors. When we expect Haggerty to be merciful and cut, he keeps his luridly swerving camera zig-zaging right at what we don't want to see, but can't pull our faces from. And he doesn't stop, he keeps pouring on the blood, pulling in the screams, piling on the horror.
The only time Haggerty pulls away is when he knows he doesn't need the visuals. He knows when he needs a scene punctuated with splatter and he knows when his script alone has you. That's what all those 80's "Halloween" rip-offs needed - a director who knew how to use gore and when not to.
Haggerty shows a mastering for shock that's uncanny, considering its his first project. His movie leaves you cold because you just see so much more than you expected and yet you didn't expect it in the first place! Not one thing I predicted came to be in this movie, right up to the bulldozer ending which will inevitably come to be one of the most talked-about and referred-to horror film endings ever (whether or not Haggerty does decide to trim some of the more grusome elements left in the work-print). At every turn the plot and characters do exactly what you don't expect, every character that should be safe by the terms of film convention isn't, every thing that should happen never does, and the things that shouldn't do. That's what horror is - what we're most afraid of at the time when we least expect it.
The finished movie is slated to premiere in only New York on Halloween week in a small group of theatres before any nationwide showcasing. And the world awaits!
-Tom Lanis is a contributing writer for several small New Haven weekly publications. Thanks to Tom Lanis for submitting the piece for our purposes here.
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