Satan’s Blade, 1984.
Directed by L. Scott Castillo Jr.
Starring Tom Bongiorno, Stephanie Leigh Steel, Thomas Cue, Elisa R. Malinovitz, Janeen Lowe and Diane Taylor.
SYNOPSIS:
A group of visitors to a remote ski resort are picked off by a murderer possessed by the spirit of a mountain man.
Shot in 1980 at the height of the slasher boom and released in 1984 when the tide had started to turn, Satan’s Blade is definitely a second – possibly even third – tier slasher movie that doesn’t scrimp on the body count, which is always a plus, but also manages to make a complete mess of everything else.
The first and only credit for writer/director L. Scott Castillo Jr., Satan’s Blade begins with a bank robbery where the two female bank staff are shot by a revolver without a hammer and a chamber that doesn’t revolve. The two robbers hole up in a ski lodge cabin where they are soon offed by a mysterious killer brandishing a large knife but that doesn’t stop the resort staff renting out the cabin the next day once the local police have had a quick look round, wiped the blood off the wall (badly) and declared the room safe despite not declaring the room a crime scene or sweeping it for clues. Naturally a group of pretty young women turn up to book a room and – surprise! – the only room available is the one that was the scene of a double murder the night before – the night before!
Anyway, the girls settle into their room after hearing the local legend about the ghost of a mountain man who kills anybody who stays on his mountain – which is unfortunate considering that the resort is situated on said mountain so not a great bit of PR by the resort owner – and later on become the victims of a prank by their next door neighbours Tony (Tom Bongiorno) and Al (Thomas Cue), who are having a weekend away with their wives but have decided to get drunk and go visit the horny young women next door. Now that everyone has bonded the scene is set for a massacre as the knife-wielding madman returns to the cabin and goes to work on his latest victims.
If there is anything positive to take from Satan’s Blade it is that L. Scott Castillo Jr. had an idea for a story, made it into a film and got it released, which is more than a lot of people will ever do. However, quite why he bothered when the end result is as lacklustre and downright dull as this film is a mystery; even the interviews in the special features cement the notion that Castillo didn’t really have a clue what he was doing. His attempts at creating atmosphere and a sense of dread aren’t helped when he has a script that was clearly a first draft being delivered by a bunch of amateurs who, funnily enough, never went on to appear in anything else. Tom Bongiorno is obviously trying his hardest and gives the best (or least worst) performance but co-writer Thomas Cue is a complete charisma vacuum as Al, although compared to the young actresses who make up the group of women next door he’s almost Shakespearean. As with any slasher movie that follows the rules, Satan’s Blade has gore and nudity but given that nobody can act and the director cannot direct then it all seems a bit flat and only there because there’s nothing else to offer. Any scene with a topless woman in it is so badly lit and/or choppily edited that it’s hard to make out who Scott is trying to appeal to as there’s nothing for the horny adolescents that would have gone to see this at the time to get excited about and there’s hardly anything about it that could be called intelligent or more grown up for those looking for the next Halloween.
Despite Arrow Video’s admirable attempts to dress it up, Satan’s Blade isn’t really a film that warrants the 2K restoration treatment. The Blu-ray looks probably as good as it ever will, the pops and grain adding to the grimy feel, but the actual content of the film doesn’t really benefit from the slight gloss up as it was so incompetently made in the first place, and the special features highlight the lack of love and affection there is for it as there is only an interview with L. Scott Castillo Jr. that is bordering on the cringeworthy and a bizarre featurette where Castillo presents artefacts from the film. Curious that nobody else wanted to have their say about the film…
If you’re a die-hard slasher fan or simply must own everything that Arrow put out then watch it once – preferably with the audio commentary courtesy of the guys from The Hysteria Continues podcast for a bit of entertainment – and then put it away and forget about it, just like most of the people originally involved with it have.
Flickering Myth Rating – Film: ★ / Movie: ★ ★
Chris Ward
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https://youtu.be/b7Ozs5mj5ao?list=PL18yMRIfoszEaHYNDTy5C-cH9Oa2gN5ng
Originally published July 11, 2016. Updated April 15, 2018.
