January 5, 2016

This week for Double Take, instead of looking at a remake and it’s original, we’re going to spice things up a bit and instead pick two similar themed “slashers” and pair them up to see if they work as a double feature. I was joined by my Killer POV co-host Elric Kane for this presentation of SLAUGHTERHOUSE, freshly out on Blu-Ray from 88 Films, paired up with the notorious AXE, also now available on Blu-Ray as a double bill with another Frederick R. Friedel rarely seen cult classic KIDNAPPED COED courtesy of Severin Films.

First up, SLAUGHTERHOUSE! I’ve been waiting years and years to see this one! It was one of those notorious VHS boxes that I’d stare at and always see at the video store, but for whatever reason, this film seems to have eluded me during the peak of my teenage horror fandom. And to the best of my knowledge, a proper DVD release was never readily accessible. But alas, the fine fiends over at 88 Films have done the Lord’s work by delivering us a high definition restoration of this bizarre fright flick.

As the poster and box art tag line promises, “Buddy has an axe to grind. A big axe.” And does he ever! Buddy is part Leatherface, part HILLS HAVE EYES family member, and all biker dude. Played by the ginormous Joe B. Burton, Buddy is a “slow” fellow that has a kindship with his pigs and tends to squeal and squeak out loud instead of actually talk. He lives with his father just outside of town in their rundown, dilapidated slaughterhouse. 3 former colleagues – the Sheriff, the Mayor and a former butcher turned competition, are giving gool ol’ Lester Bacon (Don Barrett) one last chance to sell the properly and get out, otherwise they’ll be forced out by the end of the month.

Lester is bitter about the whole thing, and when he stumbles upon a few of Buddy’s teenage victim’s bodies in the plant, he decides to use his son’s penchant for murder and aim it at those responsible for taking his slaughterhouse! Meanwhile, there are other traditional 80’s teens in this movie. Hence where Buddy got his first batch of victims. They were hanging around the slaughterhouse and messing with his pigs, which made them the opening scene victims! Their friends are also shooting a horror movie on their own camcorder, so armed with a handful of goofy masks from the convenience store, they look for the creepiest local place they can find to shoot in, which leads them to the slaughterhouse of course!

Probably the best scene of the entire movie comes in around the beginning of the third act where the kids are hanging out at the old slaughterhouse. The two boys tell the girls to go and hide inside and they’re going to sneak in and scare them. It’s intended to just been a fun goof, but it starts pouring and ol’ Buddy is sneaking up behind one of the boys with his giant cleaver in the rain as Liz (Sherry Leigh) watches from inside. In fact, this entire stalk and kill section is one of the best I’ve seen in an 80’s “slasher” movie and taken out of context would actually make for a super strong and terrifying opening! But alas, the movie instead follows two rather awkward and different toned storylines concurrently. One of the teenage kids, the dance and their movie; the other with Lester & Buddy plotting revenge against the 3 people trying to get them out of the slaughterhouse for good!

It’s not a great “slasher” movie, but it has enough interesting stuff throughout to make it worth a watch. And Buddy is kind of gross. In high def, you can see every speck of dirt and grim on him, not to mention a little snot in his beard. I felt like I could just smell him! Oof!

Up next, simply because of the title was AXE, the feature film debut by Frederick R. Friedel that clocks in at a lean 67 minutes! Before anything else, you have to watch this trailer, because I’d seen it play a dozen times before several local revival screenings and it’s always made me want to see this movie!

Now, that looks pretty bonkers, right? It is definitely an interesting slice of cult cinema, but it’s not exactly as awesome as the above trailer would have you believe. It’s a fairly low budget affair that feels like it picks up right in the middle of a mobster thriller with 3 thugs beating up and killing two men and then retreating to the countryside. In route, they stop and sadistically harass a convenience store clerk in a scene that feels quirky enough to be refurnished for a future Quentin Tarantino movie. They end up at the secluded house of Lisa (played by Leslie Lee, who bears a striking resemble to Mary Elizabeth Winstead) and her invalid mute grandfather that she takes care of. The 3 men force themselves to stay for a while and when one of them sneaks into her room to make a move on her, the unstable gal cracks and breaks out a straight razor, followed by her axe! (Well, technically hatchet.)

It’s lean, mean and saves the minimal bloodshed for the closing few minutes, but it feels like a unique college film from an intriguing new voice. Friedel followed this up almost immediately with KIDNAPPED COED, which is also included in this Blu-Ray set. And both films fell victim to a distributor that pretty much took them, made a bunch of money and ran. Friedel never got to financially enjoy his first two feature length films and hence left the movie business. There’s a great documentary on this disc that tells the whole story that I strongly recommend after you do the double feature yourself. (Either with our suggested SLAUGHTERHOUSE or KIDNAPPED COED.)

So how do they play together? It’s actually a fitting and crazy little double bill filled with thrills, eccentric characters, wacky kills and an axe here, an axe there! Now that both are available in great quality releases, they’re worth pairing up to watch with a group of friends!