Misses its Target

Rating: 3/10 (23 October 2000)

Typical early-eighties gorefest (a la Rita Mae Brown's "Slumber Party Massacre") that aims to be a sly satire of the genre but never begins to transcend it. Sam Raimi's first feature has none of the humor and storytelling skills that would come to be a hallmark of his later work (most notably the romantically swoony homage to the Universal horror films of the thirties, "Darkman"). It plods along with far too many cliches until the second half when, during the vividly gruesome action sequences, Raimi's inventive imagination comes alive through Tom Philo's camera and Edna Ruth Paul's deft editing. (Joel Coen is Paul's assistant.) Then it gets kinda fun.