Movies
[Review] Aptly Titled ‘Unhinged’ Delivers Brutal Thriller on Wheels
In a modern age where we’re glued to our phones and always on the go, road rage is no longer a cute term for inconsiderate drivers. Now it’s a moniker tethered to excessive violence triggered by incidents on the road. The news is filled with stories of fistfights and shoot outs on freeways or at intersections, resulting from escalated anger from being cut off in traffic or similar bad traffic manners. Unhinged dials into the shocking nature of road rage, living up to its apt title with a deranged lead performance and vicious thrills.
Unhinged opens with a startling introduction to our rage-fueled maniac; The Man (Russell Crowe) sits in his pickup truck parked in front of a house, staring intently while he downs a handful of pills and swigs alcohol. He then barges into the home and commits a shocking series of crimes so ruthless that it effectively sets up how dangerous and, well, unhinged, this Man can be. Cut to Rachel (Caren Pistorius), a beleaguered woman struggling to care for her son, Kyle (Gabriel Bateman), amidst a divorce while juggling other job and family obligations. Always running behind and under pressure, a road altercation on the way to Kyle’s school makes her the Man’s latest target. Determined to teach her a lesson, a deadly cat and mouse game ensues.
Directed by Derrick Borte, this thriller stomps down on the gas pedal from the start and never lets up. It’s an onslaught of car chases, crashes, and violence, all at an easy and quick pace. The set pieces and action sequences bring the adrenaline, giving a more extensive scope to an otherwise intimately scaled story. There’s an almost slasher quality to the narrative flow here, as the Man systematically hunts Rachel and murders anyone in his path to get to her.
It’s all tethered by Crowe’s committed portrayal of a disturbed man pushed well past his brink. There’s a chilling calm in his relentless pursuit of Rachel, and his demand for answers, but it’s a barely contained calm- his fury continually threatens to erupt at any moment. Crowe’s performance infuses Unhinged with stakes and an unpredictability that makes this thriller so thrilling. When he does lose his cool, it results in blood-soaked cruelty that leaves you unsure who will survive.
For all the exciting action, there’s a clear commentary at play in Carl Ellsworth‘s (Red Eye) script. Not just on the psychology behind extreme road rage incidents, but on male aggression. The Man’s backstory provides insight into his motivations, but they’re meant to make a bold statement. He targets Rachel because she refuses to apologize, despite his demands for one, and his tirade on people’s self-centeredness and lack of respect in today’s age serves as a heavy-handed soapbox for the underlying thesis. At the other end of the spectrum, we’re meant to relate to Rachel as the everyday overstressed parent trying and failing, but her choices and behavior render her initially unlikable. We only root for her because she has a much more likable child and also because, of course, no one deserves the type of justice the Man doles out.
Unhinged isn’t successful in its hollow messaging at all. Luckily, it puts its action front and center, making it easy to overlook the narrative’s shortfalls and get swept up in the mayhem. It’s a mean-spirited slasher on wheels, and Crowe makes for one intimidating villain. The film may not be as edgy as intended, but Borte makes one lean and efficient thriller that isn’t afraid to get sadistic. And it makes for a fun ride while it lasts.
Unhinged releases in theaters on August 21, 2020.
Editorials
Not Another ‘Scary Movie’: Revisiting Forgotten Parody ‘Shriek If You Know What I Did Last Friday the 13th’
After Scream (1996) made a killing at the box office, as well as won over critics and audiences, a lot of folks in the movie biz thought they could do the same thing (and yield similar results). That thing, of course, being a slasher. Most of these opportunists wound up being pretty straightforward; they were low on humor or commentary. Yet others, like Scary Movie (2000), saw the potential for spoofing Scream, and acted on that impulse with both haste and excitement.
A few months after the Wayans’ comedy first hit theaters, Shriek If You Know What I Did Last Friday the 13th landed on the USA Network, as part of the channel’s “Shriek Week” programming. That straight-to-cable (then home video) destination is possibly why many people still don’t know about this one. Or they simply chose to forget. Whatever the reason, only one of these two horror parodies came out on top—and it’s certainly not the movie where Coolio channeled Prince, and Tom Arnold saved the day.
Shriek If You Know What I Did Last Friday the 13th previously went by the name of I Know What You Screamed Last Semester. That Trimark acquisition then settled on a wordier title, just so it could avoid the litigious wrath of Miramax Films. Folks may or may not remember that Columbia Pictures was sued over the “implied connection” between I Know What You Did Last Summer (1997) and Scream. So, yeah, there was no way that this competing Scream parody wasn’t going to be kept on a tight rein.
