Such a frustrating disappointment

I wanted to but couldn't!

Excellent but underrated film

This movie was so-so. It had it's moments, but wasn't the greatest.

As soon as I saw Cameron's Mitchell's name in the cast list, I knew this movie would stink. If that guy ever did a good film, I've yet to see it. And yet, he's the best thing MEMORIAL VALLEY MASSACRE has to offer.Made at the tail end of the slasher-movie craze, this "Friday the 13th" retread is about a newly-opened campground terrorized by a serial killer—in this case, a feral teen-ager with gag teeth, a New York Dolls wig, and a Party Express caveman suit. Seems the kid was lost in the woods years ago during a botched ransom drop and doesn't want obnoxious campers despoiling his home. Can't say I blame him.The basic tenets of a slasher flick are here: remote location; lousy acting; shallow, obnoxious characters; killings that eschew feasibility; an authority figure (a park ranger named George) who wants the murders kept quiet; the young idealist (David, the owner's son) who defies him; a main character with a link to the killer; a tie-in with a holiday (in this case, Memorial Day); and plenty of room for a sequel. What it lacks are the scares and suspense of the genre's better films. We learn the killer's motives and identity way too soon, and the killings are light on the gore. There's also no nudity unless you count the wet T-shirt dance that a shapely lass performs in the rain. Is it really a slasher film without gratuitous nudity and gore?Some say this film is "so bad, it's good." I disagree; it's just bad.Item: The movie's tagline reads, "Just when you thought it was safe to go back in the tent…."Item: Early in the film, George pulls a dead dog up from deep in the camp's well. There are two ropes tied around the animal. It's never explained how they came to be tied to the dog's submerged carcass.Item: After George spends the first 15 minutes of the film insulting and berating David, he tells the kid, "It's nothing personal."Item: William Smith appears as a retired Brigadier General who is camping in a soundproofed Winnebago. He never leaves the mobile home, which makes me wonder what he's doing in the woods to begin with. The character also has no bearing on the storyline, which makes me think someone involved with the film owed Smith a favor.Item: The overly-dramatic score attempts (unsuccessfully) to elicit tension the film itself lacks.

I think the makers of "Memorial Valley Massacre" may have been trying to capture the heyday of the slasher film even as the genre was on its last legs. Squeaky-voiced fat kid? Check! Slutty Girl? Check! Cameron Mitchell? Check! I'm just still not sure if they meant it to be a comedy or not.Plotwise, we've got people at a campground and some murders. But there IS a discussion about torrential rain that won't let up, even when it's obviously bone dry. It also becomes Memorial Day at 5am too. That reminded me of Slaughter High, where April Fool's day ends at noon. MVM has a decent body count but no real gore (at least in the version I have). And it seems to go on forever, even with a mere 90-minute runtime. Absolutely awful.

***POTENTIAL SPOILERS*** (Not that they'll hurt this trite.) My Mom has a tendency to buy some generally crappy box sets of generally crappy old, forgotten-for-a-reason horror movies that even the most ardent horror fans look at with confusion at the sub-substandard films listed therein. That's where I found this little gem. In a box set I swiped from my Mom. There's a reason some of these movies end up stuffed into half-assed box sets. Let me enlighten you on the many reasons this claptrap ended up stuffed away in a bottom-feeding box set.First off, wow. Just, wow. The movie starts off right from the gate with crappiness as the opening title is painfully lame. It's a "rustic" ye olde west style font with bright yellow and orange colors and a faked 3-D look. It slides into view from the right of the screen akin to the first PowerPoint presentation of a high school student who just learned how to have a text box slide into view. The film revolves around a national park/campground which, despite being unfinished, is now open for business. Most of this "terrifying" film takes place in daylight, by the way, so picture that atmosphere. Well, there appear to be some omens afoot, all of which appear to look bad, none of which are ever investigated—like the deaths of two dogs, theft from the park manager's office, a window knocked out of a storage shed, stuff like that. All manner of clichéd guests arrive and stay at this campground which, mind you, doesn't even appear to have camping spots fleshed out so that we are met with a montage scene of people haphazardly setting up camp, backing over trees, chopping down other trees (one of which, mind you, falls over below the level at which it was being cut) and stupid stuff like this, all accompanied with dreadfully happy music. Turns out, there's hardly a massacre going on here at all (another one of those old horror films with blatantly misleading titles to draw in an audience), just some stupid mountain wild-man dressed in cliché caveman garb who terrorizes people. By the way, he's also the long-lost son of someone important in the film—a fact which is all-too-easily figured out--so don't try to call me out on that as a spoiler. This film has all the clichés: The old guy who dramatically tells of mysterious backgrounds, the badass biker gang, the slutty chick and obnoxious teenagers, the tough guy connected to the plot twist, and the lone sweet girl who predictably falls for the "handsome" hero guy.There are some occasionally nice death scenes, but some of them could've used some foreshadowing or additional thought. There's a big trap built by the wild-man just like the one in Mel Gibson's Apocalypto (which I've also just recently seen) but some foreshadowing would've been nice to tie to the beginning of the film to the end—just like Gibson did in his film. Here, no such luck. The trap comes out of nowhere and makes little sense compared to extremely simple nature of the wild-man. There is no depth at all and the acting is just plain bad. Boring, mundane, clichéd characters that have little to say that's even remotely interesting or for that matter--plot relevant. Zero atmosphere. Also, I don't think a series of killings done over a few days by a scared/crazy guy trying to (apparently) protect his territory necessarily count as a massacre. Stupid things like the wild-man supposedly starting a tractor and allowing it to run into a building happen that don't make any sense. Hell, several people are killed by simply not walking away from their respective threats! The old man storyteller is set on fire and everyone just watches him run past in flames. No one tries to help him! They just watch him slowly saunter past with "Gosh! Look at that! It's bad!" facial expressions. Aside from a scant few fairly interesting kills and some partial nudity (in a sex scene where you really see nothing), there is no reason at all to watch this film. The base concept behind the story isn't terrible, but since everything else was just done way wrong, there is no redeeming value. Not recommended for anyone.2/10

If we are going to stack movies against each other, this is the best I can do. I don't know if this the biggest wastes of time I've ever used, but it ranks up there. We have a pack of rednecks and "bad kids" staying at a dumb looking campground. Running around is a guy who apparently knows how to make clothes out of animal skins, but can't help breaking the necks and backs of the campers. The principle characters are campy and stupid, as are the people running the camp. It's just that there is no effort to make things even remotely interesting. There is a wet t-shirt, some biker talk, and some kids harrassing the stupidist looking people on the face of the earth. I knew I was in trouble when the title came on from the right. As if someone had an overhead projecter and put it over the film, already in progress. Sometimes I have fun with these silly rip off movies. This one was just horrible.