Editorials
‘Cut’ – Revisiting the Australian Slasher 24 Years Later
Currently there is only one movie where Kylie Minogue is murdered by a masked madman, and then former Brat Packer Molly Ringwald swoops in to save the day. Of course that movie is none other than the horror obscurity Cut (2000). This hidden gem from Down Under popped up during the first slasher revival, which is a large reason as to why many critics deemed Kimble Rendall’s debut derivative. Not everyone felt this way, though; fans like myself saw past the timely surface qualities and found a movie that not only commented on slashers but also championed their existence. This was a rare sight at a time when the disparaging of horror was both trendy and excessive.
It would be something of a mistake to assume Cut is another mere copycat of Scream (1996). The inspiration for Rendall and writer Dave Warner’s movie is clear, yet the overall execution is rather different. For starters, it’s evident from the opening act that the movie’s story isn’t in complete touch with reality; Ringwald’s first encounter with the villain results in an unexpected development. As the killer succumbs to his initial fatality, Cut reveals a surprising supernatural element.
In the wake of Scream, new slashers tended to be grounded and shied away from magic and fantasy. They instead relied on a simple yet timeless pitch: a mysterious and very human assailant picks off their prey in systematic fashion. Cut, on the other hand, is more high-concept without losing the sense of familiarity. This movie also slyly injects the surreal without even readjusting the total picture. After the flashback to 1985 ends with the supposed death of “Scarman” and Minogue’s character — respectively an actor and the director of a fictional slasher movie called “Hot Blooded” — the story tables that supernatural aspect for a bit and focuses on a tangible dilemma.
Pictured: Jessica Napier’s character Raffy sees dead people… in a movie theater.
Following a good dose of exposition, Cut dives straight into its present-day plot: Aussie film students set out to finish the notoriously abandoned “Hot Blooded” as part of their graduation. Jessica Napier’s driven character Raffy leads the charge despite not having her professor’s blessing; Lossman’s (Geoff Revel) contempt for horror flicks really stems from his own traumatic link to “Hot Blooded.” So right away Cut throws the audience a burning-hot red herring; could the prof want the movie to remain unfinished so badly that he would commit murder? Lest we forget, killers have killed for far less in other slashers.
Like some of the best horrors out there, Cut features an in-universe myth. One that the characters don’t believe or treat seriously at first, but in time it goes on to play a vital role in the outcome. After the director of “Hot Blooded” was murdered by her disgruntled actor — Minogue’s role is brief yet amusingly caustic — her half-done movie gained notoriety over the years. In fact, Raffy and her crew were not the first people wanting to complete “Hot Blooded,” and they most certainly won’t be the last. And anyone who has dared to approach the task has met an unfortunate end. That sort of built-in infamy is irresistible to both the characters and the audience.
In the vein of The Ring (1998, 2002) and other “curse” horror movies, Cut brings to life its own cooked-up urban legend with both zeal and style. That soft but artistic flair is more noticeable than ever now with Umbrella Entertainment’s beautiful restoration, which was the first time Cut was issued on disc after being trapped on VHS in Australia. This restoration from a 35mm interpositive is never too dramatic, though; instead it brings out what I remember best about the movie: the attractive contrast of lights and darks, the wealth of warm hues, and occasional spots of intense colors reminiscent of vintage gialli. So, in the movie’s favor, Cut doesn’t resemble its contemporaries.
If there is one transparent shortcoming in Cut, it would be the characters. Minogue and Ringwald imbue their catty roles with plenty of oomph, but the other characters don’t come across as particularly distinct or memorable. Raffy’s crew of film-school oddballs can be best described as brooding, surly, or recklessly horny. They seem too intentionally senseless. Even the two notables of these misfits, Napier’s final girl and the infatuated Hester (Sarah Kants), don’t make huge impressions on the audience. The former’s personal connection to “Hot Blooded” is too brushed aside for its own good — a modern movie, however, might have risked the family trauma subplot becoming too emphasized — whereas Hester satisfies an unambiguously queer quotient not often found in early 2000s slashers.
Pictured: Scarman (Frank Roberts) gets up close and liquefied with Raffy (Jessica Napier).
