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Overall Rating : 3.5/10
Directed By : Scott Glosserman
Nathan Baesel (Invasion (TV) )
Scott Wilson (In Cold Blood) Robert Englund (A Nightmare on Elm Street)
Zelda Rubinstein (Poltergeist)
Supplied By : Anchor Bay Entertainment
Film Reviewed By : Rick L. Blalock
Date Reviewed : Jun. 7, 2007
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| PLOT The next great psycho horror slasher has given a documentary crew exclusive access to his life as he plans his reign of terror over the sleepy town of Glen Echo, all the while deconstructing the conventions and archetypes of the horror genre for them. |
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| THE REVIEW BEHIND THE MASK : THE RISE OF LESLIE VERNON is part a "documentary and then part old fashion slasher. Taylor and here glad student pals, are brought in because they are working on a project and want to document the life of a young man named Leslie Mancuso. At first glance, Leslie is seemingly a very mild mannered young man with quite the personality, but he is really a completely different person deep down. Leslie has been inspired by a local legend from a small nearby town called Glen Echo. The legend tells of a boy named Leslie Vernon whom killed his parents, more descriptively, you hanged his Mother in the family orchard. Later the boy presumably died himself. Totally fascinated by the story of Vernon, the other Leslie, Leslie Mancuso has since then adopted the legends identity. The documentary team has joined up with the killer at the very opportune time as he is beginning preparation for his next kill. The film and Mancuso then go on to show the viewer the strategies and planning like a Michael Myers or Jason Voorhees would utilize in order to execute a killing spree. We meet his mentor, a former killer himself, and the guy responsible for showing him the ropes, we learn of the types of victims that are ideal for the serial killer and we are walked through a game plan all before the event begins. The film alternates between home video style cameras to high definition cameras in an attempt to show us the 2 sides of every murderous killer. Everywhere I have went online for the past few months where it pertains to movies, and Horror in general, there has been no possible way to escape the ads for BEHIND THE MASK : THE RISE OF LESLIE VERNON. Honestly I thought it was just another slasher flick, which I am not complaining as I love Slashers, and will watch them no matter how many times to tired plots are rehashed. It really, did look interesting...and then it came out to limited theaters and festivals were it began to get enormous praise. Since I have been a slasher fan for a long time, it's just common knowledge that I know a slasher film doesn't usually get this kind of praise traditionally, so there had to have been something non-traditional. Well I was right, this isn't exactly the slasher I thought it was, and the one that the posters promote it to be - it's basically a comedy wrapped up in Horror propaganda advertising. For the first hour of this 91 minute film it is basically a documentary about this guy Leslie Mancuso whom is supposed to be a Serial Killer. But really he doesn't seem like one he appeals to the viewer more like a class clown as he cracks jokes, that to be honest, I didn't think were funny at all. By the time Leslie and the crew go meet up with Leslie's "mentor", Eugene and his Wife, and they engage in conversations in which they talk of fictitious characters like Freddy Krueger, and Michael Myers being "real" people as in real historic killers, I thought to myself "just what in the hell is this that I am watching here?" it literally took me about 45 minutes to finally grasp and realize that this is a spoof that takes it self way too seriously, and in all honestly it became dull pretty quickly as this has all been done before in films like THE LAST HORROR MOVE, and although this is a slightly better film, it's still far from as original as people are praising BEHIND THE MASK to be. Perhaps the only redeeming thing about this movie to me are the random appearances of some of Horror's more iconic figures,(Kane Hodder - Jason 7-10, Robert Englund - Freddy Krueger, and Zelda Rubinstein - Tangina from Poltergeist), and the High definition shot scenes that alternate from the documentary cams when Leslie makes a kill, which actually feel like a real Horror movie. Speaking of that, after an hour of the documentary like footage, the ide is essentially put aside and the remaining half hour or so turns out to be a full blown Horror film. To me this is certainly where the film picks up, but it was just all a little too late. As leslie moves in to execute the plan he's been mapping out the whole film, the film crew have second thoughts and begin to regret any aid or motivation they may have given Leslie. The try to stop Leslie's plan from happening, more importantly Taylor who is the leader of the Documenting team, and in a plot twist she learns that she has been a part of Leslie's plan all along. It was a great twist, but it had not enough development to make the impact I think that it wanted, over all the whole execution of the action scenes felt like just another average B-Movie. I think that BEHIND THE MASK : THE RISE OF LESLIE VERNON, wanted to be a groundbreaking film, the film that told you the secrets of all of film's most notorious killers. The film goes as for as to show you how Leslie manipulates weapons(i.e he splits the handle of an axe so when an innocent victim tries to use it, it will break) all the way to the breaking of tree limbs, so no victim can escape via tree. When these things were being showed, about the only thing I could think was how stupid it was and "do Horror fans even care?" When fans see I guy like Jason Voorhees kicking ass, they aren't going to stop and say, "well Jason must've planted that weapon before hand", for an idea seen as "clever" some, I thought it was ridiculous for the most part. speaking of clever, some people are calling BEHIND THE MASK "more cleverer than SCREAM, how is a movie that has just one character that is self aware of the happenings even comparable to a whole movie that is self aware? Overall, I didn't really care for this movie, as for the most part it was dull and dry of any entertainment value in my opinion. It starts to pick up towards the end but it just wasn't enough. A lot of time was spend setting up and explaining a spoof, but not enough time was spent showing the executions in the action sequences. To close, I will end by saying that BEHIND THE MASK : THE RISE OF LESLIE VERNON, is probably one of the most over-hyped films I have read about or seen, I just don't get what all this buzz is about. |
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| GORE
METER 2/10 Very little blood is shown, a hint of an impalement and a few other minor gory moments, nothing special. |
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| MUSICAL
SCORE 2.5/10 The score, displayed mostly in the film's, more "Horror movie-like" moments, is really nothing special, it feels generic, which kind of fits due to the fact that it feels like a pseudo Slasher film anyway.... |
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| OVERALL
IMPRESSION OF THE FILM When reading of all the hype this film has got in a relatively short amount of time, I actually expected a completely different type of film. I expected something like a real portrayal of a Serial Killer, like a film such as HENRY : A PORTRAIT OF A SERIAL KILLER. Having just watched HENRY recently, and still being amazed by that film, imagine how it feels to watch a movie this disappointing. Again, with all of the hype surrounding this film, and its positive at that, which means many will see it.. but as for myself I wouldn't say I recommend it. This DVD will be available June 26, 2007 |
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