Slumber Party Massacre (1982): Piece 2 of 3

 

I had forgotten about the scene where Russ Thorne tells Trish (Michelle Michaels) he loves her and that she was lovely. The film is obvious in how Thorne and his drill are essentially an impotent psychopath and the weapon he uses as he member. This has been a source of essay after essay, even as so many labeled this pure slasher trash. For some slasher fans, The Slumber Party Massacre is essential for any newcomer moving through the 80s, a top-of-the-list film to checkmark eventually. I'm really actually glad the decision was made to reshoot the ending and let Robin Stille's Valerie mutilate Thorne, giving him as much as he gave to his victims. He doesn't get a slap on the wrist in this film...he gets that fucking wrist lopped off. The drill bit "castration" might be an aggravation to some who watch this slasher film, but I LOVED it...that piece of shit was never the same once the drill was rendered "neutered". He was neutered as his drill bit was. Yes, this has been the subject of plenty of discussion, and I congratulate Jones and Rita Mae Brown on successfully getting that across. I also appreciated that when Valerie actually comes at him with a weapon that was effective, Thorne was the one running away. And Valerie chasing after him wasn't lost on me. I love that he had to retreat. The high school sports coach for the teenage girls, Coach Jana (Pamela Roylance), did what she could with a much less effective weapon, only available at the time: the fireplace poker. But it could only temporarily incapacitate Thorne, as did a wooden bat upstairs when Trish used it on him. Critical errors in the slasher genre often emerges here: when the killer is immobilized with a weapon, instead of making sure he is unable to get back up to do further harm, the ones who dropped him fail to do so, allowing him to cause more damage. It took Valerie's machete to truly put Thorne down for good. Still, even with Valerie lopping off Thorne's hand and slicing open his stomach, that bastard, who fell into the pool and bled into the water, still manages to emerge again to cause mayhem. But with one less hand, Thorne couldn't get the best of Valerie...she was a fighter.