Killer Party (1986) — Triskaidekafiles

KILLER PARTY

WRITER: Barney Cohen

DIRECTOR: William Fruet

STARRING: Martin Hewitt as Blake

Ralph Seymour as Martin

Elaine Wilkes as Phoebe

Paul Bartel as Professor Zito

Sherry Willis-Burch as Vivia

Joanna Johnson as Jennifer

QUICK CUT: A sorority throws a costume party to celebrate the new pledges, and to honour the anniversary of a fallen frat brother.

THE MORGUE

Jennifer - A young woman attending college and pledging a sorority, as one does. She’s a bit twitchy, especially around an old creepy house, but is otherwise friendly, helpful, and loyal.

Vivia - Friend and fellow pledge to Jennifer, she’s the most nerdy of our lead trio, and focuses her attentions to making mischief with creative pranks, and the use of science.

Phoebe - The third of the main girls, who is the most determined to get into the sorority. She’s always willing to stand by her friends, through thick and thin.

Blake - A frat boy that Jen runs into, and ends up being the sexual tension. He likes providing a few jump scares, and as far as frat boys go, he’s pretty tame. The most normal frat boy I think we’ve encountered.

Martin - A minor character, but he lurks around the plot a lot. He’s the sort of nerd that gives nerds bad names. He’s pervy, obsessive, stalkery, and always trying to get the attention of the girls.

TRISK ANALYSIS: Welcome back, Triskelions! What is there to say? This journey began in 2009, in the middle of October, with my in depth look at Popcorn. And now here we are, 13 years to the day since that beginning. What a long, strange, demented, mind boggling trip it has been. We have seen Winterbeasts, and Psycho Killers; Alien Beasts, and Space Psychos, a whole lot of Things, along with some Slimoids, and taken our lessons in Horror 101, made it through a Birdemic, and survived several Nights of the Scarerows, and after all that, I just knew the best way to celebrate Trisk's 13th anniversary was by throwing a Killer Party. So let's get right to it.

The movie opens up on a scene in a church, the funeral for some Annabelle, with a very small service comprising of her four surviving family members and that's it.

One of them stays behind to have one final moment, and after telling the corpse off, she gets dragged into the coffin, and her screams end up being completely ignored the entire trip to the crematorium, and being tossed into the fire, and dying.

If the coffin’s a-rockin’, don’t come a-knockin’.

But oh wait, IT WAS ALL A MOVIE, and we pull out to a drive in where a couple is making out. Except the girl wants popcorn more than she wants her boyfriend’s hands all over her, so goes to find some.

The concession area is absolutely deserted, so she grabs a bucket of popcorn all on her own, and heads back to the car.

Unfortunately, her boyfriend has disappeared, only to show up a few moments later as a zombie. I don't think the popcorn will quell his hunger.

This cash register just called me an asshole!

But don't worry IT WAS ALL A MUSIC VIDEO. Seriously. This is already WAY WAY too many layers.

And like, it's not even a little thing. THEY PLAY NEARLY AN ENTIRE SONG. Until we AT LAST pull out to the real movie, after nearly ten minutes, to our actual plot.

We meet our main characters, Phoebe, Vivia and Jennifer, as they head off to college, and the usual wantings of joining a sorority, and oh gosh, is that really such a good idea?? A clue: No.

And I am just gonna cut to the chase; there is a LOT of Greek System shenanigans in the first half of this movie. Nowhere as bad as Pledge Night, but I'm gonna try and skip over the highlights and get to the meat of this.

They pass an Old Creepy House (TM), and Jennifer gets wigged out to the point she's gonna bail on the sorority...until she doesn't five seconds later.

A plan is afoot to throw a big April Fool’s party in the run down frat house, and the adult supervision of the sorority house warns them to stay away because it has a death curse, A DEATH CUUUU...wait, wrong movie. Anyways, she feeds into Jen's bad vibes.

Oh and if you’re wondering why I did this movie now, and not on, y’know, April 1st? Well besides from the great punny title I could run with, the party is a masquerade. So, close enough to a Halloween. Also, it’s my site, I can review what I want when I want. …When did I get this surly?