Whether or not it meant to, Scream opened the floodgate for self-aware and postmodern horror in and beyond the ‘90s. This was hardly the first movie to point out the tropes of the genre, yet Kevin Williamson and Wes Craven’s collaboration did lead to a number of other movies that felt the need to poke holes in horror. At worst, it had become open season for mocking the genre. Again, not the fault of Scream, but rather those who saw that movie and walked away with a derisive view of horror as opposed to an adoring and reinvigorated one. Because, above all, the original Scream does show affection for the very thing it scrutinized and, in many ways, rewrote.
Meanwhile, Cut is a less severe deconstruction of slashers. Indeed the movie points out widely known clichés and even pokes fun at itself — Ringwald delivers the golden one-liner “believe me, there was no creative energy that went into that piece of shit” upon learning the supernatural origin of the killer — but it ultimately comes to the genre’s defense. Lossman, representing the cons side of the debate on horror’s merits, calls the genre “trash” and insists his students have “more important things to say.” In opposition, Raffy and Hester express a commonly held opinion nowadays: horror can be just as political as other genres, however, it’s also acceptable to make scary movies for the simple goal of giving folks a fright. Hester later goes further by saying horror is “cathartic” and possesses “social value.”
Both retro and recent reviews stand firm on Cut being predictable and uninspired, but from a more lenient perspective, the movie is innovative for its time. The story was an early exercise in fantastical meta-slashers before the likes of The Final Girls and Totally Killer were conceived, and it offers a good balance of respect and self-reflexivity. Cut is an obvious throwback to the golden age of slashers, but there’s also something quite novel and underrated about its approach.
Horrors Elsewhere is a recurring column that spotlights a variety of movies from all around the globe, particularly those not from the United States. Fears may not be universal, but one thing is for sure — a scream is understood, always and everywhere.
Pictured: The poster for Cut.
Horror was thriving so well in the 1980s that movies like Pen Densham’s The Kiss (1988) would understandably get lost in the shuffle, only to then gain their fans later on in life. Even still, this one Canadian-American curio has had a more challenging time than others, as far as contemporary reevaluations go, which is very likely due to the movie’s limited availability—at least as of this write-up.
However, the scarceness of The Kiss, while a bit annoying, makes it like catnip for ‘80s horror completists everywhere. Hopefully, a lot of them will walk away satisfied after watching this hidden gem.
Even though The Kiss was intended as the first of several horror collaborations between Astral Pictures and TriStar, as well as the first feature produced by Densham, Richard B. Lewis and John Watson’s Trilogy Entertainment Group, it ended up being the only one produced from that former union. Once the movie was released, TriStar’s distribution jitters—they opted for a regional rollout—did the $6-million flick no favors. TriStar’s cold feet toward horror releases have been well noted, but The Kiss still did a tad better than Night of the Creeps (1986), another genre outing that flopped due to its regional opening.
Shot in Montreal, but set in Albany, New York, The Kiss—which was still called The Host just a few months before its October premiere—concerns an average middle-class family and their forthcoming situation. The uncanny problem in store for them was, in fact, set in motion some years earlier. As that hot and dusty flashback to the Belgian Congo shows, a familial curse was set upon the two Dunbar sisters well before Meredith Salenger’s teenage character was born.
Meredith Salenger, Nicholas Kilbertus and Mimi Kuzyk in The Kiss
The Kiss, which was based on a story by co-writer Stephen Volk (Ghostwatch) and penned by both Volk and Tom Ropelewski, has the outward appearance of The Stepfather (1987). This movie, though, is anything but a gender-flipped retread of that classic domestic disturber. For starters, The Kiss is far less grounded in reality—that much is clear from its unsettling opening scene. There, a trusting girl (Priscilla Mouzakiotis) is the victim of her own deceptive aunt (Céline Lomez); the movie’s titular act, and the story’s first shock, becomes the means of transferring an ancient evil from one host to another.
In the present day, Salenger’s role of Amy Halloran, a religious schoolgirl, is dealt a harsh blow in life once her mother, Hilary Halloran née Dunbar (Pamela Collyer), suddenly dies in a freak accident. But rather than a complete stranger sweeping the Halloran widower (Nicholas Kilbertus) off his feet some months later, Joanna Pacula’s character is that chosen temptress. Here, Pacula plays the grown-up version of the afflicted girl last seen in the movie’s opener. Since Amy’s mother is insistent about there being no reunion between estranged sisters, and she even contemplates buying a gun shortly before her tragic demise, it’s presumable that Aunt Felice poses a threat to her family.
