NinetyForChill: The #Podcast: What a Twist??? ”High Tension” & ”Sleepaway Camp” with Rae from 3B

 NinetyForChill.com: The #Podcast

Episode 107: What a Twist??? ”High Tension” & ”Sleepaway Camp” with Rae from 3B.

What a Twist??? ”High Tension” & ”Sleepaway Camp” with Rae from 3B

Since the original "Friday the 13th", it is safe to say that a third of slasher movies try to subvert audience expectations with a third act twist. Just trying to identify the killer may have become a stale concept far too early in the genre, so some films are dependent on discovering the deep-seeded why behind a killer's motivation. Much of the time, that ends up holding a fun or even brilliant film back. CatBusRuss and "Booze, Boobs & Blood's" Rae explore two examples of this: 2003's "High Tension" and 1983's "Sleepaway Camp".

Allow me to get out of third-person. Happy Prof. Shurtleff of Illinois Central College? I (CM Darth) will try not to make so much light of violent death in this summation. This is my declaration of changing perspective.

It seems that I am getting more accustomed to these seemingly longer weeks. I was able to watch "AEW Rampage" live on Friday night despite all the Midnight Moon Blackberry Moonshine that I drank on Wednesday recording this episode, Pour Bros. Trivia on Thursday, and still just being over halfway through a six-day work week. All it cost me was not seeing the 4-star+ bout between MJF and Takeshita.

And, there was no tequila/mezcal involved in Whaddayaknow Trivia. Perhaps that is why team "Shrug Life" failed to defend our championship. Good things happen for me when agave-based booze is involved.

I suppose I could try to dedicate myself to healthier living. Rae had recently quit drinking and sounds better for it. Or that means she has finally recovered from walking pneumonia and two bouts with COVID. Hopefully, my shot of Malort to open the podcast did not offend her. She was probably more on edge about me telling her that I got shingles at 35. That was the one disease she was happy about not starting the new year with

She is a podcasting professional, so her demeanor remained upbeat. I find that to be impressive since we were chatting about two slasher movies that do so many good things that a poor executed twist lets those film fall from great to average at best.

"High Tension" was a great horror film about a mysterious killer. It is French Extreme, so the violence and gore is beautiful. But, perhaps being French, the auteur Alexandre Aja felt that it had to actually be clever. Needless to say, I wish I was in England when this film was released because the title "Switchblade Romance" would have left me better prepared for the swing and a miss the unnecessary third act is. There just had to be a better way to get that pavement saw scene into the tale.

As for "Sleepaway Camp", Rae's suggestion for this double feature, we both found it to be a quaint little horror flick. Of course it is from the eighties, so satanic/homophobic/transphobic panic had to be the reason for the evil acts taken. There is no Satanism, the trans elements are fine, but they needed to shoehorn the gay subversive subtext. Was it meant to confuse us like the killer?

This week's trip to "Ally's Accessories Shop on Etsy's Trash Feature Revue" is also a horror movie that tries to be satirical. Sorry Robert DeNiro, but Stephen Graham is my Al Capone (Boardwalk Empire).

"Doghouse" is a tale of immature, 30-something Londoners who decide to get away from the city for a guy's weekend in Moodley, 300 miles from London. Their mate from the town says that there is a 4 to 1 female to male ration there, so that should get the soon-to-be divorced Vince over his depression. Sadly, that ratio is now 400 to them after a bioweapon had turned all the women there into pissed off, cannibalistic feminists.

Follow me on Twitter @catbusruss. If you want to be on the show, contact me on Twitter or send an email to russthebus07@gmail.com. All we need is a theme, movie, director, or actor and a focus on sub 100-minute material. As long as the credits start before the 1:39:59 mark on the runtime bar, the movie qualifies.