The Sleeper

Films like this make me happy to love indie horror.
Justin Russell's The Sleeper was a great film and I really loved it. It was well directed, well thought out and well made. It's super rare these days because a lot of people love using "grindhouse" type of films as an excuse to make stupid movies badly by saying "They're suppose to be dumb". But Russell isn't just trying to make a throwback to the classic slasher but also trying to make a good film and it shows. He has a clear vision of what he wanted this film to be and does his best to really create it. This film, unlike most of the throwback films or modern slasher films, is actually pretty suspenseful and really keeps you interested. Most films are too interested in the campy side of the slasher films (like hatchet and others) and forget that they can also be scary. I loved the score for the film and really made the film stick out. Most slasher fans will be familiar with the story concept but Russell really makes it his own so it didn't just seem like he was copying 100% instead...

Party Like It's 1981
It's 1981 and the girls of Alpha Gamma Theta sorority are having a party. As the new pledges arrive, so does an uninvited guest. Little do the sisters know someone is watching them in the shadows. As the girls shower, study, eat and sleep the stalker studies the girls. One by one he finds the girls at their most vulnerable and murders them. The police hunt for the missing girls and their killer, but will they find them in time? Or will the girls be forced to fight for their lives...

As I read that synopsis on IMDB, I knew to myself that I had to find this movie, "The Sleeper", and so I spent the next month of my life hunting down this homage to the 80's slashers that I hold near and dear to my heart. As I received my dvd for "The Sleeper" from Amazon, I ripped off the shrink wrap and threw the dvd into my player. Would I be disappointed like I have been with so many other 80's slasher homages ("Frat House Massacre" and "Psycho Sleepover"...I'm looking directly at you) or...

An unapologetic, classic-style slasher film
Just when you think you've seen every 80's slasher, a new one appears.... in 2012. Nowadays, it seems directors will only make a slasher if it's a parody or the characters (e.g. Scream) are self-aware of "the rules". The young director of The Sleeper, who probably wasn't born the year his film was set, made an unapologetic, formulistic 80's slasher film. Bravo! I love formulaic movies if the formula is solid. And the classic slasher formula has the works: beautiful girls, a mysterious killer, slow building tension, gratuitous nudity, leap outs, kills, and, of course, the sweet, quick-footed final girl. Other film makers try to re-invent the wheel and end up with movies about ghost-werewolves. Give me tried and true. The Sleeper is not perfect, but I enjoyed this "period piece". Despite a small budget, it captured the spirit of the genre in so many ways.

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