Hoo boy, if I had known how many truly awful slasher films there were, I might've reconsidered doing this. This week's movie, The Summer of the Massacre, is pretty damn bad. Before it even begins, we get this message up on the screen(the comments in parentheses are my thoughts as I was reading it):
"Many films have been based on true-life crimes over as many decades as the crimes have been committed, such as Ted Bundy, Ed Gein(...AND??? You could only think of 2 examples?); two of many famous killers. (2 of many? Is this an episode about the Borg?)
All films are truly harrowing piece's(no apostrophe needed, Einstein...) of film-making, able to terrify, unnerve and provoke emotions and thoughts that stay in the mind long after the tape has rewind(Did you mean "rewound"? What, was the budget so tight that you couldn't buy a dictionary?), due to the true facts(...as opposed to facts that are untrue...) portrayed in the features. But none as yet has been so near to the true horror's(maybe there was a punctuation sale at Wal-Mart) as The Summer of The Massacre's real life killer Hammer Head.
Based on a real factual occurrences(Phew! I was worried that this was about FAKE factual occurrences!) involving a malevolent monster called Hammer Head(didn't you just tell us this "true fact"?), whose form of life was cannibalism? (...okay, 2 things: first, this is a fragment, not an entire sentence, so try completing your thought; second, "form of life"? Seriously? And why is there a question mark? There's no question! God, 28 seconds in, and I already have a headache....can bad movies cause tumors?)
This film is a true account(3rd time you've told us...insecure much?) of the savage and unabated blood lust, which befell four very young teenagers(yeah, because those pesky elderly teenagers are a worldwide epidemic...). Four, who could nor would have expected such mad & nightmarish events that day(Is anyone else picturing Snoopy on top of his doghouse, typing, "IT WAS A DARK AND STORMY NIGHT..."?), which would scare(Did you mean "scar", Hemingway?) the survivor for the rest of their living days...(2 things here, too: First, you just spoiled the ending, knucklehead; Second, wouldn't ANYONE'S remaining days be living???)
Okay, so just to recap: We're less than a minute in, and I hate myself for watching this already. There's another whole section of text, but I'm not going to bother. Okay, so now that we've made it past the 2 walls of badly-spelled text, the actual movie begins. It looks like it was filmed by bored high school students, using whatever odds and ends they could scrounge up.
Anyway, the opening scene shows a young British couple hiking in the woods. The young man, David, is arguing with the woman, whose name I haven't figured out yet, while some dude wearing a $5 rubber mask lurks in the background. David wants to have a nice, quiet weekend camping, while Jane Doe wants to check into a nice, warm motel instead. While debating whether to go back to civilization or not, neither of them sees the masked killer coming close enough to attack David.
There's a short, silly chase around the forest(in which the killer trips and the girl screams like a howler monkey), and the girl actually starts attacking the killer instead. Hilarious. I laughed, I cried, it was better than Cats. After the second or third time they trip over the same fallen tree, the killer finally catches Bridget Jones' body double and tries choking her to death. When that fails and she gets her hands on a branch to use as a weapon, the killer chases her into some tall bushes. He starts sniffing the ground(maybe it's SUPPOSED to be stupidly funny?), and she leaps at him. They scuffle some more, she screams again, and the killer finally catches her. He bashes her with his hammer several times, and the scene ends.
The very next scene shows another group of Brits packing for a journey and mumbling dialogue at each other. From what little bit I could understand, they lost the map before even starting on their trip. Great. After a long, garbled chat, a long-haired guy brings the map. They start up the van, which sounds like it's having an asthma attack, and begin going to wherever the Hell they're heading.
They stop twice. The first time, it's so the long-haired guy can get out and get sick. The second time is to plan a route or something. I swear, the dialogue is mostly gibberish, and the camera is a handheld shakycam. It's like watching an Andy Warhol movie, minus the artistry. Oh, and I think one of the guys is named Nick, but I'm still not entirely sure. ENUNCIATE!!!
Now, where were we? Oh, right....the movie's still on. Crap. Why couldn't the DVD implode like The Sororitydid? Anyway, the Austin Powers Squad find their way to a place called Blackwood, the home of Hammer Head. The van's in rough shape, so they decide that, rather than staying on the main road, they'll cut through the tiny village to find a gas station quicker.
