Fatal Games (1984) — Triskaidekafiles

FATAL GAMES

WRITERS: Screenplay by Rafael Bunuel, Michael Elliot, Christopher Mankiewicz

DIRECTOR: Michael Elliot

STARRING: Sally Kirkland as Diane Paine
Lynn Banashek as Annie Rivers
Sean Masterson as Phil Dandridge
Michael O'Leary as Frank Agee
Teal Roberts as Lynn Roberts
Marcelyn Ann Williams as Coach Drew
Melissa Prophet as Nancy Wilson
Angela Bennett as Sue Allen Baines
Nicholas Love as Joe Ward
Lauretta Murphy as Shelley

QUICK CUT: Competition gets tough at the tryouts for the next Olympics. Who will get cut?

THE MORGUE

Annie - Our lead, an Olympic hopeful gymnast, and she knows her worth. She knows what she’s good at, she stands up to her father about it, and has a good head on her shoulders.

Phil - Annie’s boyfriend, a track star, and his main character trait is “wants to sleep with Annie”. But he’s got a good heart, and as horny as he is, he’s there when he’s needed.

Diane - A nurse at the Falcon Academy of Athletics. She’s a former Olympic hopeful herself, and does her best to protect the kids from the ambitions of others at the school.

TRISK ANALYSIS: Welcome back, Triskelions! It's an all American summer here, and what is more American than the military industrial complex? The Olympics! So I dug out this sports themed slasher flick from the 80s to take a look at, Fatal Games. I originally wanted to do this for Trisk. But it wasn't available on disc, but was streaming, so I was gonna do it for Blood Stream...and like a week after I watched it and took some brief notes...it was announced to be coming out on disc. So here we are.

The movie opens up at the Falcon Academy of Athletics in Brookfall, MA, where regional competitions for Olympic qualifiers are going on. The movie will be almost completely set there, with a few scenes t the main characters’ homes.

We spend a bit of time watching the cast do sportsy things, and celebrating moving forward in the competitions. Around that, we get character moments, and some antics, to keep things light and character focused until the fun begins.

At least during all this they also sneak in some possible motivations and/or red herrings for the murders that I promise you are coming; there is a general competitive nature going around with the kids being pushed to win at all costs, there's the coach who never made it to the Olympics and is probably bitter about it, there's one kid in particular with anger issues, being bullied by the coach etc etc.

On top of all that, there is rampant steroid use going around, sanctioned by the doctors and coaches, under the excuse of "everyone else is doing it".

While most of the kids head off to celebrate, one of the girls stays behind to get in some extra training with the weights. This was a bad decision, as the killer shows up and javelins her to the wall. The lesson; always take some time to relax.

It's not really a sports movie until the boys in their locker room are snapping towels at each other.

Specifically, our main character Annie is told she's going on "retardation hormones" because her bustline is growing too rapidly.

There is also several instances of inappropriate touching between the students and those in positions of power and authority, like doctors and coaches. This will not be the most problematic thing about this movie. But I am getting ahead of myself.

One of the girls mentions she's sneaking away to San Francisco to be there for her boyfriend's graduation, which sets her up nicely to be killed with no one noticing. At least the movie is making an effort to acknowledge why no one is really noticing everyone dying.

I Know What You Did Last Summer Olympics.

After one of the attempted kills gets blocked when the target's boyfriend shows up unexpectedly, the killer finds the angry javeliner and gets him good. So much for that particular red herring.

People are starting to notice athletes are going missing, and while no one knows anyone is dead yet, they all seem rather calm and blase about it all.

Annie has an adverse reaction to the drugs they're pumping her with, and nurse Diane rushes her to her place to take care of the athlete. We get a little insight into the nurse, that her mother also went to the Olympics, giving her some legacy to live up to, that she failed to do.

Later, Frank suffers an injury after a bad dismount, so that dashes his Olympic dreams for this year.

We're sending him to a nice farm up state, with plenty of space to run around.

That night, the victim that the killer failed at earlier finally is alone, what with Frank being in the hospital now, so they try again.

Y'know, the killer keeps taking them out at the school, arguably when no one is supposed to be there. What would they do if the kids behaved and followed the posted hours of operation?

Finally, the next day, and an hour into the movie, someone finally goes, "they could all be dead," or something. And somehow, we have still not reached peak corpse.

Meanwhile, some painters who are working on the gym ceiling get some scaffolding set up next to a lone award on as lone table in the middle of the gym.

