Every fan has their guilty pleasure, the one film they enjoy whilst just about everyone else hates and loathes it. KILLER'S MOON is such a film for me, an infamously shoddy bad-taste production in which just about everything is god-awful: sub-par editing, atrocious acting, dialogue written as if by a drug-addicted loon. Director Alan Birkinshaw (a very minor personality in British exploitation stakes) goes out of his way to deliver helping upon helping of over-the-top nastiness which amazingly managed to get through the BBFC with an 'X' certificate back in the days of its first release. A video release followed in the very early '80s, but otherwise this crummy wannabe slasher-epic has rarely seen the light of day and is mostly forgotten by fans of mainstream horror. KILLER'S MOON transcends its many limitations to become a schlocky masterpiece of so-bad-it's-good entertainment; a laugh riot throughout and for all the wrong reasons.Birkinshaw seems to be going out of his way to make an offensive movie right from the start, when a bleeding, three-legged dog limps into view - apparently the fourth limb has been severed, by persons unknown! The setting is an effectively barren Lake District, which is one of the film's finest points: the isolated atmosphere of the British landscape really comes across and gives the movie an ideal setting, as in much the same way as a film like THE LIVING DEAD AT THE MANCHESTER MORGUE for instance. Cold, gloomy, yet still attractively lush with greenery in places, the setting is ideal. Into this forbidding landscape comes a coach full of clichéd '70s schoolgirls, all into singing "Greensleeves" before their trip goes awry when the coach breaks down and they are forced to trek through the woods to the nearest place of salvation - a closed down hotel.So far, so good, although you'll have already realised by now that this isn't the paciest of movies. The slow nature of the film may be off putting to those looking for faster, more serious scares, but let's face it, nobody here had a lot of budget to work with so things necessarily must be dragged out and laboured. And just as the film looks to become a bit boring, in come four of the most outrageous film characters to liven it up. Nevermind that they're all loonies from the local asylum - here the mentally ill are portrayed as evil, twisted psychopaths with no redeeming values, three ending up brutally killed as a result of their own crimes, the fourth finally resembling a pathetic child of a man. A CLOCKWORK ORANGE is the big influence here, both in the characters' attire and their choice of names ("Mr Smith, Mr Muldoon... Mr Trubshaw" - I mean, please!), and also in the way in which they casually go about raping and murdering all in their path. The idea that they believe they're living out all their worst desires in a safe dream-world is a clever one, giving the movie the one spark of minor originality and interest which it otherwise lacks.What follows is a catalogue of atrocities, all played out in a commendably straight-faced manner. Cats have their tails cruelly lopped off; shrewish housewives are pinned to their own doors with kitchen knives; all manner of young and attractive schoolgirls are stripped and violated by the scheming mad men (watch those nightdresses, which seem to fall off suspiciously easily). Even the comedic coach driver (as played by the inimitable "Chubby" Oates - I wonder what became of him?) gets an axe in the head. It goes without saying that the minor gore effects here are pathetically done and very unconvincing, with the body-on-the-door gag being the only real "special effect" of the bunch. Of course, what goes around comes around, and eventually the bad guys are offed by dog-mauling, fire, and scythes to the back, in that order. The fourth guy (get this) dresses up the charred corpse of one of his former friends in a female wig and shirt and cries in its lap, apparently looking for comfort from his "mother"! The acting is unbelievably bad, all amateurish and no familiar faces to be seen. The actresses playing the schoolgirls have all obviously been picked for their lack of inhibitions rather than anything else, whilst the guys playing the killers go way over the top with some of the most outrageous, hammiest acting you're ever likely to see in a British horror production of the '70s. Even the American (?) hero, Mike, is played by a really wooden bloke. So why does this film work for me? For a start, the dialogue, which is positively ringing with classic gems of priceless ineptitude, including the legendarily bad summing-up of the situation the characters find themselves in: "Blood on the moon, one mangled dog, one missing axe, and one lost girl who just found a body at the wrong end of the axe. How's that for the great English outdoors?". Then there are the over-acting guys, who turn the wannabe figures of terror into laughable buffoons, the abundance of poor effects work, unpredictable events and cheesy heroes. Birkinshaw, I salute you, for making one of the last great stands in British exploitation cinema history!

