There's something deranged about enjoying watching a deranged killer stalking and slaughtering a group of people one by one. If you get your kicks from this type of movie, don't be offended by this statement, I count myself as a rabid slasher fan and I bask in the thrill of finding a good slasher flick and watching it. And finding them used to be easy. The slasher film had its heyday in the 1980s, with tons of stalk and slash killers roaming cinematic towns and woods and campgrounds, and I plowed my way through most of these 80s slashers and found something to enjoy in even the worst of them. With the more jaded and cynical 90s the slasher film died down a little from so much repetition, but with a little movie called "Scream" making hundreds of millions of dollars worldwide, the slasher flick resurged (albeit in a more self-referential tone where the movies felt the need to poke fun at the fans, the subgenre, and even themselves).

Mainstream movie fans and even most horror fans soon grew tired of this subgenre once more when all the films became copycats again, missing the point that to whatever degree "Scream" was effective, it was because of its wit and fresh perspective, which was lost the more it was rehashed. But for die hard slasher fans like me, those of us who will watch these movies even when they're terrible, it's sad to see so few slashers made these days. Truth be told, it's not THAT difficult to make a halfway decent slasher. Put a killer in the woods or some other specific area, give us some moderately intelligent characters, let the killer pick them off, throw in some gratuitous nudity and some cool gore and viola!

Into this dismal landscape came a movie everyone was talking about, a movie called "Behind the Mask: The Rise of Leslie Vernon." I read many articles and reviews for this movie, and it sounded promising. But then, most movies do when they're hyped, and in my experience movies that are hyped to the extent this movie was end up being disappointing. Which might lead you to wonder why I went to the store and blind-bought it, but then you wouldn't know me. I love horror, I love everything even remotely related to horror, and I just HAD to find out what all the hype was about, so I had to check out this movie. Cursory screening of the DVD cover will reveal what the "gimmick" is in this movie (it seems that these days, people can't release a slasher flick without it having some kind of "gimmick" to it, heaven forbid we should just make a straight up slasher film, didn't you hear those are going out of style these days?) The movie is set up as a faux documentary, with a graduate student doing an interview with a man who is currently in training to go on a slasher film killing spree. That's right, this movie treats all the famous slasher film icons (Michael Myers, Jason Voorhees, Freddy Kruger, even Chucky-the killer doll!) as though they are real killers, and the man in this movie, Leslie Vernon, is preparing to follow in their footsteps.

Thus we get to follow him as he stalks his victims and we get to learn "tricks of the trade" as he explains how psycho slashers go about their killings and how they exhibit some of their superhuman powers (surviving for so long when they should be dead). But unlike spoofs which, even when funny, take a derogatory stance and mock their source material, this movie isn't just a behind the scenes look, it actually IS a slasher movie! Hallelujah! Rejoice my fellow fans, the stalk-and-slash in this movie isn't set up to deride us for enjoying the movies we love, it jumps in feet first and loves them right along with us, showing a knowledge of the slasher prototype and a respect for the conventions and WHY they work and WHY they affect us the way they do. What the hell am I talking about? Sometimes I wonder that myself. But I have a point, I promise you that.

Typically slasher films like to have a cast of disposable characters that get killed off one by one by the killer and his knife AKA penis... much is made of the phallic nature of the knife, and I tend to agree with this assessment of the weapon while also adding that it's not only that the knife is phallic, it's that it takes a special kind of brutality to stab someone. A gun shoots people from a distance, but with a knife the killer must be up close and personal, feeling it cut through the victim's skin and tissue, must be strong enough to wield it in such a way that the penetration is deadly... definitely a deviant kind of warped sexuality there. To add to the sexual aspect, the girls in the cast typically run from the killer while partially nude which shows the ultimate vulnerability (and stupidity, but in their defense they typically don't have time to get dressed since the killers usually surprise them while they're practicing their non-virginity with a guy who gets killed as well), and after the rest of the cast disappears in a bloodbath, there is one character (almost always a girl) left behind to fight the killer and triumph. The final girl is typically a virgin so she's not distracted by her raging hormones, she's smarter than her friends so she notices that something is wrong sooner than the rest of the cast, and her girly weakness melts away as the film progresses until she is strong enough at the end to defeat the killer (often taking his phallic weapon and using it against him).

When I first made all my observations about the sexuality of the slasher subgenre I was accused of thinking too deeply in an effort to find an excuse to enjoy movies that had "little to no artistic merit." Again, there's probably some truth to the assertion that the movies don't have much artistic merit, but I'm not trying to excuse anything, I don't have to answer to anyone about why I love my subversive little movies the way I do. I do, however, like bouncing my observations around to see if anyone else sees what I see and loves what I love. Finding this movie was very validating for me...I saw it and I knew, someone else "gets it." Someone else loves the subgenre the way I do and knows how to laugh at themselves while still making a great movie in the process. Some reviews I read for "Behind the Mask: The Rise of Leslie Vernon" took it to task for being too much of a "straight up movie" instead of a "straight up spoof" and said it lost credibility in the process, but I couldn't disagree more. This movie had depth and it's a depth I appreciate because it's one I don't get to see very often in these trying times when I have to pop in a movie from the 80s that I've seen a hundred times just to get that same old thrill I always get from watching slasher flicks. Now when I want that thrill I can actually satisfy it with a movie made in this decade, and I'm so grateful for that.

Lest you think it's all in my head, I must tell you that I watched the movie with such a growing excitement that I felt the need to drag other people into the experience too, and when I forced some of my friends to watch the movie with me, it confirmed some of my suspicions: I wasn't the only one who saw these things! My friend turned to me during the movie and said "I almost feel like this is a love story between [the killer and the final girl]. It's kind of sexy." Trust me, sister, I know what you mean. If it were possible for a human being to have sex with a movie, I'd TOTALLY fuck this movie (but I'll settle for now for watching the movie). And you should watch it, too, if only to know that I might be crazy, but there are other people as crazy as I am, and they managed to make one hell of a movie out of that craziness. So what is this? A review? Hell no, it's more than a review. It's a love story. A love story and a call to action telling filmmakers it's ok to make the crazy slashers that don't get much mainstream respect but earn you endless adoration from slasher fans like me who gobble these movies up whenever we can find them. As I approach my favorite holiday, the one day of the year when I can watch my sadistic movies and be socially acceptable, I have another movie to add to my slasher roster for the day, a movie that gives me hope. It IS possible to make slasher movies, even in today's jaded and cynical culture, and to make them well.

It's a crazy premise, a crazy gimmick, and a lot of subtext, but it works. I hope other filmmakers take note... the movie works because the filmmakers love the material and know it well. If you love your movie and know what you're doing, your movie will be good, too. And there will be much rejoicing. Yay.