Horror subgenres are cyclical. After the slasher boom, we moved on to possession, haunted house, J-Horror and found footage movies and not necessarily in that order. I’m sure someone important once said that after 10 years we move back to the original “big thing”, so a decade after the late 90s slasher boom I waited with baited breath for the next wave and aside from an awesome My Bloody Valentine remake and a sorely disappointing Friday the 13th re-do, it never came. You can perhaps understand then why I was excited to hear about Bloody Homecoming.
This love letter to 80s slashers introduces us to a group of high school friends who – shock horror – are actually young and not 37 playing 17. When one of the group Annie, is nearly date raped by her douchebag boyfriend Billy, her awesome gal pal Loren (who was my favourite character) locks his ass in a closet. Sir douche then accidentally sets himself on fire and dies a horrible death, which many would argue he deserved for being a rapist. We jump ahead 3 years to the first Homecoming dance in like forever and someone in a fireman’s outfit starts bumping off the gang, starting with the poor traumatised intended rape victim who finally takes some pole, as the killer’s weapon of choice is a sharpened spirit stick (lame).
Bloody Homecoming initially showed a lot of promise. Aesthetically, it’s quite glossy for a low budget affair, the killer looks awesome (although a fire axe would have been a better weapon in my opinion), and the cast of unknowns do well. It is also fairly bloody and there are even a few nice chase scenes thrown in for good measure which leads me sadly to the downside. The score seems terribly misaligned, with what I would consider to be more what you would call theme music (which would have been great during the chase scenes) being used for incidental stuff and vice versa. Some of the acting is poor and the scenes at the dance itself are let down by the fact they must have only had about 20 extras, so where you’d usually see a crowded dance floor we had a group of 3 girls dancing round their handbags in a corner, which meant the atmosphere at the dance was flat (or as some may say – totes meh).
Despite featuring a whole heap of clichés (not least of all the characters e.g. a jock, a bitchy cheerleader, a goth, a gay guy etc.) the film manages to seem fresh and fun with some snappy dialogue and witty one-liners which would make Kevin Williamson proud and the killer’s reveal is both surprising and very well acted.
OVERALL SUMMARY
Bloody Homecoming is best described as Prom Night meets My Super Psycho Sweet Sixteen. It’s not quite as good as either of those titles, but it’s a promising start from screenwriter Jake Helgren and director Brian C. Weed.
