Slasher films are targets of scorn from critics and other high-minded pillars of the community, yet a nonstop source of fun for movie buffs. Adam Rockoff’s 2002 study GOING TO PIECES: THE RISE AND FALL OF THE SLASHER FILM, 1978-1986 stands as the definitive guide to this sub-genre – extremely well-written and well-researched, with neither a dry spot nor scholarly leaning within its pages.

Now the same can be said for the documentary based on the book, GOING TO PIECES: THE RISE AND FALL OF THE SLASHER FILM, originally broadcast last Halloween on the Starz cable channel and now out on DVD.

In the book, Rockoff is quick to defend his beloved slashers, making a good point about how tame they are violence-wise when compared to the body count of actioners like COMMANDO and RAMBO III. Better yet, he’s honest; as willing as he is to call HALLOWEEN a classic (and it is), he’s just as willing to call a stinker a stinker (and there are more than a few). By interviewing some of the prinicples behind the seminal slashers – and even the fringe ones – Rockoff gives us a detailed and eye-opening all-access pass into some juicy, behind-the-scenes stories. And who knew there were any such tales to be told regarding TERROR TRAIN, HAPPY BIRTHDAY TO ME or MY BLOODY VALENTINE?

The documentary seems practically lifted from the pages, with the added benefit of bloody footage from the films being discussed. (It’s one thing to read about SLEEPAWAY CAMP’s disturbing twist ending, but another thing altogether to see the damned thing.) In addition to the heavy-hitters, the B- and C-titles like those above are given equal time, making them appear even more watchable than they actually are in full. Though the filmmakers – that includes Rockoff, who scripted – deserve credit for seeking so many on-camera participants out; I only wish they wouldn’t have employed the annoyingly pretentious device of having them walk while talking.

From the slashers’ early days of PSYCHO to its post-modern parody days of SCREAM and SCARY MOVIE (and, in the doc, the current revival with the likes of SAW and HOSTEL), Rockoff has all the gory bases covered. If Michael Myers, Jason Voorhees and Freddy Krueger are your idea of a good time, his book was written just for you. Ditto the doc. –Rod Lott

Buy it at Amazon.

When I was 13, a friend gave me Stephen King’s CYCLE OF THE WEREWOLF for my birthday. Though I was overjoyed, my mom wasn’t too thrilled with Bernie Wrightson’s illustrations of disembodied pig heads and werewolf sex. Yet a year later, she had no problem dropping me off at Northpark Cinema 4 to see the book’s R-rated adaptation, SILVER BULLET, recently re-released as part of a sweet, affordable DVD box set containing new special editions of PET SEMATARY, THE DEAD ZONE and, um, GRAVEYARD SHIFT.

Not exactly a novel, CYCLE depicts a tense year in the town of Tarker’s Mills as its residents are terrorized by the unexplained arrival of a lycanthrope, with each short chapter representing a month. For the most part, the chapters aren’t even related, and with their sheer brevity, they come off like tone poems rather than pieces of an overall linear tale.

That’s not a criticism of CYCLE, and King transplanted a majority of those 12 stories into his own screenplay for SILVER BULLET. There’s the attack on the lonely fat woman, there’s the mauling of the cop in his car, there’s the kid flying the kite for the very last time. But a series of thinly related sketches wouldn’t work as a film, so King chose to center his narrative on Marty, the disabled kid who escapes death by shooting the werewolf’s eye with a bottle rocket.

Corey Haim stars as Marty, a casting decision that immediately dates the film. But it’s Haim before his testicles descended, so it’s all good. While every other townsperson falls victim to the werewolf despite having two legs, it’s the disabled kid stuck in the wheelchair who outlasts them all. He gets help from his homely sister (Megan Follows) and their crazy drunk uncle, “played” by Gary Busey.

Busey is incredible in this flick, and by “incredible,” I mean semi-retarded. And this was a few years before his head-injury-causing motorcycle accident. There’s this amazing reaction shot at the end where the werewolf bursts through the wall, and Busey’s looking right into the camera and goes through half a dozen amazing facial contortions in the span of half a second. Hilarious.

TWIN PEAKS‘ Everett McGill plays the town reverend, who tries to plead with his congregation not to kill the beast. (Semi-related side note: King’s decision to greatly compress time for the film was smart, because I never believed the rev could go unnoticed for three months as he does in the book.) LOST’s Terry O’Quinn has a small role as the sheriff, and RESERVOIR DOGS‘ Lawrence Tierney is, appropriately, a bartender.

As a whole, the film is fairly cheesy, but what does one expect from a mid-’80s effort from producer Dino DeLaurentiis? I’d argue that it’s comfortably cheesy, because it’s enjoyable for all of its 95 minutes, and has its share of good scenes of horror. In these days of CGI overkill, it’s actually quite nice to see a werewolf that’s just a guy in a suit.

Today’s audiences likely would laugh at Carlo Rambaldi’s work on the monster –  as well as the entire film –  but I have to admit a soft spot for this one. I think I even liked it more today than the several times I saw it two decades ago. CYCLE is kind of an interesting one-off experiment – the calendar as novella –  but SILVER BULLET brings its ideas to life. –Rod Lott

Buy it at Amazon.