555 (1988) — Triskaidekafiles

555

WRITER: Roy M. Koz

DIRECTOR: Wally Koz

STARRING: Mara-Lynn Bastian as Susan Rather

Charles Fuller as Colonel Wayne

Greg Kerouac as Sgt. Conner

Greg Neilson as Ralph Kennedy

B.K. Smith as Detective Haller

Bob Grabill as The Killer

QUICK CUT: A young man celebrates an important date in his life, by visiting some of his favourite spots and painting the town red.

THE MORGUE

Sgt. Conner - A determined detective who doesn’t play by the book, and once he has a suspect, he can be like a dog with a bone.

Detective Haller - Conner’s partner, and a bit more laid back, a bit more plays by the rules, but he’s still more fast and loose than he should be.

Susan Rather - A news reporter who does not get along well with the cops, but knows a story when she sees it, and is just as tenacious as Conner.

Ralph Kennedy - A district attorney who somehow manages to keep the two cops in line, and is also dating Susan.

Colonel Wayne - A prime suspect in the case. He’s a veteran, seen some shit, and is willing to do whatever he can to help. But he doesn’t take kindly to being a suspect.

Do I need to see 1 through 554 before watching this one?

TRISK ANALYSIS: Welcome back, Triskelions! This week we are delving back into the world of SoV horror with 555. Two quick notes of comments on the DVD cover. First, the movie warns that "viewing could cause serious damage to your brain cells". And secondly, it explains the title refers to every five years, over the course of five days, a killer strikes. But it teases, what does the third five mean?? The answer will not shock you, but we'll get there later.

The movie opens on a beach, and a couple making out on the sand, and I would not be surprised if this was the same beach from Maniac.

Fortunately, we don't have to wait long before the guy gets his head cut off so harshly, that he bleeds credits all over his girlfriend.

We fade to a police station, where the lone witness, a veteran named Colonel Wayne, relates what he heard and saw to the cops.

He can't give them much since it was the middle of the night, and he wasn't there when it happened, but slowly ambled towards the screams. However, he did see someone, and describe the one other living person he saw there...

A hippie. Damn those filthy hippies.

What is the nature of your medical emergency?

The cops don't really believe Wayne's story though, due to a bunch of odd details in his story. They think he's just an old man seeking attention.

A reporter shows up, demanding they let her interview the man who just left, but they want nothing to do with her. Oh, and her name is Rather. Because of course it is. I'm sure Brokaw and Kronkite will be along any second.

DA Ralph Kennedy, who is also dating Rather, leads her off before there's any more yelling, and the cops decide to keep an eye on Wayne.

She looks like my high school drama teacher

We move along to another couple having sex in a van somewhere. The guy experiences the little death, and it's not long before our hippie slasher shows up to give him a taste of the big death, and then take care of the girl as well.

The cops show up the next day, and we learn Sgt. Conner was the one who found them. Susan isn't far behind, but the cops are still not forthcoming. Everyone scatters to wait for the coroner's report.

Conner and Haller visit Wayne to ask him some questions, while one of them snoops around the place for any evidence. The only thing of note he finds what could be Chekov's sword connection.

Oh that’s almost got it, but just a little lower…

Once they piss him off and get thrown out, Susan shows up to do her own questioning, and she has much better luck. Largely due to her feminine wiles, and Wayne being a horny, lonely man.

Things escalate as the two make out, with Rather undressing just a bit, and I have to give the actress props and delivering her lines like she ISN'T being groped.

Everyone just kinda goes about their day, waiting to see if the killer strikes again. Conner gets a call from the police chief, telling him he contacted the FBI, to see if this case matches any others.

While all the cops are busy doing stakeouts at Wayne's to make sure he doesn't go do any killings, we find another couple in a run down building, and they become the next victims.

The girl is worried, but hey, the killer is only doing murder down by the lakefront! We should be perfectly fine, babe! He just had to go and jinx it.

While the woman heads to find a bathroom, the hippie hacker arrives, and slices Tommy's head clean off. And I'll give the movie this, it is one of the better fake heads I've seen.

The girlfriend shows back up, gets tied to the bed, and meets a most unpleasant end at the killer's blade.

Tommy had a baby and it’s head popped off!

Oh, we also find out the kids were killed in an old casket factory, so at least they're all ready to go and be buried.

So we reach the wash/rinse/repeat portion of the plot, with the cops investigating, grumbling about Susan, something with Wayne still being a suspect, and then more murder.

This is when the cops find out that there have been a series of five murders, for five nights, ever five years. I'm really not sure what the mysterious "third five" is. Is it the five murders? That's kind of a given, right? Is it five COUPLES? That's definitely noteworthy, but hardly a GASP SHOCK BIG REVEAL.

It turns out these killings go back twenty years, beginning in Springfield, Massachusetts. WOO!!! Springfield, woooo! ...Wait, is that not the right response?

