Chainsaw Sally

Now, here's one that I went waaaaay to long without seeing. And might I add, an experience more than worth-the-wait. Chainsaw Sally, to me, comes off, simply as a love letter to real Horror flicks, as well as real Horror fans. A perfect example of why low-budget Horror is far superior to the big-budget mainstream bores that will forever clog the studio-owned theaters and TV stations. Played by the gorgeous April Monique Burrill, Sally, a soft-spoken librarian, first appears to be a reasonable enough person. Although, it's probably a good idea to keep a low profile, considering Sally goes out at night and slaughters semi-innocent people. Kind of a rip-off-ish story of The Texas Chainsaw Massacre. When Sally was a child, she witnessed the murder of her father, played by Gunnar Hansen. So, now, Sally is Convinced that it's her job to defend her home, and her brother, and to to slaughter anyone who she considers "bad". So, basically, Sally is crazy, and she's right in the middle of a killing spree. Aside from that, Sally is reasonable enough. And if a totally entertaining storyline, hilarious script, and hot lead actress isn't enough reason to check this one out, just keep in mind, that our pal, that's right, good ol' H.G. Lewis got himself a role in this 21st century cult classic. For truly one of the sweetest double features I could possibly think of, pair this one with up with Sick Girl. And if you end up liking this movie I speak so highly of, you'll be pleased to know that Chainsaw Sally: The Series (season one) will be released on DVD, this month, from the good people at Troma. I guess we missed the original airing on NBC. Oh well, It's gonna be rad. I guess it's supposed to serve as a sequel, in TV show format.As for the original, we're talking'pure entertainment, lots of laughs, two very appropriate cameos, and not a dull moment, with the beauty of April Monique Burril being the highlight. In my opinion, the only thing stopping Chainsaw Sally from achieving B-perfection is an obvious and unfortunate lack of extreme gore. But by all means, don't let that stop you from enjoying this quality independent Horror flick. Gore or no gore, Chainsaw Sally is a rare bright spot in modern Exploitation. Passionately recommended to Horror enthusiasts... I mean real Horror enthusiasts. If you like The Sixth Sense, and you've never heard of Two Thousand Maniacs, You just won't get it, and it is my privilege to inform you that reading this review has been a complete and utter waste of time. 8/10

I decided to give this one a try from the pretty positive reviews, silly me, I thought this tale of a mild mannered librarian turned psycho killer had some potential. But the sad truth was that everything about this mess of a film is simply awful. From the porn-caliber acting to the lame ass comedy. The special effects (aka. Gore) was all right, but the rest of the movie was so bad that mere words can't convey how utterly disastrous it is. I thought that having the legendary Gunner Hansen AND legend H G Lewis would be a good sign and I'd find a diamond in the rough. Alas, no I couldn't have been more wrong. Avoid this film at all costs as it can only bring you misery. I consider myself a huge B-movie horror fan and even I loathed this film. That should tell you something.

My Grade: D-

DVD Extras: Commentary by Director/writer Jimmyo Burril, actress April Burril, and actor Shawn Jones: 30 minute documentary on the film; an interview with Gunnar Hansen; Story boards; a music video; promotional trailer; and trailers for "Skin Crawl", "Bacterium", "Creature from the hillbilly lagoon", "Chantel", "Sinful", "Shock-O-Rama", "Feeding the Masses", "Prison a go go", "Bite me!", "Screaming Dead", Suburben Nightmare", "Slime City", "Women's prison massacre", "Criminally Insane", "Satan's Black Wedding", & "Nurse Sherry"

Eye Candy: Lesley Vermot got topless

"Chainsaw Sally" is one of those movies that has a premise to die for. All I needed to know about this was that it was about a librarian by day and a chainsaw-wielding murderess by night. I can more than identify with that basic plot, so when "Chainsaw Sally" finally got its DVD release, I jumped on it immediately. Unfortunately, "Chainsaw Sally" comes across as a bad inside joke.