A bus with eight young female choir singers and a pair of uptight, matronly chaperons on board breaks down on a country road, prompting the ladies to walk until they can find shelter. They eventually stumble upon a huge, unoccupied hotel and settle down for the night, but a quartet of recently-escaped psychos decked out like Droogs for God knows what reason are on the loose and show up there to terrorize them. Also thrown into the mix are a hotel keeper and her slutty daughter, a gamekeeper and his wife, two male campers and a, uh, three-legged dog. There's ONE potentially novel angle present in this cheap "thriller:" the killers were all subjected to an experimental drug back at the nut-house prior to escaping. The drug puts them in an alternate state of conscience where they believe everything that's going on is only a dream so they can indulge in their darkest fantasies guilt-free. Why this angle was introduced in the first place is anyone's guess as it's poorly handled and proves to be utterly pointless. The escapees are already deranged so it's not outside the realm of plausibility they'd indulge in these activities regardless, so why even bother with the drug scapegoat? It would have been far more interesting had this detailed the effect of the drug on NORMAL people.I really wanted to like this one and expected to get at least something out of it considering many of the reviews here are positive. The initial set-up is serviceable (albeit overused), but the incompetent direction, terrible screenplay and a deadly slow pace quickly turn it into a repetitive bore. It falls into that uneasy gray area of B entertainment where it's too poorly-made to take seriously, too silly to ever be disturbing and far too tame to be a guilty pleasure. There are some mildly bloody moments, like an axe to the head and a knife through the throat, but the killings nearly all take place off screen and we just get to see the body afterward. The goriest moment is actually a throwaway WTF bit where one of the nuts chops off a cat's tail with a cleaver (!) Likewise, a few of the actresses go topless and there are a few rape scenes, but these moments are too brief, too tame and too poorly done to please sleaze hounds. You can see the same exact material handled far more compellingly and convincingly in dozens of other films of this type.Another problem I had was that there are so many pointless characters wandering around that not even the director can keep track of all of them. People go off to do things and disappear for such long stretches of time you complete forget about them by the time it returns to them. Others are at one location one minute and somewhere completely different the next. None of the choir girls are given even the slightest glimpse of personality or individuality and the director refuses to ever settle on a protagonist to give us a focal point to ground the action. I can't really comment on the acting because even Laurence Olivier would have a hard time selling some of these lines. During the film's most jaw- dropping moment, one of the girls nonchalantly tells her recently- violated friend, "You were only raped. As long as you don't tell anyone about it you'll be alright. Pretend it never happened."The final nail in the coffin is the laughably lazy visual presentation, which is so bad they can't even pull off something as simple as night convincingly! The exteriors set during the night were shot in the day with dark filters, but the sky ALWAYS looks sunny and bright. The indoor footage is perhaps even worse because they don't even bother with giving it a darker look or even closing the curtains so there's always bright light flooding in through doors and windows during the "night." For numerous scenes supposedly taking place inside a tent, they hang up a huge tarp behind a few of the actors that not only is five times bigger than it should be but not even the same color as the tent show in long shots! These scenes have clearly been filmed somewhere on a stage with ridiculously unconvincing matte backdrops, which had me wondering why they didn't just set up a few spotlights and use the nice Lake District locations already at their disposal.

Four mental patients -- who, due to unauthorized experiments, believe they are living in a dream and have shed all moral imperatives -- escape and find their way to the nearest bus-load of stranded schoolgirls.What makes this film interesting for me, besides the ethical questions (can the killers be held accountable if they think they are dreaming), is the music. Along with a jazzy version of "Three Blind Mice", we have some music that is dreamlike (appropriately) and also quite moody and dark (also appropriate). It was, for me, the difference between the movie being bad and good.Due to its (fake) animal cruelty and dismissive attitude towards rape, the film has been called "the most tasteless movie in British cinema history." While that is surely an exaggeration, I do think these elements helped give it the cult following it apparently now has. I can see it being mocked by people in a loving way.

I have just seen the new release on DVD of Killer's Moon and considering it was made some 30 years ago, well, it has certainly stood the test of time. The story follows four criminal psychopaths being treated (forcefully) in a government experiment, using dream therapy – combination of lycergic acid (LSD) and psychiatric chitter chatter; "let all your evil thoughts come out in your dreams and then you will be cured" – who escape from their institution into the wilds of the lake district. And when they escape, naturally, they assume they are still in a dream and so have to carry out their evil thoughts. Sounds pretty good so far. Then you add a bus load of school girls, whose bus breaks down, also in the bleak lake district, and add to the mix a couple of virile young lads who happen to be camping in the hills and a three legged doberman. It's all there. The 'innocent' girls wear white nighties for most of the movie whilst running around in the woods hotly pursued by the maniacs. The maniacs also wear white. Director Birkinshaw said in an interview that it was because they were innocent too! Well, why not? Then to top it all, you add some appropriate dialog by famous novelist Fay Weldon (sister of Birkinshaw) and the whole thing turns into a cult. Director Birkinshaw said in another interview that the whole thing shouldn't be taken too seriously. "It isn't brain surgery, for heaven's sake! We were having fun making it, and if people are still watching it and talking about it and being frightened by it some thirty years later, well, it has to have something going for it!" Birkinshaw isn't wrong. Killer's Moon is a wholly watchable, occasionally frightening, sometimes amusing, movie made by an award winning director who has been working ever since in mainstream television and movies.