A group of medical students head to an isolated mansion to help their friend renovate it into a pediatric clinic. What they don't know is that a series of brutal child murders happened at this house years before when this place was a foster home. Caretaker Martin was falsely accused of molestation by some kids and he returned the favor by murdering everyone. Now it appears he is back and doesn't take kindly to folks cleaning up his former crime scene. This is about as standard as you can get when it comes to the slasher genre, but EVIL LAUGH does have its moments. Director Dominick Brascia (the fat kid victim in Friday THE 13th PART V) co-wrote the script with lead Steven "brother of Scott" Baio and you can't really tell if they want to spoof slasher films or just imitate them. The deaths aren't very intricate, but do involve lots of splashing blood. The highlight is probably Baio getting his head baked in a microwave. Lots and lots of cleaning montages in this one with some cheesy 80s pop songs. Jody Gibson supplies the film's only nudity, which is odd as final girl Kim McKamy would go on to a highly successful adult film career as Ashlyn Gere a few years later.

An on-the-cheap, shot-on-video and quickly made 80s slasher that's enthusiastically pitched and made the more interesting for being made by Dominick Brasica (which Friday the 13th fans would pick up as being the memorable first death in "Friday the 13th: A New Beginning") in what feels like a labour of love. It might not be ranking up their with the best the 80s had to offer and could be seen as just another slasher, but the quirky "Evil Laugh" had its moments. Even some creativity, as some elements actually reminded of Wes Craven's 90s slasher "Scream". Plenty of self-knowing quips feed the shonky script (mainly from a horror-buff character) and there's a plethora of references to other horror mediums (horror magazine Fangoira to "Halloween" and "Friday the 13th"). The story is simple, as it builds up the standard conventions and its over-the-top macabre (which includes some dancing while cleaning and jittery music score) where a group of young medical students decide help out a friend re-open an abandoned orphanage, although they don't know of its terrible past which saw ten years ago the custodian murder the residents. But this weekend is not going to be any ordinary weekend, as people start disappearing and find themselves at the mercy of a jump suit wearing killer with a mask and beanie. Yeah, sadly the murderer doesn't live up the illustration on the artwork and naturally the heroine points out the horror fan for being the murderer. The execution does match the budget, as it's a slapdash of blood, nudity and humour. Sometimes things would happen off-screen, but other times we get flashes of tatty gore. The random performances are acceptable with Kim McKamy making a solid heroine and a decent Steven Baio (who also produced and co-wrote). Nothing new, but it's full of spontaneous energy."No legend is going to scare me".

This overall poor and redundant 80's slasher is more or less 'famous' for one killing-sequence in particular, in which some guy's head is turned into bloody hodgepodge because the masked killer places him in a microwave oven and hits the start-button. Is that even possible? Perhaps it was an older and unsafe oven model, because the one in my kitchen refuses to function as long as the door isn't closed. The head melting itself is delightfully cheesy and gross, as are most killing scenes in this ludicrous guilty pleasure of mine. Naturally, everything else about "Evil Laugh" varies from bad to downright terrible, including awful acting performances, lousy dialogs and a total lack of suspense. You know how the background myths to introduce a story's murderer are usually a lot more petrifying than the actual slasher itself? For example, finding out how and why Jason Vorhees (of "Friday the 13th"-fame) drowned in Crystal Lake is more fascinating than enduring his quest for vengeance during the next ten sequels, and also Freddy Krueger's ("Nightmare on Elm Street") acts of child-abuse and murder were a lot sicker before he got toasted by the furious parents of Elm Street. "Evil Laugh" is another prime example to state the background theory. The killer's myth is horrific, but the slasher itself is horrible. A group of medical students – who certainly don't look like medical students – plan to reopen an abandoned orphanage after it closed down over ten years ago, following a sinister series of murders. One of the caretakers, named Martin, got falsely accused of molesting the orphans and the scandal drove his father to commit suicide. When Martin was found innocent after all, he returned to the orphanage one night and slit the throats of all the children. See, now that promise would result in a gripping horror film with nail-biting tension and shocking murders! Instead, the newly arrived teenagers face a ridiculously masked serial killer who may or may not be Michael who returned from the grave, or someone entirely different. Just in case it is Michael, the title makes no sense, because why would he laugh with his tragic past? And as long as we're stumbling over details, the killer's laugh isn't really evil, but more like an infantile chuckle. For undemanding fans of lurid 80's nudity and bloodshed exclusively.

Evil Laugh is a poor attempt at trying to jump on the 80's slasher band wagon. The gore factor is OK, but the cheese, oh my God the 80's cheese! The music is borderline unbearable, and the dancing doesn't help either. It does make you laugh though, as does some of the acting. The chest rubbing joke was cracking me up. Not the worst I've seen, and you might find it somewhat entertaining, but not because of scares. I dunno where the hooded skull character on the cover comes from either. The killer looks more like a 5 foot tall burglar wearing some type of wrestling head gear. This is the second "Lucky 13" flick I've seen, and they're not exactly winning me over.