Psychocop

Well sure, we ALL loved "Maniac Cop", the 1988 horror semi-classic from William Lustig and Larry Cohen. "I want to do that too" is what writer/director Wallace Potts must have thought, and not even a year later "Psycho Cop" magically appeared. There's only one little problem, though. Wallace Potts is (was...) a talentless hack! He was only capable of imitating the obvious and superficial aspects, like the idea of a police officer as a horror villain, the title sequences and even blatantly the tagline (from "you have the right to remain silent ...forever" in "Maniac Cop" to "you have the right to remain dead" in "Psycho Cop"). But apart from all that, "Psycho Cop" is nothing but a mundane and terribly by-the-numbers late 80s slasher.

I'm not going to lie, I had tremendous fun watching "Psycho Cop". But mainly because it's such an unbelievably inept and dumb slasher, full of embarrassing clichés and hopelessly empty-headed characters. Even when half of the six-headed group is already killed off, the remaining ones keep assuming the others are off buying beer or playing pranks. The killer, Officer Joe Vickers, is one giant joke as well. He supposedly is a devil-worshiper, but he totally doesn't have the profile of a Satanist. Apart from drawing one stupid pentagram in the sand, he does nothing what devil worshipers would do. He simply slaughters teens whilst hysterically laughing and saying moronic things.

All this I can tolerate, but why-oh-why doesn't "Psycho Cop" feature more barbaric gore and gratuitous nudity? We have three beautiful girls (especially Palmer Lee Todd is very hot... and that even rhymes) laying by a pool half of the running time, but none of them takes the bikini top off. Lame! And now I must get my dirty little hands on the sequel.

Oh God, where do I begin with this one. (Deep breath...) I am shocked and chagrined that this masterwork has not seen the light of day for a DVD release. I would love to hear B.R. Shafer's commentary on how he came up with those hilarious one liners.

In a nutshell, a group of personal friends run to the hills for some boozin' and relaxation. Their only two concerns seems to be misplaced beer and the caretaker. They missed one...a devil-worshipping cop who is on the loose and filled with one-liners and bag of tricks on how to kill. Officer Vicker's one line cliches are timely and very funny. The movie is not scary or frightening. It wasn't meant to be since it was written diligently by Wallace Potts on a weekend. It was directed and produced by Potts in about a fortnight. The attire worn by the cast is appropriate for an 80's slasher flick and adds to the air of comedy surrounding this film.

The deaths. The deaths are silly, but he employs a variety of methods as a means to killing these youths. Especially when he rips a guy's heart out and follows it with "Have a heart. HA HA". This adds to the brilliance of this movie. I prefer this movie over Manic Cop by Bill Lustig.

Overall, a night of laughter and comments like "I cant believe I'm watching this" will fill your living room as you watch this film.

Score: 10 out of 10 -- NOTE: a 6 pack should be consumed before and an additional 6 pack should be consumed during.

It has to be one of the worst movies ever but is very good to watch. We quite often play drinking games to it, for example everytime they say "beer" which is a lot take a drink. I think it has to be watched more than once to be fully appreciated.

It has some good ideas but how the hell the cop catches up to people when he is walking and they are running or even in a car i don't know.

Overall worth a watch and a laugh.

This is the ultimate party movie, take a drink every time they mention the caretaker. Well don't actually or you will die. What great cheese this movie has, kids paranoid as hell and a satan worshipper/ stand-up comedian/ psycho cop. Watch for the 666 shot of the hand it will leave you in stitches. This movie has the stupidest teens ever and some of the worst 80's fashion. Want laughably bad horror and acting here ya go. Officer Joe Vickers you suck and yet your really cool! These kids also talk about beer along with the caretaker constantly and the beer looks like canada dry. So bad it's good is not always a lie.

A country cop has a bad life and turns to satanic worship and killing everyone which happens to include some holidaying young people headed off to a very pretty lodge in middle of America somewhere.

What we are left with is a regular formula campy horror movie where there is always at least one person holding the group back from making reasonable decisions due to his unbreakable desire to holiday with his friends so one by one they get knocked off because no stands up for their own point of view and just leaves.

My primary complaint with this movie is the very wooden execution of the jokes told by the very persistent psycho cop. I laughed maybe once or twice hence I'm not rating Psycho Cop too low it is a B-Horror after all and one needs to remember this at the end which was very typical for Horrors like this.

Other complaints include the movie being too dark especially during the climax kills. You couldn't see what was going on, maybe they've never heard of day for night. Not to mention hardly any of the characters were likeable in any way. There's no T/A and no sex scenes not to mention what seems like the tiniest budget for blood and gore.

You can understand why many didn't like it that said however it does have very good flow. There's hardly a minute where something isn't happening to keep your attention and the script is solid for a B-Horror as well. It's only let down be the feeling the movie was lacking in so many other ways as previously mentioned.