Review #1,099: 'The Burning' (1981)

Tony Waylam's The Burning, the first film to be produced by Bob and Harvey Weinstein's Miramax Films, is but one in what seems like an endless churn of stalk-and-slash movies inspired by the low-budget success of John Carpenter's Halloween (1978) and Sean S. Cunningham's Friday the 13th (1980). It performed moderately at the box-office and was panned by the critics, and did little to disguise its desire to replicate the success of Cunningham's newly-established franchise, merely re-hashing the plot in the process. So why now, 35 years after its release, is The Burning so beloved amongst genre fans?

It's difficult to really pinpoint the reason why Waylam's film isn't as insufferable or outright boring as many others from the 'slasher' genre generally are. But for me, I found that the characters, who are little more than your usual horror archetypes, rather enjoyable to be around when they weren't busy getting carved up in the woods. The likes of Jason Alexander, Brian Backer, Fisher Stevens and Holly Hunter appear before they were famous, and are given the job of fleeing from the deformed killer stalking them - here a psychopathic victim of a prank-gone-wrong named Cropsy (Lou David). They are in the woods as part of a canoe trip arranged by Camp Blackfoot leader Todd (Brian Matthews), who is unaware that the camp-fire spook tale he frequently tells is about to become reality.

With a rather likeable bunch at its core, The Burning doesn't really drag when it isn't dishing out scenes of gore, and the performances feel naturalistic. When the gore does come, special effects maestro Tom Savini, having turned down Friday the 13th Part 2 (1981), delivers some of his finest work, naturally landing the film in trouble with the censors. As one of the first films slapped with the 'video nasty' tag, it was always destined to achieve legendary status amongst fans, and the infamous scene of mass murder on a raft, which really had the right-winger media up-in-arms, is extremely well-executed. I doubt I'll ever take to the slasher genre - I find them generally dull, dated, formulaic and misogynistic - and while The Burning certainly contains those elements, it isn't difficult to see why it is still so popular with fans of the genre.


Directed by: Tony Maylam
Starring: Brian Matthews, Leah Ayres, Brian Backer, Larry Joshua, Jason Alexander, Lou David
Country: USA/Canada

Rating: ***

Tom Gillespie