Slashers (2001)

The Japanese reality show “Slashers” has decided to expand globally and it is having a special all-star edition, but with just Americans. So 6 Americans have flown to Japan for a chance at $12 million but watch out, losing in this game results in death. See, the goal is to run around a maze and get to the end without being killed by the 3 serial killers – winner gets the cash – multiple winners can split the cash but if you aren’t careful, you may be split in half yourself.           Overall: Fangoria Magazine can sure come up with some neat ideas but the actual product is sorely a mess. We have a Japanese show that is supposed to be important and worldwide ratings winner and yet we only know that ‘cause the law student contestant, Megan, tells us she’s doing this to make a political statement. The film has no info on how the rest of the world reacts to the show. Maybe a few clips of ratings info or whatever would have backed that up. Also it is a Japanese show, which for the first time features Americans. However the first 20 minutes is all in Japanese with pre-printed English subtitles, which don’t fit on the screen (there isn’t a choice between wide screen & full screen) – so the beginning was tough to watch. The audience is Japanese, the hosts and camera operators are Japanese so why didn’t we get more of that with clips? We got a ˝ Japanese, ˝ American film. That didn’t work well. What worked even worse was realizing in the deleted scenes they had a possibility of correcting the flaw I’ve mentioned. But regardless the film still hints at a Japanese contest with American serial killers. Why not have the killers be Japanese too?           The moviemakers seem to give each other props in that the film was a “1 shot” deal with 1 camera – but that was part of the problem!!!! We only saw some characters and had no idea what anyone else was doing. Those commercial breaks were cute but they only occurred when someone was about to die – how about a break when nothing was happening – problem was, there were more parts with characters talking about their true motivations for being on the show and those were so boring, I could have used more excitement. And what was with Megan changing shirts 4 times in the 1st 44 minutes? A nice running gag could have been if she kept doing it as the show went on. Also it seemed she would do that so the movie could avoid showing nudity which would have made sense but if she was gonna flash the camera, why go to the extremes of multiple wardrobe changes? And the pathetic idea of college students dressing up as killers and killing but not really wanting to (meaning they admit they are characters) was a bummer. Why not keep everyone in character? It was already obvious enough 2 of the killers were played by the same guy – very same accent – you got all of those extras to play audience members and u couldn’t afford a 3rd actor to be a killer? The film was so much of “The Running Man” that I wondered if the producers got permission to plagiarize & boost ideas. I mean, did anyone contact Stephen King first?           Getting back to the plot, I think the film is of course entirely unrealistic, regardless of what the lead actress says in the “making of” the film. But assuming she’s right (she isn’t), the sets are simply cardboard and utterly pathetic – they got access to a nice hanger or warehouse and re-used the same areas over and over. I think they had a great idea and could have made this a decent indie film but the execution was utterly poorly thought out. Someone should have had the cajones to fire the pre-production teams and screenplay writers and then hire professionals. Grabbing useless nerds off the internet is a no-no.           Comparison: The Running Man meets Kiss the Girls

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