HauntedWeen (1991)
Directed by Doug Robertson
Some slashers have great titles: Friday the 13th, Nightmares in a Damaged Brain, My Bloody Valentine, to mention a few. Others get named HauntedWeen, and somehow that sticks. Like was Possessed Cock already taken? All jokes aside, does a bad title make for a bad movie?
HauntedWeen is about some frat bros wanting to raise money to keep their frat going. So they start a haunted house attraction at the local creepy house. Little do they know, the boy whom once lived there has returned and is really killing people. Sure we’ve seen it before, the movie is called HALLOWEEN, shit it is also called Offerings, but have we seen it with a madman hitting a dude’s head off with a baseball bat in front of 10 year old children? I THINK NOT!
Yeah this movie is basically a shit Halloween ripoff. Those are a dime a dozen, Offerings and Final Exam are two that I can name instantly off the top of my head and there are many others. All hail Tubi! I have to say it each time guys, I mean this shit is on Tubi so I HAD to watch it. Does this movie do anything to make itself stand out from those? Yes and no. Yes it does stand out, but not until the last 20 minutes. The rest of the movie is just a paint by numbers Halloween movie. A young boy kills a girl years ago, he returns decades later and starts killing people back home again. I’m also not sure how this kid, named Eddie btw, wasn’t instantly fingered as the murderer. The cop in town sees Eddie wearing the mask, even talks to him and compliments him on it. Then when Eddie kills the girl, he drops the mask and runs away. Not too hard to figure out, I mean no need to call in Matlock here. Ok quick side tangent. My parents watched a lot of Matlock when I was a kid, and I said one time “what if Matlock is the one doing all these murders, but he’s so smart that he’s able to pin it on other people?” Think about that shit! Anyway, Eddie is able to escape with his mom and “go away for a while”. Then she dies and he’s like “well shit, guess I’m going home to kill college kids.” Yeah most of the college kids are at least in their mid 30s with receding hairlines haha.
The acting. Well, it isn’t great. There are some likable characters at least. The character of Hanks is kind of a dolt, but he’s charming and wacky at the same time. Think Styles from Teen Wolf mixed with Waldo Geraldo Faldo from Family Matters. Never thought I’d be making a Waldo Faldo reference but here we are…coo! Theres also our main character, Kurt and his girlfriend Melanie. Whom is hot sometimes, and other times she’s meh. I can’t quite figure her out. Anyhoo, Kurt gets too much bro time and his girl wants attention, so she’s pissy with him nearly the whole movie, great female character! As far as I know Brad Hanks, whom plays Hanks, ironically isn’t related to Tom Hanks, missed opportunity!
The kills are ok. I mean, this has the leg up on Deadly Manor at least, because it isn’t all throat slits. The favorite of mine, I already mentioned and that is the baseball bat knocking the dude’s block off. That made me laugh. What is a slasher movie without nudity? This movie has a fair share. There is a scene when Kurtski and Melanie are at the beach and a pontoon full of the frat Chads flies up and this one blonde girl has her top off. Normally I wouldn’t really mention this because it has nothing to do with the story but this woman has some pretty awesome boobs (see left, I’m mean, cmon), I mean Debi Sue Voorhees level boobs. If you know what I mean, and I think you do!
All in all, HauntedWeen might have one of the lamest names for a slasher, but it was watchable, hell even decently fun at times. Sadly it takes a little while to get there. The beginning drags. The constant calling of characters names is annoying. We know the kid’s name is Eddie, you don’t have to say it 5 times in a conversation. The music is lousy, like casio keyboard bleeps and bloops trying to ripoff Halloween, it happens. This is hard to grade, its average, but fun so I’ll give this a C+.
