Turning it over in our heads later, we can assess The Prowler as a metaphor for post-traumatic stress disorder. The "why?" behind that madness-the one question Pam actually does ask of her attacker-goes overtly unaddressed. The masked killer's affect is hidden from us, and like most slasher films, the easy answer is that he's insane.
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What's missing, or at least not fully defined, is a motive. Zito's camera lingers well past the point of comfort, serving to give Savini's murder effects the loving gaze they deserve and to indict the viewer for failing to look away. No guts get unwound and devoured as in Dawn of the Dead or Day of the Dead, but the deaths are prolonged and painfully rendered. On the subject of those kills, they may be some of Savini's best. A double bill would make for some interesting discussion afterwards as Alex Jackson notes in his omnibus reviews of the Friday the 13 th series, the emphasis of that second instalment is likewise on death by penetration, not hacking or cutting. Her contemporary in Friday the 13 th Part 2, Amy Steel, had much the same toolkit, and the two actresses could pass for sisters. This heroine isn't the type to stand around and ask, "Who are you? What do you want?" while the killer lumbers towards her out of a darkened corner-she runs (and looks beautiful doing it), and we root for her to survive and turn the tables. Having researched the early deaths, budding graduate Pam (Dawson) must convince her badly blow-dried local-cop love interest Mark (Christopher Goutman) that new mischief is afoot.Īll this is fertile ground, but only Savini's work and Dawson's performance really come to flower. He's loaded for bear, in other words, and he has an agenda stemming back to a Dear John letter sent from an Avalon Bay co-ed to her serviceman beau fighting abroad. The Prowler, clad in World War II fatigues, helmet, and a camouflage balaclava, carries an array of armaments, unlike the single-weapon Jason Voorhees or Michael Myers. And with the renewed celebration comes a renewed killing spree.
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The isolated Northeastern community of Avalon Bay revives its annual graduation dance, thirty-five years after two teen guests were murdered at the event in 1945. There are no real shocks to be had, beyond the graphic nature of the killings and the choice to open a scare flick with stock '40s newsreel footage. What it lacks, though, is tension and surprise-at least in retrospect. Its closest equivalent is probably Friday the 13 th Part 2, released just six months prior, which likewise coped with horror passed down through the generations. Barberaīy Jefferson Robbins Was it that the flicks got less suspenseful, or that I got savvier? Joseph Zito's The Prowler boasts an intimidating slasher (although "stabber" or "puncturer" is more apt, since he tends to pitchfork and bayonet his victims to death), a complement of gore F/X from the estimable Tom Savini, a compelling backstory that touches on the legacy of war, and a Final Girl (Vicky Dawson) who's fleet, smart, next-door pretty, and resourceful.
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Starring Farley Granger, Vicky Dawson, Christopher Goutman, Cindy Weintraub