Stay up all night with the films that put a new twist on the slasher genre. Along with Halloween (1978), Friday the 13th(1980) and Prom Night (1980), Slumber Party Massacre (1982) helped define the slasher film ethos of the 1980s. Put together by first-time director Amy Holden from a script, titled “Don’t Open the Door,” by feminist author Rita Mae Brown (Rubyfruit Jungle), the film was an immediate hit for Roger Corman’s New World Pictures, eventually spawning two sequels.
Here, for the first time, all three Slumber Party Massacres are brought together in one DVD set, due to drill its way into your heart on Oct. 5, 2010 from Shout! Factory, in association with New Horizons Picture Corporation. The 2-DVD set includes The SLUMBER PARTY MASSACRE: Special Edition, SLUMBER PARTY MASSACRE II, and SLUMBER PARTY MASSACRE III, as well as such killer all-new bonus features as a three-part documentary, “Sleepless Nights: Revisiting The Slumber Party Massacres,” a photo and poster still gallery, and an essay on the Slumber Party phenomenon, “Close Your Eyes For A Second … And Sleep Forever.” A must have collection for all slasher fans and collectors of Roger Corman’s Cult Classics, own the complete set for $24.97 SRP.
Thanks in part to a brilliant marketing campaign pushing a feminist angle because the film was written, produced and directed by women, the story of a girls’ basketball team drilled to death at their celebratory slumber party became a staple in mom-and-pop corner video stores of the 1980s. Bulked in with the “best” of the early slashers, The Slumber Party Massacre (1982) had a secret weapon: a wicked little brain and a dark sense of humor layered between the three nude scenes and one very brief sex scene. The girls take on the masculine roles (playing sports, working as telephone repair women, basketball coaches, carpenters and always willing to fight back against the “Driller Killer”), while the somewhat effeminate boys made the stupid decisions typically played out by women in the subgenre. Additionally, the boys died more violently on screen than their counterparts.
In The Slumber Party Massacre, 18-year-old high schooler Trish (Michelle Michaels) decides to invite her high school girls’ basketball teammates over for a slumber party. What she doesn’t know is that the girls will get an uninvited guest — Russ Thorn, an escaped mental patient and murderer of five people who’s weapon of choice is a portable power drill.
The only sane survivor of the first incident, Courtney (Crystal Bernard of “Wings” fame), dreams of the driller killer returning in the first sequel, Slumber Party Massacre II (1987). She can’t help shake the feeling that she and her friends will be viciously tormented by the killer. Her nightmare becomes reality when the killer returns, reincarnated as an evil rocker with a deadly guitar, who goes about slaying more teens.
The final, installment, Slumber Party Massacre III (1990), is a reimagining of the first film, but with more gore and violence. After a relaxing day at the beach, a group of teens decide to have a slumber party. Their boyfriends predictably show up to scare them, but there is something much scarier lurking in the shadows as the group starts getting attacked by an unknown killer with a fixation on drilling.
Disc 1
The SLUMBER PARTY MASSACRE: Special Edition (1982)
Disc 2
SLUMBER PARTY MASSACRE II (1987) and SLUMBER PARTY MASSACRE III (1990)
Special Features:
· New anamorphic widescreen transfer (1.78:1) of “The Slumber Party Massacre” and “Slumber Party Massacre II”
· All-new three-part documentary: “Sleepless Nights: Revisiting The Slumber Party Massacres”
· Photo and poster still gallery
· Theatrical trailers
