When I was starting to really get into films, I did not know initially what constituted as a “cult classic” film. As a kid, I always assumed that if I liked a film, it was universally liked by everyone else. I mean, come on: when are people ever wrong? That naive mindset didn’t really show its cracks until I got into a specific genre: horror. Horror films are drowning in cult classics, ranging from the notoriously gory Dead Alive from The Lord of the Rings director Peter Jackson (no really) to weird niche Italian films that are loved by horror fans alike yet not a single person on the street would know off the top of their head. Since what scares a person is subjective, a cult classic for one can be considered overrated to another. That’s why I love Sam Raimi’s Evil Dead 2 yet know that it’s a possibility that it won’t resonate with some friends or with…most of my family.
That being said, horror cult classics seem to be shifting towards a particular subgenre that used to dominate in the late 70’s to the early 90’s: slasher films. Most mainstream horror films have been eating up ghost and haunted house stories, leaving slashers to rely on their dedicated fan bases to keep their gory kills and unnecessary nudity somewhat relevant. This leads to the modern cult classic in the slasher genre: Adam Green’s Hatchet series. In 2006, Green gave slasher fans a homage to Friday the 13th and A Nightmare on Elm Street films of yesterday, bringing back classic horror faces in order to give fans some nostalgia and gore without taking itself too seriously. Now in 2018, the fourth film in the series, Victor Crowley, is terrorizing home releases and video-on-demand services, bearing one question in mind: was anyone really clamoring for a fourth entry?
Victor Crowley takes place a decade after the events of the previous films, following several characters as they try to use the Crowley murders for their own personal gain. The two “important” characters the film seems to follow is Parry Shen’s Andrew, the only survivor from the last film, and Katie Booth’s Chloe, an aspiring filmmaker who has come to the site of the killings with her best friend and boyfriend in order to shoot a mock trailer for a Victor Crowley film that she wants to direct. After Andrew’s flight unexpectedly crashes into the bayou that Chloe and her friends are at, it becomes clear that something is wrong. Add the fact that Chloe’s friend decided to play a video that chants the voodoo curse that brought Crowley back alive and you have a setup that is not only obvious but certainly not going to end well for three-fourths of the characters. What follows is a gruesome experience that any slasher fan can predict with their eyes closed.
Before I get into the actual critique of the film, I want to clarify where I stand with horror: I love horror. I love slasher flicks, ghost films, monster movies, weird foreign horror, and so on. I also love horror that doesn’t take itself seriously, personally believing that horror and comedy go together incredibly well when in the right hands. I enjoy a genuine horror experience like The Witch just as much as I enjoy watching Jason Voorhees punch a guy’s head clean off in Friday the 13th Part VIII: Jason Takes Manhattan. The point I am trying to make is that I don’t always need a super serious horror film and, as a horror fan, I’m open to pretty much anything.
Keep that in mind when I tell you that Victor Crowley is bad. Not funny bad; the type of bad that makes you question why this franchise has been popular up to this point. Victor Crowley is a gory mess that doesn’t take itself seriously whatsoever, creating the quintessential slasher scenario just to let Kane Hodder’s Victor Crowley go to town on a bunch of idiots and horrible people. Now does that sound like the worst thing ever? As a horror fan, absolutely not! Hodder is the best Jason Voorhees actor, giving each monster he portrays a physicality and menace that others wish they had. However, what this film severely lacks is an emotional core.
Even in the weakest films of the slasher classics, they knew that having a straight man/”survivor girl” was important to giving the films somewhat of an emotional pull. You need a Tommy Jarvis or a Nancy Thompson to push the narrative along and give the killings some weight. Watching Jason kill a biker while he’s in an outhouse is pure gory fun. Watching Jason nearly kill someone Tommy cares about adds tension that is appreciated. Even Scream knew to do this even though it’s a parodic twist on the slasher genre. It was even more baffling to me when I found out that the Hatchet franchise actually has that in Danielle Harris’ Marybeth Dunstan. They just decided not to use her, resulting in a film that has no redeemable or interesting characters.
Speaking of the characters, the acting ranges from bad to cringeworthy. Looking through the cast list, it was obvious that a couple of the acting choices were made as nods to those actors’ previous works in horror. However, when your most notable actors are Jonah Ray from Netflix’s Mystery Science Theater 3000: The Return and Q from truTV’s Impractical Jokers, you start to understand that the film is casting either on “Hey, they have a horror background!” or “Hey, they’d like to be slaughtered. Let’s put them in!” It also doesn’t help that the writing isn’t good, leading to most of the jokes falling flat. I chuckled about three times but the writing ultimately made the film a better gorefest with the sound off.
Now even with all that said, most horror fans know that there could be a saving grace in one aspect of the film that I haven’t addressed yet: the kills. Even if a horror film is 75% bad, most horror fans will look past those flaws for just a couple of creative, gory kills. Thankfully for this film, it’s the best aspect. The kills are gory, over-the-top, and practical to an impressive degree at times. There’s certainly one kill in particular that is just so silly and hilarious that I’ll never forget it when looking back on kills in slasher films. It seems like that’s director/writer Adam Green’s favorite part of the film both in terms of directing and writing.
That being said though, it’s not worth watching nearly 90 minutes of film just to get a few good kills. The acting is bad, the writing is lazy, and the film is painfully boring at times. Most of the film takes place in a low-budget interior of a plane, leading to a good chunk of the film relying on the characters while Crowley waits for someone to make the stupid mistake of going outside the plane. It was bizarre watching a film fail this bad at making fun of one of the easiest targets in the horror subgenre, especially when so many others have done it better. If you looking for a comedic and gory take on slasher films, I’d recommend 2015’s The Final Girls or 2010’s Tucker and Dale vs. Evil over Victor Crowley anyday. If you’re even looking for a return to form (flaws and all) of a classic 80’s slasher franchise, 2013’s Curse of Chucky and last year’s Cult of Chucky might be more up your alley.
Anything over a fourth entry that probably doesn’t even do its own franchise justice.