Mrs. Henshaw heads over to the house to make sure everything is safe, and speaks to the grave of someone, and acts like they speak back, saying "It was only an accident". Please, let someone covered in acid claw their way out of someone's stomach.

She wanders around, and does some light home repair so the place isn't a TOTAL death trap in its own right, before any killer shows up, she is being watched by someone. Or something.

We watch as a hammer is raised and...comes down on some nails. It's actually a REALLY good fake out, playing on our expectations. And then the movie delivers when whomever is watching beats her dead.

We go through more frat house shenanigans as the movie takes very long to get anywhere, notably meeting Blake of Beta Tau, who is a mischief maker, but nowhere near the level we've seen. He and Jennifer instantly hit it off, so I guess they're our romantic leads.

There's also a bit with Martin, who is the token nerdy kid, and he's smitten with...well, everyone, but after a rejection or two, he homes in on Vivia. He's very creepy, and stalkery, and I'd call him a red herring, but aside from being creepy, there’s no other signs pointing to him.

During the ceremony to induct the three girls into their sorority, Weird Things start happening, and everyone, including the full sisters, start to freak out.

Vivia stands up to the challenge and bravely heads into the basement of the creepy house. The rest soon follow, with Jennifer leading the charge to help her friend.

They find Vivia tied up under the blade of a guillotine, which comes down, and chops off her head...which is revealed to be a prank. Okay, I like her.

Veronica threatens that Vivia is in trouble for her tomfoolery, but when the girls' fates are revealed the following day, they are all accepted into the sisterhood. Of course, Vivia was only let in because they were impressed with her pranking, and they want her to rig up some shit for the party.

Following a brief bit explaining the accident 22 years ago that shut down the house, we see as our trio sneak in to start getting things set up for the party. With some additional ghost stories about the Weird Things going on.

Blake makes an appearance again with another scare, and helps the girls in their work, starting with the fuse box.

Professor Zito comes by to inspect the place before everyone shows up, but someone is already there. And he finds them when the unseen figure jabs the professor's neck with an electrical wire.

The good news is, with Zito's death and the start of the party, act three kicks off, and stuff is finally about to start happening.

So when the Beta Taus raise a toast to kick the event off, and then bottles start exploding, and shit starts falling off the walls, I am very relieved.

Jennifer hears a voice, suddenly falls to the ground, and is dragged into the basement. But surprise, it's just more of Vivia's trickeria.

For some reason, a random fight breaks out when the guys can't break into the basement, and Blake ends up stabbing one of his frat brothers. But surprise, that's a prank too!

Jennifer is increasingly freaking out, despite being responsible for at least half the pranks going on, and declares that she fears they have stirred something up in the house. I mean, we've only been here for five minutes, but something must have been stirred!

We rack up a few more deaths in rapid succession, and it all feels kinda hollow with how it's all just piling up so quickly, and in some cases, with how little we know them.

Inevitably, bodies start being found by Vivia, and you would think the prank master supreme would be more sceptical and check for pulses, but no.

So, to recap; almost an hour of college shenanigans with the occasional droplet of weird, and then the final 30 minutes, made up of 10 minutes of party, 10 minutes of wiping out EVERY SINGLE CHARACTER save for three, and that brings us to…here.

Buckle up.

Vivia and Phoebe find Jennifer, who is acting strangely, as her voice goes weird, her eyes glaze over, and she starts magically bringing down the house.

Jennifer? …Honey? Are you feeling okay??

The movie quite literally just went from 0 to 200 in half a second. Holy squawk. The possessed Jennifer chases her former friends, climbing the walls, dancing on the ceiling, and being all around menacing.

Now, while the movie suddenly going ABSOLUTE BUCK WILD is amazing, at the same time...since we have zero connection to the dead kid, whom I presume this is, without a reason why they are back if it is them, with no real rules we're following, with no explanation of Why Jennifer?...it is very hard to grow a single fuck to give in this barren soil.

