WHY is Lee Grant in this film????
Baffles me why she signed on to do this.
Perhaps it wasn't a slasher-film when she began, and the gore was added later.
And this cost over 5 million to make!?
Lee Grant decided to do this picture because I wrote it for her, and she and I wanted to do something intriguing. If you look beyond the gore, every seven pages required, you will see that this is a movie about women struggling for power in a man's world. She and I designed this ourselves as a reason to do it. Look closely: Michael Ironside is seen in quarter light in the first part, then half light, then full light. He represented the forces that were holding back women at that time. Lee Grant and I had worked before and she trusted me. She and I were happy with what we did. I was signed to scare people, and I wanted Lee to do the picture. She agreed if we could make a statement on which to hang the scares. We did, we were happy, those who were looking for something behind the violence were happy. The picture works, made a fortune, has a cult following because good horror is about SOMETHING. It is not meaningless violence. When you write that way, as I have done for all the scary movies I have done, the audience senses something is going on behind the fear...and they are right. Brian Taggert
shareI gotta hand it to ya. I let this movie fly under my radar for years. I finally picked up the DVD and I was amazed. This movie has everything the American slashers of that time period lacked. Excellent performances, thought-provoking subtext. Instead of having teenage girls plucked off one by one in various stages of undress, it features women of different ages and backgrounds, all of which are very unique characters, all of which respond in their own way to the killer. That's just something you don't see in US slashers of the time.
And Michael Ironside is just f'n creepy in this. I've always liked him and think he's good at playing sleazy in an effective way, but this just takes the cake. The first scene made me scream out loud.
It will end again in bullets, friend
If you look beyond the gore, every seven pages required, you will see that this is a movie about women struggling for power in a man's world. She and I designed this ourselves as a reason to do it. Look closely: Michael Ironside is seen in quarter light in the first part, then half light, then full light. He represented the forces that were holding back women at that time.
VH is one of my favorite slasher thrillers from the era in which it was made. It delivered the goods in terms of suspense, atmosphere and violence. The film wasn't overtly graphic, yet it was protracted and disturbing violence. It made the violence ugly and terrifying and it takes a lot of skill to get this right.
I also feel the film could have also been trimmed by about 5mins in the editing room to tighten it up a little. This is a minor quibble though.
As far as your statement goes about writing the film to make a point about the struggle of women for power in a man's world is a bit of a stretch though. Are you inferring women want the same sort of power as men? This film is about a misogynist killer only and it was underdeveloped in representing Colt's resentment and only depicted this in some rather vague flashbacks. All I can make out of it, and I have seen the film umpteen times, is that Colt begrudged his mother for throwing hot oil on his father and for leaving them.
Taking on the domestic violence theme is also not indicative of how most men treat women and while Deborah was fighting for justice for an abused woman at the start, it hardly conveyed any profound or nuanced ideology about abused wives and what they should get away with to get out of the toxic relationships.
Deborah Ballin was a headstrong and feisty woman. Grant acted the part very well, but the film is still veneer and ultimately only a horror suspense film made for shock value, nothing more, nothing less. share