The Kiss isn’t a movie ever too concerned about its own predictability. The audience is indeed often one step ahead of the story here, but also keep in mind how every one of those steps is loud. Take, for instance, the death of Amy’s mother; the Halloran matriarch goes out in garish, gruesome fashion, as a supernaturally commandeered truck sends Collyer’s character through a store window first, then leaves her one leg short. The directorial enthusiasm truly comes out in horrific moments such as these.
The Kiss is always sure to revel in its characters’ ills and misfortunes. So if the plot doesn’t impress, then its lurid parts should. Amy’s mother’s exit scene was proof of an eager, first-time horror director proving his worth. Then, bestie Heather (Sabrina Boudot) survives to tell the tale of a bizarre escalator mishap that, despite showing relatively less gore, spikes viewers’ empathy meter. The wilder bits of this movie, however, commence with that inevitable hookup between Felice and Amy’s bewitched father; their kitchen coitus is paralleled by Amy’s feverish classroom terror. The outcome there is a disquieting cross-cut of sex magic and a young woman’s menstrual onset plus hallucinations.
Sabrina Boudot in The Kiss
From foam appliances to bladders, that parade of special effects in The Kiss casts its own spell on the audience. Felice’s familiar, a visibly malevolent cat, was realized here with several models, some more articulate than others. Admittedly, the demon cat’s not as convincing as most of the effects here, but accepting that artifice, as opposed to fighting it, will make the whole experience way more enjoyable. As for the makeup used to manifest Felice’s inner villainy, it is more minimal and subtle than one might like; yet the work done to turn Pacula into an antithesis of herself is nonetheless compelling.
The otherworldly perils and dreadful goings-on wouldn’t work half as well as they do in The Kiss without the story’s contrast effect. Finding frights in picturesque, extremely ordinary settings was something that took off in the ‘80s, thanks to that sweeping shift to locales like the suburbs. And Amy’s home, a replica of a real Montreal suburban house, is the ideal battleground for any proper good-versus-evil story. It’s also prime real estate for this movie’s satanic panic-inspired horrors.
Because of their ostensibly similar plots, The Kiss has been compared to The Exorcist (1973). Except in Densham’s movie, the sinister, non-Christian entity targeting a teen girl lies within something less apparent and, perhaps, more devastating upon its exposure. To an outsider, Pacula’s Aunt Felice is too beautiful and unobjectionable to ever suspect of being a monster. More suspicious is how quickly she rips into the fabric of the Halloran home. Felice’s mere presence upsets the “texture of family life,” according to the director.
The demon cat in The Kiss
Taking out Amy’s mother and best friend, and distracting her father, would suggest The Kiss is playing by a different set of rules. It is initially leaving its adolescent target unsupported in a rather grim scenario. In contrast, though, this story offers up a surrogate parent who does her best to fill in the holes of Amy’s eroding home life. Mimi Kuzyk does good work as that family friend and doctor, Brenda, who guides the lost child without also steering her in any one direction; she is naturally skeptical of Amy’s accusations until it’s almost too late to do anything about them. So although The Kiss does an admirable job of undoing the main character’s support system, it never leaves her without a lifeline. This dark movie, in spite of everything that’s transpired, doesn’t deprive itself of light and hope.
The Kiss is a potent mélange of familiar ideas. If not for the director’s surprise flair for horror, though, the movie would have been less effective. What a shame that Pen Densham didn’t continue with the genre. As for Joanna Pacula, she is, too, owed credit as the wicked vixen opposite Meredith Salenger’s pitiable Amy; she never fails to be unsettling in her role. Pacula makes Aunt Felice a sexy yet intimidating character.
For horror that steadily doles out madness and menace, while also delivering a flashy and ghastly conclusion, The Kiss is certain to please. Yes, it’s cheesy all the way, but most favorably, everyone involved plays everything straight. That kind of commitment goes a long way with this movie.
The Kiss
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