Carnage

There's no disguising the fact that 'The Burning' is a rip off of 'Friday the 13th' so I won't bother arguing about it. The most important thing is that 'The Burning' has more likeable characters and they are killed off in gorier and more flamboyant ways. This makes it one of the few knock offs that I can think of that surpasses the original. The thing that really makes this outstanding isn't the handful of actors in the cast of unknowns that went on to bigger and better things (Jason Alexander, Holly Hunter,etc.), but Tom Savini's realistic and gruesome effects, some of his best work. I don't think you really watch a slasher movie for much more than some shocks and some gore, and this has both in spades, making it one of the very best slasher movies of the 80s. This genre isn't my favourite kind of horror, but I enjoyed 'The Burning' a great deal, and the uncut version is worth tracking down for the raft sequence alone, which is unforgettable and very, very cool. Recommended, but not for the squeamish.

THE BURNING

Aspect ratio: 1.85:1

Sound format: Mono

An abusive caretaker at a lonely summer camp is disfigured by fire during a prank which goes horribly wrong. Five years later, he returns to the area to take revenge against one of his former persecutors (now a camp counsellor) and the kids in his charge.

Makeup artist Tom Savini rejected an opportunity to work on "Friday the 13th Part 2" (1981) in order to create effects for Tony Maylam's THE BURNING, yet another in the assembly line of low-budget horror movies which emerged in the wake of HALLOWEEN (1978). Savini warned the film's producers - including a fledgling Harvey Weinstein! - that the script for THE BURNING shared uncomfortable similarities with the "Friday" sequel, though fans may have been too dazzled by the gruesome set-pieces to either notice or care. In truth, THE BURNING shares only a handful of superficial details with "Friday 2", including a late night campfire episode in which the villain is dismissed as an urban legend, culminating in a false 'scare' which today's audiences will probably see coming a mile off. Despite a couple of groan-inducing incidentals ("Oh, I forgot my vitamins - I'll have to go back to my cabin through the dark, creepy woods!"), the narrative develops organically from one scene to the next, and characters react believably to the escalating situation. Unfortunately, the climax - set mostly within an abandoned mineshaft - is staged and executed with little flair or suspense, and amounts to something of a major disappointment.

Of course, the main point of interest - besides seeing some familiar faces in early roles, including Jason Alexander (TV's "Seinfeld"), Fisher Stevens (SHORT CIRCUIT) and an unrecognisable Holly Hunter - is Savini's horrific makeup effects: Victims are slashed, stabbed, punctured and poked in graphic detail, and blood flows copiously from some horribly convincing wounds. Indeed, the film reaches a crescendo of horror during a notorious sequence involving an 'abandoned' canoe (I'll say no more), one of the most vicious set-pieces of the 1980's 'slasher' cycle. Briskly paced, and scored with a series of electronic doodles by no less than Rick Wakeman (!), THE BURNING may seem awfully simplistic to modern viewers, but it delivers the gory goods in no uncertain terms. The movie was censored for an R-rating, but the uncut version has since been released on home video.

Summer camp caretaker Cropsy is fire roasted when some pranksters try to scare him with a flaming skull. Five years later, after numerous failed skin grafts, Cropsy is released back into society with a horribly scarred face and even more scarred psychological make-up. Now he's got a bone to pick and returns to the same camp of his accident (after gutting a hooker in the stomach with a pair of scissors) to get revenge on the new campers populating the camp. Armed with a pair of hedge clippers he doesn't hesitate to hack into a dozen or so foul-mouthed, oversexed teens, setting aside special interest in counselor Todd (Brian Matthews), who was one of the kids responsible for his burning. Even though it's saddled with a tired, predictable plot, this is still one of the best of the Friday the 13th rip-offs, and that has a a lot to do with Tom Savini's gory special effects. The music score is also excellent and there are fun appearances by Jason Alexander, Holly Hunter, the guy who played Ratner in Fast Times at Ridgemont High and some other recognizable faces before they were famous. The original VHS of this film was heavily trimmed to remove the gore, but that footage has since been restored. I saw the uncut version on Showtime actually.

The Burning has the great fortune of being a product of the early 80's slasher fest that greeted audiences in the hundreds. Some genre highlights were produced from ca. 1980-1984, a time when these films took themselves semi-seriously and were moderately successful at creating creepy atmosphere, displaying gratuitous nudity and inventing some spectacular death sequences. The late seventies laid the groundwork for what was to become a stable formula for these movies and for a minimum budget and isolated surroundings the films could provide some solid shocks and gore that pleased audiences.

The Burning is nearly identical in plot and storyline to Friday the 13th. Here the bad guy is a burn victim as a result of a prank gone awry and years later he takes vengeance on unsuspecting campers in gruesome fashion. While the movie is pretty slow and the gore fest doesn't really start until an hour in it's never boring. Here's where the film is different from Friday the 13th and many others: The teens aren't merely disposable pricks who you can't wait see get their grisly demise. They're actually a pretty likable bunch, well played by some future stars (Jason Alexander, particularly likable here, and Fisher Stevens among them) and when some get slashed you kinda feel bad for them.

