‘Killer’s Moon’ Blu-ray Review
Stars: Anthony Forrest, Tom Marshall, Georgina Kean | Written and Directed by Alan Birkinshaw
What would you do if you thought you were in a dream? What do you think four lunatics would do if they were programmed to believe they were dreaming would do? That’s pretty much what Killer’s Moon is about.
The lunatics Mr. Trubshaw, Mr. Smith, Mr. Muldoon and Mr. Jones having escaped from the hospital in which they were being held are on the loose and living out their dreams. They have no morals in their dreams so they can do what they want, and they do. This includes murder, rape, theft and anything else they feel like doing. Why not, it’s only a dream right?
While these lunatics are lurking around the English countryside a bus full of school girls has broken down near a closed down hotel. Making their way to the hotel they are given shelter for the night. Unlucky for them the lunatics also decide to make their way there too. What will happen to the school girls when the predators arrive? Well it’s pretty easy to work out what, and it’s everything you expect.
In a movie style that I’d describe as “Confessions of a Lunatic” the outlandish characters make this movie feel very much like A Clockwork Orange but with a more comic edge of a 70’s British sex comedy. The lunatics even dress like Alex deLarge and his “Droogs”, even though the men are actually dressed in medical outfits but the style is still a constant reminder back to Kubrick’s classic.
The movie is basically scared school girls locked up in a hotel that is overrun with lunatics. Not long into the movie the girls (who are obviously not girls at all but young woman) dress in night dresses and the teachers who are meant to be looking after them are either killed or faint and are seen as no threat to the lunatics antics. Various rapes and murders take place as they live out their fantasies. Obviously this is not too many people’s tastes as the subject matter is fairly extreme. There is no remorse shown for the acts of violence that take place, it’s all given a reason by “it’s all a dream, I can do what I want in a dream can’t I?” even though, I’m not sure how many people would really murder and rape others in their dreams (but they are psychotic lunatics so that probably explains that one).
The main standout characters have to be the lunatics. They kept my interest in the movie when it could have got quite boring. Their constant nonsense talk is quite entertaining and again is a reminder of A Clockwork Orange, a movie which I have always enjoyed. Although they speak in English they speak in an almost Shakespearean way, giving them an out of this world style persona which of course is probably the aim as they are meant to be living a dream. The idea of being in a dream is the main tool of the movie, and the impression is given that the lunatics themselves are actually victims to the doctors that have programmed them to believe in the dream state.
This is most definitely not a movie for everybody. Killer’s Moon features animal mutilation (though obviously fake), rape and murder of school girls, it holds back no punches really. Its style of using comedy along with the sex and violence made me feel it was a movie that fit in with such sleazy comedies like Confessions of a Window Cleaner. Of course along with that there was the obvious tone of menace. I’m also sure that people will be put off by the view point on rape on this movie, as both the perpetrators, the doctors hunting out the lunatics and even the victims themselves, seem to trivialise the act – either thinking rape is an OK thing, and/or it can easily be forgotten.
Killer’s Moon a cult classic though and for people who are fans of such movies as A Clockwork Orange, The Last House on the Left and I Spit on Your Grave, this movie will have its appeal. My personal view was that it was entertaining enough but did have parts that make you uncomfortable with the trivialisation of the acts that take place. It is definitely a cult classic though and a movie “of its time”.
Killer’s Moon is available on Blu-ray now from Screenbound Pictures.
