The Prowler (1981)

One of the better 80s slashers, 4 April 2005

A "Dear John" letter is the impetus for a returning WWII G.I. to brutally murder his former girlfriend during a Spring Dance. 35 years later, the local college decides to bring the dance back. Once again, someone dressed in army fatigues is stalking a murdering the young women at the dance.

I hadn't seen The Prowler since it's initial theatrical run some 25 years ago. At that time, I thought it was a very good slasher. For the most part, it's held up rather well. It is easily one of the better of the slasher films from the early 80s. The killings are especially brutal and feature something that's not seen as often in today's teen horror movies – literally gallons of blood. Someone was working over-time mixing red dye with Karo syrup.

The story isn't much to write home about. Most of the plot revolves around people waiting around to be slaughtered. Most of the characters literally do nothing but stand around and act like easy prey. But in this kind of movie, a deep and meaningful plot is not what most people are after. It's the killings. And as I mentioned previously, that where The Prowler excels.

The Prowler does feature one camera technique that a lot of directors of 80s horror films used that drives me nuts. It's the fake POV shots that get under my skin. Personally, I like POV shots. When done correctly, as in Halloween, they're most effective. But when a director uses a POV shot to trick the audience into thinking something bad is about to happen, it's cheating as far as I'm concerned. Take the scene in The Prowler where the girl is waiting in the jeep at the cemetery. The camera slowly moves toward the jeep. The image moves slightly up and down as if it's shot through the eyes of a moving person. Suddenly, the shot is over and there's no killer (or any other person for that matter). Why do a shot like that unless you're going for cheap scares. It's really annoying.

7/10