A Heavy Reliance on Late ’90s TV References
Simon Rex, Julie Benz, Majandra Delfino, Harley Cross, Danny Strong, Tom Arnold and Tiffani-Amber Thiesen in Shriek If You Know What I Did Last Friday the 13th.
Naturally, there would be similarities between Shriek If You Know What I Did Last Friday the 13th and Scary Movie—their scripts are built on the backs of the same two movies. It goes without saying that the other big slasher of the 1990s, I Know What You Did Last Summer, was as much of a target as Scream. However,the film pads itself with more TV references than Scary Movie did.
Half the cast coming off of (and in some cases, returning to) a WB show could be a reason why. Dawson’s Creek is particularly zeroed in on, based on how there’s a central character named “Dawson Deery“, and how the teen drama’s teacher-student affair plotline is satirized to the nth degree. As if there weren’t enough nods to television, Baywatch, VH1’s Pop Up Video, and even those cheesy Mentos commercials all serve as joke prompts.
Shriek director John Blanchard and writers Sue Bailey and Joe Nelms all hailed from television, so it’s understandable that they would stick close to home. The movie’s humor in general makes more sense, in light of learning that Blanchard worked on SCTV, Kids in the Hall, and MADtv. The writers, on the other hand, were each fairly green, with Bailey being the most experienced of the two; she wrote and produced the game show BattleBots. Nevertheless, they, plus Blanchard, churned out a passable, joke-a-minute movie. The whole thing is staggeringly of its time, but no one here was aiming for longevity.
Having seen enough of these kinds of movies, we know to expect jokes of the low-hanging fruit variety. That’s the parody’s whole prime directive. From the characters having names like “Screw Frombehind” and “Doughy Primesuspect”, to stereotyping that feels taboo nowadays, this is a movie from a different era of comedy. Its coarse, corny, and unapologetic sense of humor won’t sit well with everyone in these more enlightened times. In which case, Shriek If You Know What I Did Last Friday the 13th can be treated as a time capsule.
Does Shriek If You Know What I Did Last Friday the 13th Humor Still Hold Up Today?
“You may already be a victim”—Someone receives a most peculiar threatening piece of mail in Shriek If You Know What I Did Last Friday the 13th.
Although Shriek doesn’t live up to its own claims of being so funny that you’ll die of laughter, its bawdier parts could still lead to some nervous laughter. For instance, after this movie’s parallel to Drew Barrymore’s Scream character is done in—not by the killer but by a bug zapper—the movie throws a newspaper next to the victim’s fresh corpse. The headline? “Popular slut killed! Football team mourns”.
We then move on to the wacky and inappropriate goings-on at Bulimia Falls High School, home of the Hurlers. At this nexus of constant absurdity, indecency, and surrealism, students are seen fornicating on the lawn, cheerleading squad applicants are advised to be comfortable with partial nudity, and terrorists openly prepare for an anthrax attack. It can be a tad jarring to watch, especially if you didn’t grow up witnessing this style of comedy firsthand. Hell, even if you did, you may still have a “what the hell were they thinking?” reaction.
It’s not just the aggressively edgy humor here that can make you chuckle—the slapstick, the sight gags, and the ribaldry all have a decent chance of landing. The movie’s own villain, whose hockey mask was instantly transformed into a crudely Ghostface-esque one after coming in contact with an open flame, commits more cheap laughs than kills. His and his victims’ chase sequences, most of which are cartoonish in nature, left this writer grinning. The Scooby-Doo fan in me also totally ate up that clever unmasking joke.
Final Thoughts on This Forgotten Horror Parody
Shriek If You Know What Did Last Friday the 13th
Now, the jury is still out on whether these comedies are to blame for the death of the first slasher revival. There is more to consider than some parodies. At the very least, the likes of Scary Movie didn’t exactly encourage big studios to put their money on a trend that was being derided to death (and not as profitable as the spoofs). These sorts of movies also felt unnecessary at the time, given how their principal inspiration is already a deconstruction of the genre. But like anything else that quickly becomes popular, mockery is unavoidable.
Shriek If You Know What I Did Last Friday the 13th is indeed a movie nobody asked for, much less needed. As a sample of pre-millennium humor and cultural attitudes, it’s not always precise. But as I’ve laid out, your mileage may vary. Horror parodies typically don’t have the best track record, so managing one’s own expectations here is recommended.
Upon rewatching, I for one laughed a bit more than I did back then. Only this time, I responded to the jokes that my younger self didn’t notice or find all that amusing. So it just goes to show that the movies don’t change—we do.
Harley Cross and Majandra Delfino must unmask the killer a number of times in Shriek If You Know What I Did Last Friday the 13th before learning their true identity.
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