Trophy Heads

TROPHY HEADS is a cheapo Full Moon production that pays homage to the classic scream queens of the 1980s and 1990s, throwing them together in a self-referential production that acknowledges their heyday. The loose plot involves a serial killer who captures and imprisons said actresses before brutalising them in various cheesy death games. The highlight here is seeing the likes of Michelle Bauer, Brinke Stevens, Linnea Quigley and Denise Duff teaming up to revisit their careers, but the script is pretty poor which renders the whole thing something of a talky bore, and of course the endless old movie clips don't help much.

Basement trash-horror fan teams up with his brownie-baking mother to ghoulishly preserve the magic of the passing generations of scream-queens.

Comedy horror mostly pisses me off, but this is a great idea. The genre is splashed all over the screen and, although a bit coy on the sex, this should hit the spot for experienced fans of US slasher movies. Myself, I can't ref the films or actresses.

Clunky production that gets into its stride, and I liked the performances as it went along. Dialogue and editing a bit slow, so the humour sometimes fails to spark and a lot of jokes are left at the table, but the pace is good. Favourite scene was at the audition, where the actors get to play it up. Plus the ending doesn't disappoint.

It also hits a good note on the nostalgia of a film fan - the first reaction to watching a movie recedes, the regret becomes overwhelming. Kill it before it dies. Mom!

Overall - low rent, dirty irony, but lack of sharps on the sleaze and humour.

So the plot line is that an obsessed movie fan kidnaps a series of 1980s "Scream Queens", and the proceeds to film himself killing them before doing bad taxidermy on their heads.

The sad lives of the former scream queens can't be any worse than their actual sad life that ANY of them thought this was a good idea. None of them have looks that have held up from their heydey.

It's not only torture porn, it's BAD torture porn. I just can't see who this film is made for. It demeans the Scream Queen actresses. It makes the fans look bad. None of the characters are likeable. Who are we supposed to be cheering for here?

Hard Pass... I wish I had.

This is not Alfred Hitchcock. In terms of production values it's not even Ed Wood. But that doesn't matter. It's made with a great deal of love for the subject matter, and actually allows the scream qeens to have their time in the spotlight.

The whole film is very tongue in cheek, and obviously not meant to be taken as more than a love letter to a genre, and a group of women that made the genre what it is. Which is why it deserves eight stars. It succeeds at its mission with gusto.

Trophy Heads (2014) is a Full Moon Features movie I recently watched on Tubi. The storyline follows a serial killer and his mom on a mission to collect the heads and mount them on his wall of all the famous scream queens. Unfortunately for the killer, the queens won't stop talking to him even after being killed and mounted.

This movie is directed by Charles Brand (Puppetmaster) and stars Maria Olsen (Paranormal Activity 3), Adam Noble Roberts (Evil Bong 666), Brinke Stevens (The Slumber Party Massacre), Darcy DeMoss (Friday the 13th Part VI: Jason Lives), Jacqueline Lovell (The Killer Eye), Linnea Quigley (Night of the Demons) and Carel Struycken (The Addams Family).

I liked the storyline and the concept, which definitely had potential. The main character and his mother could have been better written but they were fun to watch as the movie evolves. The acting overall is fairly mediocre but the film didn't take itself seriously and it felt that way. The kill scenes are just okay and the CGI blood was bad. The best part of the movie is a random topless character that sits in a jail cell the entire film.

Overall Brand had a good concept and cast for this movie but didn't seem to take the potential of the film serious enough. Unfortunately this is a mess that could have been good. I would score this a 4/10 but would still recommend seeing it once for horror genre enthusiasts.