Valentine

The Jerry Ford murder. The victim trips over piano wire while she's coming out of an airplane, and falls to her death. But she doesn't die from a head wound - she chokes to death on her gum. Earlier, we see the killer sitting next to her, mysteriously offering her a stick of his specially treated gum when the plane starts descending. The camera focuses in on the gum, so that we stupid guys get the reference. Then the cop says, "she would have made it if she hadn't tried to walk and chew gum at the same time"
The Nixon murder: two choices. Either the victim is choked to death on audio tapes, or just happens to be the one Cambodian citizen that Nixon hasn't already killed.
The FDR murder: the victim is found in a wheelchair, choked on a cigarette holder, next to a roaring fireplace.
The Reagan murder: nobody can remember who the victim is. The police can't even remember whether there was a murder.
The (original) George Bush murder: the poor girl appears to be a hanging victim, but upon closer inspection of the crime scene, her neck is seen to be "out of the loop". When the coroner does the autopsy, he retracts the patient's gums to see "no new taxes" written on the inside of her lips.
The Clinton murder: the murderer kills a nun in broad daylight, in front of 12 cops. The cops think they have him cold this time, but Clinton pardons him, and he's back on the streets. Turns out the killer's attorney is Hugh Rodham.
The George Quincy Bush murder: this is the one that finally trips up the murderer. Like Dubya, he gets really confused with written instructions, finally has to read some munitions instructions, gets stuff all ass-backwards, and ends up killing himself instead of the victim.

What about this specific movie I'm supposed to be reviewing here? Who cares? Forget it. Just another barely OK formula picture, hoping to target the college-age market. Not very scary. Not Imaginative. Not well acted. Pretty girls, but not naked. Obviously meant as a pure formula marketing-oriented project.

You know the drill. It's filled with women who go off on their own every chance they get, despite the nearby presence of a mad killer stalker dude.

"Oh, I wonder what that noise is in the deserted wing of the house. I'll go check"

"Gosh, that didn't really look like a deer out there in Spooky Woods. I better go see what it was."

That kinda stuff.

Then people jump out from behind corners and say "boo", and some violin music shrieks at the appropriate time. Should scare the hell out of your three year old.

no DVD or tape available yet

Guy kills some women who snubbed him in sixth grade. Luckily for the filmmaker, all of them grew up to have enormous breasts (Like Katherine Heigl and Denise Richards) Is the guy anonymous, or one of their boyfriends? Or is it someone else just pretending to be the sixth grade geek? I'll never tell, except to say that the explanation is impossible because the person identified as the killer is a different size from the person we watch commit the murders.

The killer wears a cupid mask, and when he is photographed in the shadows wearing the mask, it appears that the murders are being performed by film critic Roger Ebert. I doubt if Ebert really did it, but if he did, no jury in the world would convict him. Clearly justifiable homicide.

The Critics Vote

General consensus: less than two stars. Berardinelli 1.5/4, Apollo 54.
Rotten Tomatoes summary. Dreadful: 11% positive overall, 9% from the top critics.

The People Vote ...

With their votes ... IMDB summary: IMDb voters score it only 3.9, but Apollo users a surprising 66/100.

With their dollars ... as of this writing it has taken in $15 million in two weeks. Opened with a pretty solid $10 million weekend on 2300 screens, but the following week it went up against Hannibal's opening.

IMDb guideline: 7.5 usually indicates a level of excellence, about like three and a half stars from the critics. 6.0 usually indicates lukewarm watchability, about like two and a half stars from the critics. The fives are generally not worthwhile unless they are really your kind of material, about like two stars from the critics. Films under five are generally awful even if you like that kind of film, equivalent to about one and a half stars from the critics or less, depending on just how far below five the rating is.

My own guideline: A means the movie is so good it will appeal to you even if you hate the genre. B means the movie is not good enough to win you over if you hate the genre, but is good enough to do so if you have an open mind about this type of film. C means it will only appeal to genre addicts, and has no crossover appeal. D means you'll hate it even if you like the genre. E means that you'll hate it even if you love the genre. F means that the film is not only unappealing across-the-board, but technically inept as well.

Based on this description, this film is a D. If you really have to see every serial slasher film, at least this one has decent production values, some pretty girls and that Angel guy, Buffy's vampire lover.