We get the usual "I'm not possessed now, help me!" games, more chasing, and eventually the trio end up outside.

Largely due to the women climbing out a window, and discovering Demonnifer already there, who flings Vivia off the roof.

They get down to the ground, some slower than others, and the two able bodied women dance around each other for awhile.

Eventually, Phoebe grabs a large post, beats the possessed Jennifer around a bit, and eventually runs her through, when her friend regains enough control to beg for her death.

Phoebe goes to help Vivia and OOPS now the demon is in Phoebe, and uh, guys? You do realise there's less than four minutes, right?

The demon taunts Vivia, saying all her talk of hauntings and pranks is what raised it. But since "this is all your fault" type shaming is pretty standard demon shenanigans, it's hard to get invested in this being a real reason for what happened. Especially this late in the game. If it’s supposed to be some big revelatory moment, it could’ve been done better.

But the police show up, and this creature, this demonic entity, that has spent the last thirty minutes tearing apart a building with her mind bullets, climbing on walls, killing nearly every single character we have seen up to this point is stopped...by the gentle grip of a cop? I call bullshit.

Not even the mighty forces of Hell itself can fight against the long arm of the law.

Vivia is hurried into an ambulence...where Phoebe is also waiting, so this drive off into the sunrise is going to be anything but a happy ending.

TRISK ASSESSMENT

Video: This looks pretty good for an 80s slasher. No complaints

Audio: It’s fine, nice and average, but I definitely feel like they could’ve done more.

Sound Bite: "Where'd you get a guillotine??" "Box tops."

Body Count: I mean, once we finally get there, it definitely delivers some bodies.

1 - 4:30 but it's an honourable mention as Stephanie gets tossed into the crematorium fire in the movie within the movie.

2 - But at 22 minutes we get a REAL death when Mrs Henshaw gets killed.

3 - Professor Zito gets electrocuted.

4 - One of the girls gets tridented.

5 - April gets hammered

6 - The killer puts Harrison in the gulliotine

7 - Virgil gets macheted in the kitchen

8 - One of the guys in bee costumes gets harpooned up the backside.

9 - And the other gets killed off screen.

10 - Blake is found drowned.

11 - Jennifer gets staked

Best Corpse: Hmm. I kinda liked Harrison getting his head cut off, since it took its time, and was very well set up throughout the movie. Very Chekov’s Guillotine.

Blood Type - C+: Not bad, not great, but it’s solid enough.

Sex Appeal: Brief flashes of butts.

Drink Up! every time someone says goat.

Movie Review: Despite all my griping about the pace, and not much meat to the bones of the story, I don’t hate it THAT bad, I’m being probably a bit unfair. Being more critical, there are threads there, the movie doesn’t hold your hand though. But that doesn’t change that it could’ve been handled better or differently. The characters are actually VERY well written, and only the secondary or tertiary characters are really annoying, or bad people. The acting is solid. The plot is clear, and knows what it’s doing. The problem is that it’s heavy in the backend, because that final 20 minutes is genuinely pretty great and fun. But a slower movie is pretty typical for the 80s. It’s less egregious on the hazing stuff to Pledge Night, but isn’t quite as batshit as that movie…but it is close! A long journey, with fortunately interesting characters, that does pay off with a wild final act. Three out of five egg yolks.

Entertainment Value: This definitely could be improved upon. Again, it’s all in the back end. That opening sequence though was fun, and predates Scream by a good number of years with the number of fakeouts before the real movie begins. It’s a bit much, and feels like they’re stringing you along a bit too much once you clue in on the joke. But it is VERY 80s, and kinda ballsy to do. A music video breaking out is hilarious, and I respect the mind behind that move. If the movie didn’t have such good pay off, and didn’t have characters to carry the story until then, this would be much worse, but it’s definitely interesting enough. Three out of five clown costumes

And that may wrap up our Killer Party, but I’ve got a few tricks left up my sleeve for the rest of this 13th anniversary month, so stay tuned!