There aren’t many movies that come along every so often like “Popcorn,” but it’s safe to say long before “Scream” stomped in to theaters to pay tribute to the classic horror tropes, movies like Mark Herrier’s “Popcorn” came and showed audiences how to do it first and better. Which is not to say “Popcorn” is as landmark as “Scream” was. In fact it’s about as unremarkable as any old shelf filler from the eighties. But for a film that came along during the death of the slasher genre in the early nineties, it’s a safe bet that “Popcorn” will whet the appetites of anyone looking for an eighties romp in the cinema with some classic devices of the slasher and mystery genre.
Truth be told, the film is about a bunch of film students trying to raise money for their class by staging an old fashioned midnight movie marathon at their old theater, eighties cleaning montage and all. Within the context of the movie, the horror movies the students present for their audience are completely fabricated for the film, but sadly much more interesting than the entirety of “Popcorn.” I often found myself wanting to see their fake schlock movies instead of this slasher that oddly feels shoe-horned in to the plot.
It almost feels as if the film was originally a comedy drama about film students staging a midnight movie marathon, and someone tacked on a plot about a “Phantom of the Opera” type of slasher systemically knocking off the film students within the confines of the theater. Taking cues from William Castle, “Popcorn” is a gallery of old fashioned movie tactics that ironically never actually bring the movie to life.It strives in being a meta horror movie that takes horror movie fans being killed by a horror movie fan who is your typical horror movie slasher of the eighties murdering them as they entertain horror movie fans alike.
“Popcorn” primarily sets up the big reveal and the twist on our heroine whose dad may or may not have been a psychotic filmmaker who killed himself in the theater, and she’s plagued with nightmares that are peppered throughout the story. For the most part, “Popcorn” pleases as a horror thriller with a sly tongue in cheek tone and demented climax. It’s just sad that it’s not an iconic or even memorable slasher title in the sub-genre. Not the most memorable precursor to “Scream,” director Mark Herrier’s is an entertaining if underwhelming meta horror slasher that never quite rises above average, but is at least worthy of a viewing for slasher buffs.