SLUMBER PARTY MASSACRE II (1987)

 

(Director/screenwriter: Deborah Brock)

Plot: Young female collegiates have a slumber party. Unfortunately, one of them is Courtney Bates, younger sister of Valerie, who was stalked by a drill-wielding murderer in the original SLUMBER PARTY MASSACRE. . . a surreal situation Courtney and her friends find themselves in!

 

Review

The second entry in producer Roger Corman’s “all-girl franchise” SLUMBER trilogy, like its other films, was scripted and directed by women. This time out, it was director/screenwriter Deborah Brock. In a post-SLUMBER II interview, she said it was largely inspired by the 1975 science fiction musical film THE ROCKY HORROR PICTURE SHOW, also noting that it, like ROCKY, was made as a satire.

SLUMBER II, officially a sequel, is an updated, musical, and loosely scripted remake of the original film. Valerie Bates, main Survivor Woman from the first flick, is now in a psych ward. We see this in the dreams of her younger sister, Courtney, whose nightly horrors include visions of a transmogrified, breakdancing rockabilly Driller Killer, wielding a Gibson guitar with a big drill tip. He dominates Courtney’s surreality─a surreality where she and her friend will likely end up dead.  

This incarnation of the Driller Killer (DK) is obviously not the original DK. DK 2.0 has a flashier, rock ‘n’ roll personality and displays musical talent (Atanas Ilitch, who played him, is a real-life musician with several solo albums).

SLUMBER II furthers the franchise’s virgins-afraid-of-sex theme, and Brock tries to inject levity, absurdity, and suspense into it, but its fuzzy logic, rambling screenplay, lack of character development, and 1980s-generic cut-away scenes nullifies any suspense that might’ve been achieved─SLUMBER II feels longer than its hour-and-fifteen-minutes run time. To its credit, it has occasional, fun-cheesy gore, especially the infamous exploding giant zit scene.

Notable actors include longtime gospel singer Crystal Bernard (WINGS, 1990-97) as Courtney Bates, Jennifer Rhodes (HEATHERS, 1989) as Mrs. Bates, Courtney’s mom, and Kimberly McArthur, PLAYBOY magazine’s January 1982 Playmate, as Amy (she keeps her clothes on in II).

Its unsurprising dovetail finish is not bad, but given what comes before it, it doesn’t matter. A series-ending sequel, SLUMBER PARTY MASSACRE III (a.k.a. SLUMBER PARTY MASSACRE 3) followed in 1990.