Top 10 Slashers of the 80's

[rhett]

Hey guys, I thought it would be neat if we all listed our favorite slasher films of the 80's. In order not to saturate the lists, lets not include any sequels. Here are mine:

1. Friday the 13th
2. Prom Night
3. A Nightmare On Elm Street
4. My Bloody Valentine
5. Maniac
6. Terror Train
7. Sleepaway Camp
8. The Burning
9. April Fool's Day
10. Silent Night, Deadly Night

Honorable Mentions: Final Exam, Hell Night, The Prowler, Happy Birthday to Me, Madman, Graduation Day, House on Sorrority Row, The Final Terror, The Funhouse.

[mcchrist]

1. Truth or Dare: A Critical Madness
2. Nightmare
3. Sorority House Massacre
4. Blood Cult
5. Violent Shit
6. Death Spa
7. There Was a Little Girl
8. The Initiation
9. 555
10. The Mutilator

I really can't stand the "slasher" genre at all but I absolutely loved "Maniac". It was so unrelenting and effective that I needed to take a shower after watching it!

[Cydeous]

1. Maniac
2. Friday the 13th
3. The Burning
4. My Bloody Valentine
5. The Prowler
6. Mother's Day
7. Terror Train
8. The Slayer
9. Butcher, Baker, Nightmare Maker
10. Happy Birthday to Me

[mcchrist]

I don't consider Maniac a slasher at all. Slasher's to me, are films about mass murderers. Maniac was about a Serial Killer, the same goes for Henry as well. I'm a huge fan of true crime and the like, and there is a huge difference between the two. That's why I can't put something like Maniac in with slashers. I know it sounds morbid, but think of it in Capitalistic terms. Killing for quantity over Killing for quality. Mass murderers kill for the sake of killing, where a serial killer kills to fulfill a need.

Maniac is not a slasher.

I think it is the epitome of a slasher film in it's presentation so I'll go along with nearly every publication and call it a slasher.

[rhett]

Originally posted by mcchrist
3. Sorority House Massacre

Interesting pick mcchrist. I personally think it is one of the worst movies I have ever seen, but I also like Final Exam, so more or likely my taste is skewed. I am just wondering though, what did you like about the movie?

1.) Friday the 13th
2.) A Nightmare on Elm Street
3.) Maniac
4.) The Slumber Party Massacre
5.) Silent Night, Deadly Night
6.) Sleepaway Camp
7.) The Prowler
8.) My Bloody Valentine
9.) Mother's Day
10.) The Burning

Honorable Mentions: Christmas Evil, Happy Birthday to Me, Nightmare, Graduation Day, Madman, The House on Sorority Row, Slaughter High, and Hide and Go Shriek.

[Hellbilly]

1. Friday The 13th
2. Happy Birthday To Me
3. April Fool's Day
4. Hell Night
5. Sleepaway Camp
6. Prom Night
7. House On Sorority Row
8. Hospital Massacre
9. Madman
10. The Burning

Honorable mention: And All Through The House (1989), that TALES FROM THE CRYPT episode.

[KillerCannabis]

Mine, in no particular order:

1. Friday the 13th
2. Nightmare on Elm Street
3. Maniac
4. April Fool's Day
5. Sleepaway Camp
6. The Shining
7. Silent Night, Deadly Night
8. Madman

I'm only doing 8. I'm too stoned to think.

[mcchrist]

Take a closer look at my list Rhett, I like all the titles I listed, but I'm not too keen on slashers myself. Sorority in my mind was a little better than average. I want my slashers gritty and pointless. Sorority or Fill in the Blank, it doesn't matter to me, any title that I listed fits the bill.

A site that I recommend for almost all the films in the slasher craze would have to be Hysteria!

I know I posted this before, but it is such a cool site that is needs a second posting.

[Mark Relford]

1. Maniac
2. The Burning
3. Slaughter High (big time guilty pleasure.)
4. Terror Train
5. My Bloody Valentine
6. The Stepfather
7. The Mutilator (uncut version only)
8. Friday the 13th
9. Silent Night Deadly Night
10. Visiting Hours

It's a shame that the slasher movie is dead. I haven't seen a good one in ages.

[mcchrist]

The slasher movie is dead, there is a reason for that but it would take me three days or so to type it up. The slasher is dead because the cold war is over.

Slasher points to consider:

1. The killer is an unstoppable force
2. The victims are youth participating in lewd and unsavory behavior
3. The victims are corrupted (such as toying with a ouija board or something that summons or offends the killer) and eventually they are slaughtered.

Seigfried Kracour (I think that's how you spell his name) once wrote a book saying that the film is the unspoken cry of an entire people. He was talking about the coincidences and the correlations between the german expressionist silent cinema and the Third Reich.

POLL:

The unstoppable force in the typical American slasher film could be seen as being the communists...

-or-

I'm talking out of my ass... American cinema is dead.

In no particular order of preference:

1: Friday the 13th
2: The Prowler/Rosemary's Killer (Uncut)
3: The Burning
4: Happy Birthday to Me
5: Mardi Gras Massacre (Simply for its high cheese value)
6: Maniac
7: Psycho from Texas (Again, very cheesy, but has nostalgia value)
8: My Bloody Valentine
9: Madman
10: Sleepaway Camp

There are many others too, like Slumber Party Massacre, The House on Sorority Row, The Toolbox Murders and Eyes of a Stranger. All of which have something in them to recommend them.