I wanted to put director in quotes
Main Cast: Adam Berasi, Vic Badger
Director: Ryan Cavalline
Not that I believe for a second that Ryan Cavalline’s 2002 atrocity SERIAL KILLER deserves the time of day, but, well, I’ve already committed to doing the review.
So Adam Berasi, star of Cavalline’s DEMON SLAUGHTER, returns to the video screen as Michael Johnson, famous author who’s putting the finishing touches on his latest manuscript, SERIAL KILLER. He’s only a few chapters from the end, has met with the publisher, everything’s a go, but … his drinking is getting out of hand, and his stress is heightened by the arrival of several videotapes in the mail. The videotapes feature naked women tied to chairs, detailing the events that led to their capture, as well as the horrors that have been wrought upon them since. Among the victims are Michael’s agent and his ex-wife. The killer, who is upset about being excluded from Michael’s book, also claims to have the author’s daughter and will kill her if Michael doesn’t meet him at the local cemetery.
Berasi wails and gnashes his teeth, curses at the air and collapses in a drunken heap before watching more videotapes. Meanwhile, back at the homestead, the killer (another Cavalline staple, Vic Badger) sits in a chair watching bondage videos, killing Jehovah’s Witnesses and stranded pizza delivery people, all while talking to a bloody USPS box containing a severed human foot.
Berasi drinks more Jack and Coke while yelling the F word, Badger smirks and tries to be an even worse actor than Berasi (which is no small feat), and everything comes to a head in a big twist ending that is really anything but. Trust me, no matter what wool Cavalline tries to pull over the viewer’s eyes, you don’t have to be the lovechild of Robert Ressler and M. Night Shyamalan to figure out what’s really going on here. Didn’t see that one coming during the opening credits. Yawn.
So a crappy, predictable story I can handle. Some of my favorite movie memories come from crappy, predictable stories. But what I can’t handle is watching a movie and trying to untangle the timeline. I’m pretty set on knowing what’s going on in relation to what in the story. Here’s my problem:
In the beginning, Michael’s agent calls to remind him of a meeting with his publisher, and asks him how it feels to be published. This implies that Michael is going to talk about his first book. But later, he signs an autograph for someone who has all of his books. Why would she ask him that question if he has enough published works to establish a fan base?
Then the videotape of his kidnapped agent shows up, followed a while later by a cop showing up at Michael’s house asking about the agent’s disappearance. Michael says he just talked to her two days earlier when she was setting him up with his publisher.
THEN there’s the fact that Badger’s character is irritated at Michael for not including him in his book. His book that hasn’t been published yet. So apparently in the two days since Michael first talked with the publisher—a talk during which Michael said he should have the last few chapters done in a week!—the book, along with several others, have been published, Michael Johnson is a big star, the agent has been kidnapped, and Michael is receiving videotapes from a disgruntled, ignored serial killer.
Right?
Sorry, I can’t untangle the logic there.
Another problem I had was stuff that made the writer in me cringe. For example, when Michael signs the autograph for his fan, he signs “Your dead!”
Your dead what? Either complete the thought, or try using the correct form of the word, you mangy tool!
Then, when Michael’s talking to the cop and the officer wants to come inside, Michael stalls him by saying he’s in the middle of something, that he’s a writer and he’s in his “training of thought” and if he loses his “training of thought”, he’ll lose everything. I think he meant train of thought, and even then while you can lose your train of thought, I don’t think you’re ever IN your train of thought.
Later, SERIAL KILLER flashes back to that scene with the cop, and shows the officer getting into his car before Michael calls him back and, alright, he kills him because we all know Michael’s the real killer and that Badger’s character is a figment of his imagination and if I actually ruined that for you, then you need to go watch SECRET WINDOW with Johnny Depp and John Turturro. It’s not much better, but it’s got Johnny Depp and John Tuturro. Anyway, when Michael calls the cop back, the cop is about to get into the passenger side of his car. Then Michael kills him. Well . . . was the cop driving one of those foreign cars with the steering wheel on the right side? Was there someone else in the car who was going to drive the officer back to the station? Perhaps a partner? If so, how come he didn’t jump out of the car and arrest Michael right there? Maybe there was no partner. Maybe, just maybe, the cop was alone and his getting into the wrong side of the car was just a mistake that no one bothered to catch because Cavalline just has so many boss ideas for movies that he can’t stop to check the particulars of his scenes, he just wants to move on to the next masterpiece?
I thought DEMON SLAUGHTER was a bad movie, but apparently I didn’t know the meaning of the word. I don’t think I’ve come across another “director” yet who can make 73 minutes feel like 150. Sweet chicken, this movie was SLOOOOOWWWWWWWW.
I have to assume Cavalline’s intentions are good, that he has a passion for making these movies, and that—I hope—he’s not purposely making them bad. I have to assume that he really does want to make good movies. And the only advice I can offer is the same advice I seem to be offering over and over with these movies: stop hiring your friends to star, and spend some cash for quality equipment. The second one might not be the most attainable goal—things are tough all over, man—but at the very least, the first one ought to be easily corrected, I would think. I’m not saying you gotta go after Johnny Depp or John Tuturro for your next project, but someone who can act wouldn’t be beyond the realm of possibility. Just my two cents, take it for what it’s worth.
As for SERIAL KILLER? I think I’d actually suggest DEMON SLAUGHTER over this piece of crap. And that’s saying something.
C. Dennis Moore is the author of over 60 published short stories and novellas in the speculative fiction genre. Most recent appearances are in the Dark Highlands 2, What Fears Become, Dead Bait 3 and Dark Highways anthologies. His novels are Revelations, and the Angel Hill stories, The Man in the Window, The Third Floor, and The Flip.
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