The film follows Sally (April Monique Burril), a small-town librarian who likes to keep things in order. Everyone in town considers her the local frigid spinster. However, Sally and her irritating drag queen little brother form quite a macabre little pair who use their spare time at home to reenact chase scenes from horror movies. And when someone rubs Sally the wrong way, she trades in her stereotypical librarian garb for a mall-punk outfit (which has her looking like a sad Switchblade Symphony reject) and goes ballistic with her chainsaw. A stranger who inherits a house in town starts snooping around for information on the house's history, and turns to Sally for her librarian skills and perhaps a bit of wooing. Will he get too close and uncover her secret? Who cares? There's so much wrong with "Chainsaw Sally" that I don't know where to begin. Sally's victims never recognize her as the dorky local librarian, even though the only thing that's different about her is a costume downgrade. One of the local snots who makes fun of her is later wooed by her at a "goth" club, and they engage in a quick sapphic smooch--yet she never notices it's the same chick. What's more is no one seems to be concerned that so many people in such a small town are constantly disappearing or being murdered. The amateur actors, especially the lead, all come across as unenthusiastic. Burril seems to attempt channeling Pamela Sprinsteen's "Angela" from the "Sleepaway Camp" sequels, with her absurd moralizing before each kill. "DO YOU KNOW THAT LIBRARY BOOK WAS THREE WEEKS LATE?!" While this dialogue can be amusing at times, Burril is clueless as how do give a proper comedic delivery. She just sounds bored. The supporting cast doesn't fare much better and mostly sleepwalk through their roles. The genre vets are in this only to give the movie some cred: the original Leatherface (Gunnar Hansen) pops up for a few seconds in a flashback, and gore-god HG Lewis has a throwaway role as the hardware store employee where Sally buys her weapons.

What's just as distracting as the bad writing and acting is the awful editing. This completely unscary horror movie is filmed and edited like a daytime soap opera. Often a scene will end with characters talking and another scene will pickup with a different set of characters talking about something unrelated. Repeat. I will say that there are some interesting and inventive murder ideas here, but the execution of these scenes is very poor, usually not showing enough to satisfy even the slightest of gorehounds. Often the scene will cut to Sally's dopey mug instead of showing what she's doing to her victim, which just makes it all the more irritating.

The most frustrating thing about the film for me (nerd alert! nerd alert!) is that the filmmakers obviously know nothing about libraries. The small town public library in "Chainsaw Sally" consists of a small room with a bunch of books strewn loosely about on shelving units against the walls. They don't even have call numbers on them! Sure, this is probably due to budget constraints, but they could have at least tried! To quote Parker Posey's character in "Party Girl," "We'll just put the books any damn place we please! We don't care!" That classic outburst pretty much sums up "Chainsaw Sally"--a poorly thrown together movie that leaves the viewer with a big mess and a headache.

I was really looking forward to this one, and I'm sorry to say I do not recommend it.

Pretty good flick. Back in 2004 I attended the Shockerfest Convention down in Modesto, CA and watched this on the big screen (and met some of the cast). I had no idea this was scheduled to play, when I saw one of the little flyers, I knew I had to watch it. My sister and I agreed that it was one of the best feature-length films shown.

By day Sally works at a library. She has a younger brother who lives with her. I found this character 'Ruby' extremely likable and funny. At night Sally goes a little psycho violently murdering anyone she believes to be a threat to herself, her brother and her home.

On a personal note, I thought the girl who played the 'Cinthia' was/is hot. Felt a little sad to find out this is her only film to date. Hope to see her in more movies in the future.

Anyway, going back to Chainsaw Sally. The audience seemed to like it as much as my sister and I did. Can't wait for the sequel, hopefully I'll be able to watch it on the big screen as well!

This movie is really bad. I don't mean cheap or amateurish, as I understand low budget independent film making has many obstacles. My problem is that it is written terribly, acted even worse and is just a massive rip off of John Waters brilliant, Serial Mom. The title character ( played by the fleshy and comatose April Burrill ) kills those who offend her sensibilities by acting in ways she feels are unacceptable. Bad manners, talking in the library, not recycling ( whoops, that's from Serial Mom, sorry )... well, u get the picture. Basically the writer has taken Beverly Sutphin, Waters's domestic maniac, and put her in some punk rock ( read: I bought this cool gear at Hot Topic ) clothes. I could let the ripping off slide if the damn movie was even a little entertaining but it's not. I gave this one star. I do like to find one positive in any movie I hate, and in this, it's the actress Kristen Hudsen. She is beautiful, sexy and the only person who appears on screen that can act. Why isn't she Chainsaw Sally????