Holiday madness, I tells you, MADNESS!!

BLOODY NEW YEAR

1987

Directed by Norman J. Warren

A.K.A. Three things wrong with that title

Plot When coming up with a film to review for the holiday roundtable, I had decided to stretch things by having a film that was set post-holiday. Little was I to know just how much of a stretching of the concept the movie had instore for me. We start out looking at black and white hi-8 footage of a new year's party, signaling the end of 1959 at a hotel ballroom. As the credits roll, a schmaltzy love song plays over the images that will refuse to dislodge itself from the center of your brain. After the party, one girl stays behind and is looking at herself in the mirror. Suddenly, her reflection reaches out and yanks her in! Cut to the present (I.E. mid 80's), summertime, on the beach. We meet 5 young ones (couples Tom and Leslie, and Rick and Jan, as well as lovable loser Spud) on vacation, who decide to go to the local fun-fair. (I was a little surprised to realize that this flick was British in origin, considering how long it had sat on the video store shelf) There, the guys see an American girl, Carol, being harrassed by some punks running a tilt-a-whirl type ride. Being the Chivalrous type, the guys rescue the Yankee damsel in distress, and get in a chase with the hoodlums, with highlights including one no-goodnick getting a face full of the scrambler ride, and Random Gratuitous Violence against a Spookhouse. The gang then hop aboard Rick's sailboat and head off for adventure! Which is good because a half-hour into this movie, not a damn thing has happened. On the boat, Spud is too busy focusing on Carol to pay attention to his steering, and drives right over a sharp rock. Luckily, there's a nearby island, and the group can wade through the cold water to the shore. After passing an ancient looking downed airplane, the kids find an oddly deserted hotel at the middle of the island. Nothing suspicious here! Once inside, things seem a little off. Despite being summertime, the places is dolled up in a 50's era christmastime theme. Everything is new looking too. The group then couples off to investigate the place and find a way to dry off. Sppud and Carol go into a party room and start a fire. Tom and Leslie go look for a way to turn the power on to the place. RIck and Jan go to one of the rooms and change into some convieniantly left behind clothes (it must be the rapture!) Plus, they have sex. Like 5 times. In a row. Well, Spud goes off to look for a blanket for Carol and sees a ghostly musical number. Carol, meanwhile, gets a blanket from a ghost maid. SPOOKY! Down in the cellar, Tom rejects Leslie's amourous advances in favor of turning the power on. This results in all sorts of electrical chaos, until all six youths regroup, realizing that stuff just got left on. The rest of the gang switches into dry clothes, and they all go downstairs, where they start hearing noises. Turns out there's a small movie theatre inside the hotel, and it's showing "Fiend without a Face." For fun, everyone sits down and starts watching the flick. Afterwards, a reel starts up of an old home movie shot at the hotel, depicting people in costumes. Spud, being the wacky guy he is, jumps up and starts pantomiming along with the screen. Suddenly a guy in a "Sheik" costume pops out of the screen, brutally attacking and apparently killing Spud before randomly fading away! Wow, the killed off the odious comic relief first! Well, the other five aren't complete imbeciles, and they get the heck out of the motel. They then split up to look for help on the island. Tom and Leslie sumble upon a fistherman's hut and get attacked by a seaweed monster that seems to come out of a tablecloth. Carol spies the ghost-maid, and follows her back into the hotel--and straight into an indoor blizzard! Rick and Jan, meanwhile get chased throught the forest by what appears to be the forst monster from "The Evil Dead" films. Seriously, it's the exact same "running camera" effect. Rick and Jan eventually meet back up with Carol, and then run into Leslie, who tells them that Tom is in trouble. She leads them back to the house, but Tom is nowhere to be seen. Rick opens a door and nearly falls off a cliff. Then out of nowhere, one of the ruffians from the funfair shows up. Taking another cue form Evil Dead, Leslie inexplicably goes all deadite on his ass. The other three kids know when they're not wanted, so they hightail it back to the hotel. Why they think THAT is the safest place is beyond me. But now they have ghost-demon-thingies and thugs after them. They are so boned.

Rating I give Bloody New Year: One and a Half Rotting Shambling Corpse out of Five Half a point is for the overall weirdness and originality of the film. Other than that, it really doesn't have anything else going for it. It's neither bad enough nor good enough to be enjoyable.

The "Holiday Roundtable"

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