The head of the school, Doctor Jordine, calls his three main staff into his office, and shows them a picture with all the missing students crossed out. And only the four people in the room have access.

Frank is busily looking around for Lynn, which is no easy feat for someone on crutches. Unfortunately, this makes him easy prey to become the killer's next target. Phil and Annie also show up to help him look, albeit a bit late to the party.

I cannot believe this is Chekov’s trophy.

But with Annie now there, the killer has their next target already in sight. They get her good with the javelin, but this is somehow the one time their jab is not a one shot kill. Must be all those hormones.

Phil shows up and the killer runs off. It's a good thing Phil noticed that there was a light on in Diane's office, since Annie is in need of serious medical attention.

Of course, if Diane just so happens to be there, well, you can probably guess where this is going. But you are also not prepared.

The general reveal/unmasking of the killer I think is fairly well done. It doesn't feel like a cheat, the clues are there, and having the killer remove the hoodie and everything while the kids are clueless, is handled pretty well.

But the reveal is...well...Diane is...she was born a man. She wanted to be like mom, wanted to go to the Olympics just like her, and when it all failed because her male hormone levels were too high, she turned to medicine. And oh yeah, she also has an obsession of making sure no one goes to the Olympics because she couldn't.

And even with all that, somehow ahead of its time, and yet also handled in the most awkward way possible, I almost could have forgiven it. It rides that line of transgressive progressiveness, although "male athlete becomes female" is a bit too hot button topic THESE days, and is exactly what conservatives fear.

But then...

Oh.

Oh NO.

😬

Now when Diane speaks her voice is processed to sound much lower, and it both sounds terrible and is WILDLY inappropriate. She's sounded fine the whole movie, but the instant we learn she was a born a man, and is eeeevil, her voice becomes lower?

There isn't even any good reason for Annie to suddenly freak out aside from "Oh that's weird and icky!". "She was a man so is abnormal and must be the killer!" is just...ugh.

Yikes.

They try and give her a split personality, and that just digs the yikes hole even deeper.

Annie runs up the scaffolding in the gym, and Diane ends up falling off it, right onto that conspicuous award. It would've been great if it wasn't so awkwardly set up. And, well, all that other stuff. And the movie just abruptly slams into the end.

TRISK ASSESSMENT

Video: It looks pretty good, as you come to expect from Vinegar Syndrome.

Audio: Sounds just as good.

Body Count: Not too much here, and most are with javelins.

1 - About 17 minutes in and Nancy gets javelined to death
2 - The javelin finds Sue Ellen next.
3 - The killer gets Joe Herring next
4 - And then Lynn gets javelined in the pool
5 - Frank it the next to get stuck.
6 - Diane dies

Best Corpse: That first kill is a very striking shot where Nancy is flung back against the wall, and it’s a well executed, memorable death.

Peak Corpse: Not until the movie is almost over, and Frank finds everyone stuffed into lockers.

Blood Type - C+: Not a whole lotta blood, but they get in a little bit here and there.

Sex Appeal: Lots of men and women in the showers, and a few teased sex scenes

Drink Up! Every time there is appropriate touching with the athletes.

Movie Review: I quite like this movie…right up until the precise moment that I do not. You can probably suss out where that particular turn is. The cast is fairly likeable, all the characters are good, none of them are your typical jocks or meatheads, the closest we get is angry Joe, and I appreciate all that. While the kills get a bit same-y, it makes sense in context of the story, and Diane’s sport being the javelin. But for most of the movie, while it might not be the most original, shocking, bloody slasher out there, it’s actually solid enough, with enough going on that it’s fine. But then that twist, and how poorly it all was handled. Again, yikes. When I first watched it, I knew the movie had it’s reputation as being offensive, and as the final 10 minutes are coming up, I’m like huh, that was actually okay, kinda charming,m I wonder what was so…OH. Yeah. Which is a shame. Without that twist, the movie could’ve been completely forgotten, or maybe had a small loyal following, since it would’ve been a very okay slasher. But with it, the whole thing gets overshadowed, and remembered more in its infamy. Two out of five javelins.

Entertainment Value: Most of this comes from the antics and competitive nature of the kids. The dialogue has some fun to it, and the banter between characters. The deaths are okay, but one note, and while they’re dead, there’s also something unintentionally silly about someone with a long-ass javelin sticking out of them and wobbling. Not so bad it’s entertaining, and nothing so entertaining that it’s great or memorable, but again, a very okay movie. Two out of five hormone injections.