Now for what really counts. Two things; gore and mood. The Tom Savini gore effects do not disappoint. Keep in mind that this is 1981 and digital effects have improved horror gore somewhat but this is pretty impressive stuff. The raft scene is a particular standout. As for mood, you can't beat these early 80's alone-in-the-woods scenarios and they're all well played out here. Although there are a lot of false scares here, they're buildups are great and the creepy surroundings go a long way. If films like Psycho made people afraid to take a shower and Jaws made people afraid of the water then films like The Burning and Friday the 13th must have made a few parents hesitant at sending their kids to summer camps.

Fans of slasher films will not want to miss The Burning. Although Friday the 13th is more suspenseful and The Burning feels a bit too stretched, it nevertheless has plenty of good moments and top notch kill scenes. What's not to like?

"The Burning" showed up on Showtime late one night, as I've noticed many rare films have (one time, I saw a really strange Italian action-adventure movie from the 80s, complete with bad dubbing and all) so I decided to tape it, hoping to finally see the infamous "raft scene," which was probably the only reason I wanted to see this.

Well, let's just say the movie didn't live up to ALL my expectations, but it wasn't terrible. The story is fairly generic, complete with rehashed backstory about Cropsy being burned to near-death by some mischevious campers. After five years in the hospital (!) he's finally released, so what's the first thing he does? Solicits a prostitute, of course, with terribly gory results. Eventually, he makes his way to a summer camp, armed with some gardening shears, to do some dirty work as only a slasher movie villain can.

The real deal doesn't start until some counselors and campers (well-established in the "Meatballs"-like interum of forty minutes) head off on a canoeing trip down the river. Cropsy comes along, and only then manages to do away with some (not enough) of our unlucky characters. So, who are these people? Well, there's Todd (Brian Matthews), the brawny head counselor who only wants everyone to get along; Michelle (Leah Ayres), his likable co-counselor and girlfriend, I suppose; Alfred (Brian Backer), the weird outcast who seems to eternally annoy Glazer (Larry Joshua,) our stock bully character. Rounding out the main characters are Karen (Caroline Houlihan) and her slimy boyfriend Eddy (Ned Eisenberg), kindly prankster Dave (Jason Alexander), Glazer's girlfriend Sally (Carrick Glenn), and Woodstock (Fisher Stevens), who...well, who's just plain weird, and he's got the stupidest laugh ever.

Anyway, most of these people are all killed before the credits roll, and only the ones you really end up liking survive. As far as who survives, well, it's usually a bit more predictable earlier on in the movie. Took me a while to figure out who was playing who. I thought Karen was the "final girl" at first, and Michelle was the slutty friend. In the end, though, there really is no "final girl," at least not in the conventional manner. Sure, there's a female character left standing (I wonder who, take a wild guess) but most of the climactic action is left to two male characters, which while unique to the genre, did not work for me. I mean, I realize that Alfred's character was supposed to be sympathetic and we were supposed to worry about him during that delirious, never-ending run through the woods, but that job is better performed by a token heroine. I guess I'm just old-fashioned. I don't mind a male hero (sort of expected, I guess) but when all the heroine is given is one scene of peril, and then some dull scenes on a boat, the tension all but dies away for me.

Anyway, speaking of all this carnage, the gore in this movie is unbelievable. I definitely winced a few times (particularly with the prostitute's murder) and would expect nothing less from Tom Savini. And that, my friends, leads me to the raft scene. It was, I'm sorry to say, a letdown. I mean, the suspense that builds as you realize what's going to happen in the scene, is really well-established, and I was on the edge of my seat. But then...it's over in a few seconds. The scene is extremely rushed and while somewhat gory, didn't really seem like a whole lot of carnage. Now, I'm not a fan of watching mass killings or anything, but I suppose I was just hoping the scene lived up to its reputation, and it really didn't.

As far as music, there's an excellent score that works well with the movie, and always adds a little edge to things. Acting-wise, everyone does pretty well. Leah Ayres was a little uneven. While at some points she was excellent, and her delivery was right-on, at others, like when she was angry, she got a little melodramatic. Jason Alexander shines, and it's no surprise he went on to be something big. Holly Hunter, the movie's other budding star, is barely in the movie. You see her a few times once they go on the rafting trip, but she has very little dialogue, and not much to do. Oh well. Everyone else is decent, to say the least. There's quite a bit of nudity in this one, more than I expected, and the shot of people mooning someone, a staple of camp slasher films, is here, and is quite hideous, thanks to Fisher Stevens. Probably one of the most hideous butt shots in film history.

Anyway, "The Burning" isn't a bad movie, but it isn't great. There aren't many genuine scares, and towards the end, things seem to inexplicably lose a lot of suspense. I suggest you see it, though. It's probably required viewing for slasher fans.