No crime fighting yet mom, just let me have five more minutes…

Conner wants to bring in Wayne, but when they go to do so, he's disappeared. So it's back to staking out and waiting since they know nothing.

The detectives get a call from Chief Luca, from his office on the second floor, and he tells them some info on the first attacks in Springfield. A woman was killed, the boyfriend survived, and then five more slayings, and the boyfriend, Joseph Dwyer, was cleared.

But it's time for more killing to keep the plot going, as the Manson wannabe goes all helter skelter on yet another couple.

Whomever can pull this knife from the throat, shall be crowned the true king of England.

While the cops check out the latest crime scene, Conner is off looking for Wayne. He drags the vet to the bedroom of the latest victims, shoving his face in the corpses like he's a dog who just shat on the floor.

Two of the younger cops there are more than willing to kill the suspect on site, telling Conner to let him go, and they can say he was escaping. Wow, great, all cops are bastards even in 1990.

While they interrogate Wayne back at the station, he says he was in hiding, because they knew he lived in Baltimore and...okay, yes, that's a good reason, but how did HE know that they knew that??

My partner Teller usually screams a lot less.

Kennedy shows up and lets Wayne go back to a cell, since the detectives are bending the rules oh so very much. And now it's just a waiting game to see if anyone else dies.

Rather sneaks in while things are going on, and goes through the Springfield file. She figures some things out, and confronts Conner and Haller once they return, with what she knows.

She says she recognised the boyfriend's name, Joseph Dwyer, but we know him better as...RALPH KENNEDY. ...And lemme tell ya, he was in the movie SO little the first time I watched it, I blurted out at this point, "WHO THE FUCK IS THAT?!"

For real, the DA is the killer, and he's barely been IN the movie, to even make him a suspect. It seems his full name is Joseph Ralph Dwyer, his mom remarried, and he liked his stepdad so much, he took his name. So it's still his name, and it's just different enough to not be immediately connected, unless you know where to look or who to ask. Sure, okay.

They figure he must be ready to strike at the beach, Susan thinks she knows where, but Kennedy has a scanner, and is not so easily fooled. They piece this together, and decide if he has to pick someplace new, it would be someplace familiar, so they head to the coffin factory. It’s understandable, but still feels like a big leap that works out.

Unfortunately, Hippie McSlaysalot has already committed his final two murders, and is in the process of raping the woman's corpse. But his coitus gets interuptus when he hears sirens, and runs off.

Conner shows up following him, and he hears gunshots. He calls out to his partner and Susan, and they find Haller on Kennedy's ass, shooting him dead. Huh, that feels anticlimactic.

TRISK ASSESSMENT

Video: It looks all right, but very clearly cheaply made. It’s about as good as this would get. Most flaws come from it just being filmed darkly.

Audio: Not great, but gets the job done. At least everyone’s voice is clear.

Sound Bite: “I asked you into my home, and now I ask you OUT of my home!"

Body Count: It’s definitely not lacking in bodies, even if many of them do get shrouded in a lot of shadow.

1 - Dude gets hacked up all over his girl not two minutes in

2 - The girl is killed off screen

3 - Another guy gets it in he neck

4 - And his girlfriend is not far behind

5 - Tommy gets his head lopped off.

6 - And his girlfriend gets sliced open

7 - Another guy gets knifed in the neck.

8 - And his girlfriend meets the same fate as the rest.

9 - Another guy killed off screen

10 - And his girlfriend gets her neck slit.

11 - The killer gets shot to death.

Best Corpse: Dude gets beheaded, c'mon. Easy choice. Also, that head? That looks AMAZING. I’ve seen worse heads in bigger budget flicks.

Blood Type - B: It’s definitely trying, and I’m giving a lot of points for effort. But a lot of the blood does get lost in the shadows, or done off screen. Still, what we see is great, and again, fantastic beheading.

Sex Appeal: Pretty much every female victim is topless, plus Susan.

Drink Up! Every time someone says hippie.

Movie Review: This movie won’t change your life, it’s not a great slasher, the plot is a bit murky and could use another pass for clarity, or just to do things a bit better but…it something about it…works? Yeah, the production values look like high school theatre sets, the plot is pretty basic, but somehow it transcends all it’s flaws. The actors are genuinely trying, and are at least putting effort in, and seem to be having fun. This might genuinely be something better than the sum of its parts. Three out of five bell bottoms.

Entertainment Value: Conner is great at chewing scenery. The kills, when we see them, are decently bloody at the worst, and at least it never quite becomes boring. Some other performances are definite stand outs and amusing. If, like me, you forget Ralph Kennedy is a character by the time he gets named, a big shout of “WHO??” is almost worth the price of admission. A fairly average movie with enough standout moments to get a three out of five fives.