SLASHED DREAMS isn't a horror movie, isn't a revenge thriller, isn't a romance, isn't social commentary, it's, well, not much of anything.
First the good news. Pretty much all of the people involved in this continued working and some did well. Robert Englund, of course, made the ELM STREET films. The editor went on to be nominated for an Oscar for DIE HARD. And the movie does have some parts that are fitfully entertaining.
The bad news is that it's dull. It's dull as dishwater and, at an hour and fourteen minutes, seems endless.
It's not a musical but it has songs, lots of them. Every once in a while the plot screeches to a halt while a young woman sings (fairly well) and then two or three minutes later the plot gets back in gear.
The script is the main culprit.
We start on a college campus. Marshall, a big shot in his fraternity, is dating Jenny, who looks as much like Ali McGraw in LOVE STORY (a college student named Jenny in that hugely popular film) as possible without hiring Ali McGraw. Jenny is friends with Robert, who is strong but sensitive. Jenny has gotten a letter from Michael, (Robert Englund, in a good performance), a man who, like Thoreau, has gone to the woods to find the meaning of life. In Psychology class the professor (Peter Brown from BIG VALLEY) and the students discuss values. Then the scene changes and we never see the professor again despite his prominent billing in the opening titles.
At a party Marshall humiliates a pledge and treats Jenny like dirt. Finally everyone, including nice girl Tina, heads out to visit Michael. After an incident of road rage Jenny breaks up with Marshall and only she and Robert go on to look for Michael. The other characters and subplots are abandoned.
After many scenes of driving they come to a small town and go into a general store owned by Rudy Valee, whose career had been revived a few years prior to this film by his work on Broadway in HOW TO SUCCEED IN BUSINESS WITHOUT REALLY TRYING and the film version of that show. Valee sings and talks about the old days of show business, then warns Robert and Jenny that they shouldn't hike to Michael's cabin because they might wind up being hunted. He tries to sell them a knife, they decline, and another subplot lies in the dust.
Rudy Valee's dialog would seem to set us up for a BLAIR WITCH ADVENTURE situation almost a quarter of a century before that film was made. Instead the story goes in more mundane directions. And Valee, seventy some years old, is the best thing about the film: this would be a zero star film but it got two for Valee and two for Robert Englund playing a nice person.
We watch endless footage of Robert and Jenny walking and walking. They climb a steep hill while a terrible song called "Animals Are Clumsy Too" reminds us how humorless what's happening is. They get to Michael's cabin but he's not home, so they go skinny dipping.
At this point screenwriter/actor James Keach realizes that he's given us tons and tons of exposition but the title SLASHED DREAMS is not appropriate to the soap opera romance he's written so he introduces two psychos to menace the lovebirds. Keach (who at this point in life looked a lot like Buster Keaton) plays one of them and overacts. The other one gets far less dialog. Hey, if I'd written this I'd have given myself the best lines, too.
Robert and Jenny get back to the cabin and have a firelit love scene, then the psychos intrude and do the things psychos are supposed to do in movies like this. They have no motivation for this, but the screenplay says they do it. Robert and Jenny survive but are much the worse for wear.
Michael arrives and they tell him what happened. Since we've watched random story elements from DELIVERANCE, DEATH WISH, and STRAW DOGS we figure that the third act will be bloody retribution. This would provide a nice character arc for these intellectual young people who seem so introspective in nature.
Instead Robert goes after the psychos with an ax and has a fight and they leave, and Michael tells him they won't be back. He has no way to know that, but it's what the script says.
In the cabin Jenny reads (I think it's from THE PROPHET, which everyone was still reading in 1975) about pain. Another skinny dipping scene, then the lovebirds start back toward their everyday lives sadder but wiser.
The closing titles run over a freeze frame of the lovebirds, Jenny's Ali McGraw style hair artfully backlit by the setting sun.
The romantic triangle on campus could have been a whole film. The idealism/materialism theme introduced in the campus scenes could have been a whole film. The old time entertainer leaving the bright lights of Hollywood to live in a wide place in the road could have been a whole film. The theme of a man turning his back on society to live a life of contemplation could have been a excellent film, with Jenny and Robert the snakes in his Eden ultimately forcing him to make a hard choice. The two (possibly inbred) madmen were a cliché in 1975 and should have stayed on the cutting floor.
I love horror movies, especially the Friday THE 13TH and HALLOWEEN types where I can shout "Don't go upstairs!" to characters and royally confuse my family because I watch movies with headphones after midnight and we live in a one story house. Watching SLASHED DREAMS I wanted to shout at the screenwriter, "Pick one story and tell IT!"
