Sunburst

this is one of the darkest films i've ever seen. certainly, it's one of the most politically incorrect. it may have been packaged as a sex and violence exploitation thriller, but it could be thought of as more along the lines of an existential art film. it really goes beyond the need for a numerical rating; it practically inhabits a universe unto itself. yet at the same time it in some ways is VERY MUCH of its time. it's a post-"easy rider," post-youth culture seventies burnout epic. "good" doesn't triumph over "evil." in fact, the fact calls into question the validity of such categories. a woman is raped and learns to "accept" her ordeal as a part of life. the rapists are never punished and the crime never even appears to have been reported. as far as i am concerned, the film goes a BIT too far. it's existential acceptance of human suffering ends up as a kind of complacency. authentic existentialists generally see human suffering as largely meaningless and hence unjustified. yet director polakof seems to ask us to view suffering as justifiable, as part of "the plan," as part of "fate." nonetheless, he takes the viewer on a "realistic" journey instead of giving us fairy tales and revenge fantasies. as a result, "slashed dreams" stands apart from both common exploitation fodder and whatever kind of product the "mainstream" motion picture industry is putting out these days.

Probably the only reason this amateur hour snoozefest isn't on the IMDb Bottom 100 list is that almost no one has seen it. If they had, it would have easily surpassed "Manos: The Hands of Fate" and "Baby Geniuses 2" as the most excruciating home movie ever. In fact, "Manos" now looks like a profound work of art in comparison, and perhaps deserves a reevaluation.

There's almost no way to describe the incredible badness of "Slashed Dreams"/"Sunburst." It goes way beyond the Mystery Science Theater 3000 level... and of course never comes close to hitting that so-bad-it's-funny, level -- just goes on and on in an early '70s, 16mm Ektachrome so-bad-it's-painful mode. Like a couple of high school kids went out in the woods with a camera. But a couple of high school kids with prefrontal lobotomies. We're taking no story here. No pace. No connection to reality and no idea how a film is actually made... however they did manage to obey every single Stupid Rule of horror films ever invented: kids go into woods, kids are threatened by maniacs, kids don't even CONSIDER leaving woods -- check. Girl is raped by maniacs, guy does absolutely nothing, and then they STILL don't even consider leaving woods -- check.

And in the middle of this lobotomized "Deliverance"/"Easy Rider"/"Last House on the Left" hybrid with a "Friday the 13th" poster, who shows up but of course, Rudy Vallee. Yes folks, Rudy Vallee. Just made sense I guess for the legendary 1920s jazz crooner to be included in a home movie thriller about a woman being raped by inbred hillbillies. All the sense in the world.

But far worse than Anything Else is the screeching, shrew-like banshee wail of some Joan Baez wannabe plastered over the home movie footage every ten minutes or so in order to convey the Tragic and Sensitive Nature of this very Profound and Serious Film about Rape.

Nurse, please hand me the leucotome. And welcome to hell.

I saw this movie, as I think most people have these days, on the out of print Academy Home Entertainment videotape under the title Slashed Dreams. I doubt that is the original title, as it appears on the screen via a bad video effect, and appears to be blocking out the original title by being placed on a large green rectangle (probably Sunburst). The videotape dates from 1986, and since Robert Englund (who later played Freddy Kreuger) appears in it (albeit briefly, towards the end), the title is probably meant to suggest A Nightmare On Elm Street (1984). None of the actors' names are mentioned on the box, although my box was cut, so maybe the names just got cut off. "Slashed Dreams" is probably also meant to suggest slasher films, but this is at most a proto-slasher; nobody gets killed, and the only slashing is of one bad guy by another.

The video box suggests that the movie starts with a skinny-dipping scene, with the characters watched by someone with a knife, and then flashes back to how they got there. In fact, it's entirely presented in chronological order, starting with a bunch of young people in college. In a class, they talk about the meaning of life, and where people have their roots; "in the earth," one suggests, "in heaven," suggests another.

One of the students, Jenny, brings up her friend Michael, who'd dropped out of college and moved into the mountains. Her boyfriend doesn't think much of a dropout, and he doesn't like Jenny's lifelong brainy friend either. At a frat party, her boyfriend gets really belligerent, and Jenny and her old friend drive off to find Michael.

On the way, they get directions at a country store. The proprietor is found in a back room, rehearsing his night club act (he says), talking and singing on a microphone. He's a former radio star who's been forgotten (played by the crooner Rudy Vallee). He's about the most chipper old man to ever warn a couple of young people not to go in the woods! He presses some Licorice Nips on them, and tries to impress on them the need for a knife.

They pass on the knife, and make their way into the woods, where they encounter a bear, and find a cabin they think might be Michael's. It's made out of rather thin branches, so that it is possible to see right through the walls. There are also windows, and at least two large holes in the roof, so that when they say they wish they could lock the door, it sounds rather funny!

There's an odd sort of rape scene, in which one of the assailants seems to be at most dry humping a sleeping bag (and he couldn't get it up either, we learn), and the other also seems to be doing some dry humping, but also does some bruising face-slapping. Later, some strange advice is given to the victim, to "push the demons out" and to find some "truth" in what happened.

The movie ends with one of the characters taking a slim illustrated hardcover book down from a shelf in Michael's cabin, and reading: "Your pain is the breaking of the shell that encloses your understanding. Even as the stone of the fruit must break, that its heart may stand in the sun, so must you know pain.... And in the sweetness of friendship let there be laughter, and sharing of pleasures. For in the dew of little things the heart finds its morning and is refreshed." These are two different passages (on pain, and on friendship) from Kahlil Gibran's popular (more then than now, I think) book The Prophet.

Not much of a horror movie, and may not have been intended to be one. Between the opening scenes in the college classroom, and the reading from The Prophet, and some of the dialogue in between, it seems the filmmakers may have been trying to reach for something meaningful, but...

After seeing Sunburst I'm still trying to figure out why Rudy Vallee bothered to appear in it. Certainly the audience this film was reaching at thousands of drive-ins across the country wasn't going to be buying his records.

This outdoors film which relies on a lot of nature shots to fill in the story gaps has Peter Hooten and Katherine Bauman dissatisfied with college and the imbeciles that they find going there lately. Possibly their friend Robert Englund who has gone back to the Sixties and back to nature with his tune in, turn on, and drop out philosophy may have the answer. He's off in the woods of Northern California and Hooten and Bauman are off to find him.

Unfortunately before they find Englund they run into a couple of bottom feeding inbreds played by James Keach and David Pritchard. More I cannot say because things do degenerate from here. Let's just say their actions might have stimulated a little of what goes in drive-in theaters so the exhibitors might have booked Sunburst with that in mind.

Robert Englund of course went on to play Freddy Kruger in several slasher flicks with Freddy as the central character. Vallee plays a small role as a storekeeper who still sings some of his old hits. He sounded a lot better on The Whiffenpoof Song in his prime.

Nice cinematography and Rudy Vallee, can't think of any other reason to watch Sunburst.

Slashed Dreams (1975)

* 1/2 (out of 4)

The producer's tried to sell this off to the horror crowd in the Last House on the Left vein but it's more of a mix between Love Story and Deliverance. A guy and girl go into the woods of Northern California to look for a friend who has moved there. That night, while in the cabin, two rednecks beat the hell out of the guy and rape the girl. Will everything be okay? This is one of those movies that keep you entertained because you expect something to happen but when it never does you hit yourself for staying with the movie. Robert England plays the friend living in the woods.