Review of "The Burning" (1980)

Cropsy "Our Hero" in "The Burning"

Oh, how I'd hoped that Jason Alexander, Fisher Stevens, and Holly Hunter in association with the brothers Weinstein and Tom Savini were really gonna deliver an unsung masterwork of the slasher genre. But therein lies the trouble, "masterwork" should never be in the same sentence as "slasher genre" unless that's in the same sentence as "John Carpenter's Halloween." Even so, I went in with low expectations but, apparently, my expectations weren't low enough. "The Burning" sucks chunks.

The story, if it matters, is about a curmudgeonly summercamp groundskeeper named "Cropsy" who accidentally gets torched in the opening by a bunch of kids pulling off a lame prank. Ooops! Well, five years later, Cropsy is released from the hospital and takes on the manner of a professional slasher down to bad POV shots (replete with a Vasoline-fogged lense). His first stop is Times Square, where he murders a hooker with a pair of scissors, and from there, it's back to summercamp!

Now, since five years have passed, all the original kids involved in burning Cropsy are long gone, but that doesn't matter. After what feels like an eternity getting to know the kids (Get this - they're all pretty horny and one of the "tough guys" picks on a nebbish), Cropsy starts snipping away at the teens using his pair of garden shears. This was always one of the things that compelled me about "The Burning" was the image of those damned shears held up against the red sunlight, but it's always too little too late. Of the several murders which take place, only one scene stands out as a good piece of slasherdom that belongs in the pantheon of good summercamp teen executions.



Fisher Stevens and Jason Alexander - Fresh Meat

As for the various star-making turns to be found here, Jason Alexander has the biggest role, with a full-head of hair, providing the comic relief role as a camp counselor who also peddles smut and, in one scene, tries selling an oversized bag of condoms. Fisher Stevens, looking like he's 12, gets his fingers snipped off by Cropsy in the film's best scene and Holly Hunter has the memorable line, "Hey Todd!" The only other worthwhile mention is Brian Backer, who would get somewhat immortalized two years later as "Rat" in "Fast Times at Ridgemont High" playing an introverted twerp who "likes to watch" but is only just misunderstood. Uh-huh.

I've allowed myself the indulgence of visiting some of these horror films that I missed out on in my youth, and this is mainly to quell the plague of curiosity in wondering what sort of horrors are tucked away within them. IFC was showing slasher films last month and so I was able to finally check out "My Bloody Valentine" (bad) and "Slumber Party Massacre" (so bad that I'd forgotten having already seen it). With a curious cast and a legendary production team behind it, I'd hoped this film could have been a standout in an era of Friday The 13th knock-offs, but at the end of the day, "The Burning" can't hold a candle to the original "Friday The 13th" or its sequel. And that's pretty scary.