First the good news. Pretty much all of the people involved in this continued working and some did well. Robert Englund, of course, made the ELM STREET films. The editor went on to be nominated for an Oscar for DIE HARD. And the movie does have some parts that are fitfully entertaining.
The bad news is that it's dull. It's dull as dishwater and, at an hour and fourteen minutes, seems endless.
It's not a musical but it has songs, lots of them. Every once in a while the plot screeches to a halt while a young woman sings (fairly well) and then two or three minutes later the plot gets back in gear.
The script is the main culprit.
We start on a college campus. Marshall, a big shot in his fraternity, is dating Jenny, who looks as much like Ali McGraw in LOVE STORY (a college student named Jenny in that hugely popular film) as possible without hiring Ali McGraw. Jenny is friends with Robert, who is strong but sensitive. Jenny has gotten a letter from Michael, (Robert Englund, in a good performance), a man who, like Thoreau, has gone to the woods to find the meaning of life. In Psychology class the professor (Peter Brown from BIG VALLEY) and the students discuss values. Then the scene changes and we never see the professor again despite his prominent billing in the opening titles.
At a party Marshall humiliates a pledge and treats Jenny like dirt. Finally everyone, including nice girl Tina, heads out to visit Michael. After an incident of road rage Jenny breaks up with Marshall and only she and Robert go on to look for Michael. The other characters and subplots are abandoned.
After many scenes of driving they come to a small town and go into a general store owned by Rudy Valee, whose career had been revived a few years prior to this film by his work on Broadway in HOW TO SUCCEED IN BUSINESS WITHOUT REALLY TRYING and the film version of that show. Valee sings and talks about the old days of show business, then warns Robert and Jenny that they shouldn't hike to Michael's cabin because they might wind up being hunted. He tries to sell them a knife, they decline, and another subplot lies in the dust.
Rudy Valee's dialog would seem to set us up for a BLAIR WITCH ADVENTURE situation almost a quarter of a century before that film was made. Instead the story goes in more mundane directions. And Valee, seventy some years old, is the best thing about the film: this would be a zero star film but it got two for Valee and two for Robert Englund playing a nice person.
We watch endless footage of Robert and Jenny walking and walking. They climb a steep hill while a terrible song called "Animals Are Clumsy Too" reminds us how humorless what's happening is. They get to Michael's cabin but he's not home, so they go skinny dipping.
At this point screenwriter/actor James Keach realizes that he's given us tons and tons of exposition but the title SLASHED DREAMS is not appropriate to the soap opera romance he's written so he introduces two psychos to menace the lovebirds. Keach (who at this point in life looked a lot like Buster Keaton) plays one of them and overacts. The other one gets far less dialog. Hey, if I'd written this I'd have given myself the best lines, too.
Robert and Jenny get back to the cabin and have a firelit love scene, then the psychos intrude and do the things psychos are supposed to do in movies like this. They have no motivation for this, but the screenplay says they do it. Robert and Jenny survive but are much the worse for wear.
Michael arrives and they tell him what happened. Since we've watched random story elements from DELIVERANCE, DEATH WISH, and STRAW DOGS we figure that the third act will be bloody retribution. This would provide a nice character arc for these intellectual young people who seem so introspective in nature.
Instead Robert goes after the psychos with an ax and has a fight and they leave, and Michael tells him they won't be back. He has no way to know that, but it's what the script says.
In the cabin Jenny reads (I think it's from THE PROPHET, which everyone was still reading in 1975) about pain. Another skinny dipping scene, then the lovebirds start back toward their everyday lives sadder but wiser.
The closing titles run over a freeze frame of the lovebirds, Jenny's Ali McGraw style hair artfully backlit by the setting sun.
The romantic triangle on campus could have been a whole film. The idealism/materialism theme introduced in the campus scenes could have been a whole film. The old time entertainer leaving the bright lights of Hollywood to live in a wide place in the road could have been a whole film. The theme of a man turning his back on society to live a life of contemplation could have been a excellent film, with Jenny and Robert the snakes in his Eden ultimately forcing him to make a hard choice. The two (possibly inbred) madmen were a cliché in 1975 and should have stayed on the cutting floor.
I love horror movies, especially the Friday THE 13TH and HALLOWEEN types where I can shout "Don't go upstairs!" to characters and royally confuse my family because I watch movies with headphones after midnight and we live in a one story house. Watching SLASHED DREAMS I wanted to shout at the screenwriter, "Pick one story and tell IT!"