The Slasher Movie Book

by | Mar 29, 2012 | Reviews | 0 comments

I am a child of the eighties. The first real horror movie I ever saw (read that as not an old, campy, creature feature on Saturday afternoon TV) was Friday the 13th Part 4. From that moment on I was a devoted horrorhead. I devoured all things dark and scary, from classic ghost stories, to the cosmic terror of H.P. Lovecraft, to modern (at the time) books by Stephen King. As far as shriek cinema, my tastes ran the gambit from gory zombie films, to a multitude of monster movies, to all the satanic panic films, and fright flicks of all stripes. But slasher movies would always hold a special place in my heart. Not only for busting my horror cherry (eww) but because I truly love them so. Not all of them. To be sure, there are some truly dreadful masked maniac movies, but in most of them, even in some of the of the most insipid and uninspired of them, there can be found a kernel of charm for slasher fans such as I. But alas, they have often been treated as the redheaded stepchild of not only cinema in general, but also in regards to other horror movies. While they all but ruled the movie theaters in the early 1980s, made the companies that were embarrassed by them a ton of money, and have been some of the most profitable horror movies of all time, they never got the respect they were due.

That is, until now.

It seems at long last that the humble slasher has started getting some love. Sure, they’re only getting it from people like me who grew up loving them and are now writing books and making documentaries, but hey, I’ll take what I can get. Now days there are pretty decent docs on all the major slasher franchises, an impressive (and impressively large) book all about the Friday the 13th films (Crystal Lake Memories) and good overview of the rise and fall of the slasher flicks (Going to Pieces) and now we have The Slasher Movie Book. How does this latest offering stack up to those that came before it?

Pretty damn well, let me tell you. No really, let me tell you. Keep reading.

First released in the UK in 2010 as Teenage Wasteland (so if you already have that book, then you don’t really need this one) that tome has at last been released on this side of the pond under this new title, with some slight additions and corrections. It is a good sized book and chock-full of great pictures taken from the films, or original movie posters, which I really loved. It gets high marks for looks and presentation, but what about the written word?

Thankfully, that is also topnotch.

Author J.A. Kerswell knows his stuff when it comes to all things slasher. One of my favorite games I like to play when reading books on movies like this is to see if I can think of any film that the author missed. Well I tried that with this book and was utterly defeated. Sure, some slasher films only get a brief paragraph devoted to them, but at least they’re all covered. That’s really impressive.

The book is broken up into chapters, as books are wont to do, with the early part being devoted to proto-slashers and “almost” slashers. Such things like Italian giallos and German krimi films are covered, and their inclusion here I found appropriate and informative. Then the march of what would eventually be called “slashers” begins and runs year by year. Starting in 1978 and going through the golden years up until 1984. From there, things get more abbreviated as the slasher flick was starting to die. There are chapters on international slashers, direct to video slashers, the post Scream slasher resurgence, and more. There are a nice collection of appendixes, such as Top 10 body counts, a before they were stars listing of actors who had their beginnings in slasher flicks (you just know that they keep them off of their resume), and a glossary of terms. There are also ten feature length reviews for the most famous of the classic era slasher movie.

Perhaps my only complaint is that some movies barely get any meaningful coverage at all. Sure, all the big boys like Halloween, Friday the 13th, Nightmare on Elm Street, My Bloody Valentine, Prom Night and others have pages devoted to them. That’s only right and makes sense. But some of the more obscure but still loved flicks only have a tiny paragraph written about them. Now that in and of itself isn’t too bad. After all, there was a ton of slasher movies made and that’s a crazy amount of films to cover. I recognize that not every direct to video release can get the same kind of coverage as say Halloween. However in some cases the info presented is just sort of ‘who cares’. In more than one case the author will list the title of a movie, then briefly go into how much money it made at the box office…and that’s it. Now I don’t expect him to ruin the plot of any film, but a little bit on the story of the movie, the characters, setting, and killer, would have been a far sight better than listing the film’s box office statics. Yes that’s a minor quibble in an otherwise great book, but it’s my job to express my quibbles. So consider that job now done.

The Slasher Movie Book is a great read for fans of murderous masked maniac movies. I can highly recommend it to slashophiles big and small, young and old. It will be released on June 1st. If you ever loved Michel, Jason, Freddy, or any of their less recognizable brothers and sisters, do yourself a big favor and pick yourself a copy when it is.

About Brian Sammons