They eventually find a gas station, but it's abandoned. When Nick gets angry and starts to deface the building, a wino staggers up to him and starts mumbling about sharks. Sharks, a killer named Hammer Head, get it? A real laugh-riot.
Anyway, Josh(the one with the short hair) elects to stay behind with The Yeti, so named by me because of a white, furry vest she wears. Josh plays a prank on her, so they decide to spend some quality time apart. I hate it when Mom and Dad fight.
So Josh leaves to pee, and Hammer Head follows him into the woods. The killer bashes him in the head several times with the hammer, then wraps his face in Saran Wrap, before wrapping the rest of the wrap around a tree to prop the corpse up. Nice.
The Abominable Wo-Man gets tired of waiting for Josh to return, so she decides to look for him. When she finds his body at the tree, for some reason, a nursery rhyme starts playing. Uh.....okaaaay. Hammer Head grabs Yeti and nails one of her hands to a tree, then leaves to haul Josh back to his lair. Yeti pries her hand loose and starts running.
Hammer Head follows the girl, and taunts her with his grunts and growls. He ties up her hands, then drags her to his house in the woods, where he strings her up in an upstairs room. Instead of killing the girl, he decides to finish off Josh first He trusses up the corpse like a turkey, then carries him back to the van.
At the vehicle, Hammer Head encounters Nick and the other girl, who take off into the woods. Together, the couple hide in the trees and try to come up with a plan. The phenomally stupid plan consists of Nick hiding behind a tree, Hammer Head attacking him, and Julie screaming. When Nick knocks the killer out temporarily, he and Julie split up and she promptly gets lost among the trees.
She does what all damsels do: she shouts to let the killer locate her, then grabs a branch to use as a weapon. Hammer Head somehow sneaks up behind her, and the chase resumes. She gets her foot caught, but escapes the killer after hitting him a few times with her makeshift weapon.
Nick, in the meantime, also finds a stick to use as a weapon. His is pointy. He waits for the killer to look for him, then sneaks up and attacks the psycho. They chase each other around, keep knocking each other out, then find themselves in a cornfield. The killer gets a corn cob in his eye, but keeps on coming. Nick stabs him in the gut with the pointy stick, then hits him in the head a few times as well.
Logically, the minute Nick turns away, the killer gets up and attacks him. Nick is bashed to death with the hammer, and the sequence finally ends. It's followed by several scenes of Hammer Head sewing up all of the wounds Nick gave him, grunting and shouting the whole time.
Yeti wakes up in the house and unties her hands. Walking through the killer's house, she finds body after body, most of them torn apart. She grabs a wooden plank to defend herself with and slooooowly tries to escape.
She doesn't get far. Hammer Head meets her at the front door, and she hits him with her board. He chases her back into the house, where he traps her in a room filled with bodies and body parts. Hilariously, she puts some distance betweemn them because he stops to redecorate the room by putting some of the dismembered parts in specific places. Very feng shui.
Yeti finds the road, then hides in the woods when she hears the killer pursuing her. She goes in the opposite direction, but decides to give away her location by tripping and screaming. Very thoughtful of her. Hammer Head tries to find her, which should be easy, given her furry outfit. She even stands out in the open.
Hammer Head gets her on the ground, but she fights back yet again. This goes on until hde tries hugging her to death. I shit you not, this actually happens. He drops the hammer to strangle her, and she attacks him with his own weapon.
She staggers away, and a note onscreen tells us that she was found 2 days later. Her injuries included some fractured ribs, internal bleeding, and a miscarriage. Yup, I guess she was pregnant as well as a bonehead. The wall of text goes on to say that the cops found the house the killer was living in, along with 19 corpses, but no sign of him. THE E--no, wait. There's another scene in the credits. A guy is calling the authorities to report that the couple from the first scene vanished with the equipment he rented to them. Hammer Head kills him right after the call. He even tears the guy's eye out. THE END, finally.
Boy, what a stinker. Everything about this one was botched...the acting, the effects, the music...you name it, it was guaranteed to be terrible. I'm giving this one a big fat ZERO trees out of 5. Heck, I'm not even going to do my usual summation of the highlights. Next week, I review the sequel to S.I.C.K., Mr. Jingles. See you then, fellow movie masochists.
