When you watch a slasher, there are probably a few little story beats that you see happening again and again. Some of them were laid out in Scream. People who have sex are likely to die, with the virgins being the ones likely to survive. When people say that they will be right back, they probably won’t be. Partying and drinking will likely bring the killer, who will then kill people because that’s what the killer does. Those are only a few of the story beats that frequent slasher movies.
One of the other tropes is something that I want to cover in this post, thanks to this week’s movie. That story element, which is common through many of the slashers from the 1970s through to the present day, is the idea of the mysterious killer. There have been star villains of slasher movies, like Jason Voorhees or Michael Myers, that people knew and came to the movies to see. They weren’t mysterious at all. They were masked killers that people knew. They were legends within the movies, and every time they came back, they left more destruction for the characters who knew the stories. The people in a Friday the 13th movie knew about all the murders that happened at Camp Crystal Lake before whatever movie they were in. It was part of their world. These mysterious killers are a little different.
Scream featured one of the two main ways to have a mysterious killer. Much like a Jason Voorhees or a Michael Myers, Scream had Ghostface. The difference was that audiences and characters didn’t know who was beneath the mask. The movie was spent trying to solve the mystery of which character had donned the robe and mask to kill their friends. That mystery was kept alive through subsequent Scream movies and television seasons by having someone different don the mask in each story. There would always be the mystery of who was beneath the mask. It was an essential part of the Scream franchise. It was as much a slasher property as a who-done-it.
A few other movies have featured mysterious masked figures, as well. Before Scream there was the classic Canadian slasher My Bloody Valentine. Someone dressed up as a murderous miner from decades past. They started killing the present-day miners, and nobody knew who it was. The entire movie set up red herrings, had people die, and had the reveal of who was beneath the mask at the end. It was a mystery that gave a full view of the killer, albeit with a mask on. It was a visual while also being a mystery.
Other, more recent, examples include the Happy Death Day movies, the most recent Black Christmas movie, and even the opening of the Fear Street trilogy. Each featured someone in a mask stalking and attacking characters. It wasn’t until the masks came off that anyone, audience or characters, knew who the killer was. Though My Bloody Valentine was a decade and a half before Scream, it was really Scream that made this kind of slasher mystery more popular. Either that or Scooby-Doo, but Scooby-Doo wasn’t a slasher.
To get into the other kind of mystery slasher, we must first look back at the movies that came before slashers. In the mid-60s and through the 1970s, some very influential horror flicks came out of Italy. These giallo films would become part of the inspiration of the American slasher genre, particularly the mystery killer kind of slashers. Some of the common elements included vivid colours and mysterious killers wearing black gloves. It’s the mysterious killers wearing black gloves that would come over to American film in a big way.
This week’s movie was a good example of that. Silent Night, Bloody Night was a 1972 movie that sort of paved the way for Black Christmas, which would lead to Halloween, which would then spark the slasher craze to follow. In the small town of East Willard, Massachusetts, there sat a house. It was originally owned by Wilfred Butler (Philip Bruns), until he died from a freak burning accident in 1950. His son took the house and kept it for twenty years before deciding to sell it to the town as a historical landmark. The problem was that anyone who went near the house would be killed by an unknown assailant. It was up to Wilfred’s son Jeffrey (James Patterson) and his new acquaintance Diane Adams (Mary Woronov) to get to the bottom of the mystery.
The key to Silent Night, Bloody Night was that the story hinged upon the mystery of who was protecting the house by killing everyone who went near it. The face of the killer was never shown. Instead, there were point-of-view shots of the killer’s hands in black gloves as they committed the murder, or shots where the killer’s head or body was blurred in a way that it was impossible to make out who they were. The killer wasn’t hidden behind a mask. For the most part, they were entirely hidden. Black gloves covered their hands. Long sleeves and pant legs covered their body. Blurs hid their face. Any of the killer’s physical attributes were a mystery. There was nothing known about them until the final big reveal at the end of the film.
It was this style of mysterious killer that American films took from their giallo predecessors. Graduation Day followed suit by having a mysterious, black-gloved figure kill the members of a track team. Sleepaway Camp featured someone killing people through point-of-view shots at a summer camp. The first Friday the 13th film, before Jason took centre stage as the killer and star, featured a mysterious killer murdering the counselors at a summer camp as they set up for that season. Graduation Day and Sleepaway Camp involved people pointing fingers about who was killing the others. Friday the 13th, not so much. They all shared the point-of-view shots of the unknown killer, though. Until the reveals at the end.
A movie with a slightly different take on the mystery aspect was Prom Night. I feel like I need to bring this up just to show how some movies can change the mystery, while keeping the mysterious killer stuff. A group of teens were murdered on the night of their prom because of a death they witnessed when they were children. The killer had to be someone connected to them and the death, but they didn’t know who it was. The mystery involved finding someone connected to everything, who would know their connection, much like in the story of I Know What You Did Last Summer. The killer wouldn’t be revealed until the end of the film, allowing the mystery to last as long as possible.
There are two kinds of mystery killers that show up in slasher movies. There are those who appear in masks, chasing after the other characters to kill them. The victims spend their time trying to unmask the killers, to no avail until the end. Then there are the killers who may not have masks, but it doesn’t matter. They are barely shown. Their hands pop into frame, typically with the giallo-style black gloves, to commit the murders. If their full bodies are shown, it’s usually in full clothing that covers all skin, hidden in darkness or distorted vision. Nobody that sees their face survives, so the mystery continues.
Scream might have re-popularized the mystery slasher, but the concept had been around well before that franchise reignited people’s interest. The giallo flicks coming out of Italy inspired early proto-slashers like Silent Night, Bloody Night, which inspired some of the classic slashers like Black Christmas and Friday the 13th. The mystery behind who the killers were helped to give some strength to the slasher idea that might have been a little flimsy, otherwise. Movies that didn’t have depth were given depth. Audiences were more engaged. And more classics were born.
Now it’s time for a few notes:
- Movies that I mentioned in this post included Sleepaway Camp (week 150) and Graduation Day (week 462).
- John Carradine was in Silent Night, Bloody Night. It was his fifth Sunday “Bad” Movies appearance. His other four movies were Monster in the Closet (week 55), The Ice Pirates (week 128), Shock Waves (week 299), and Jack-O (week 466).
- Philip Bruns returned to Sunday “Bad” Movies this week. He was previously in Ed (week 11).
- Alex Stevens was in Hercules in New York (week 68) and Silent Night, Bloody Night.
- Finally, cult actress Mary Woronov was in Silent Night, Bloody Night. She was also in Chopping Mall (week 306).
- Have you seen Silent Night, Bloody Night? What did you think of it? How do you feel about mystery killers in slasher flicks? Let me know what you think in the comments or get a hold of me on Twitter.
- You can find me on Twitter or in the comments if there’s a movie you want to suggest for a future week of Sunday “Bad” Movies. I’m open to all suggestions, and they may even make it into the schedule.
- Sunday “Bad” Movies is on Instagram, continuing the Sunday “Bad” Movies fun when it’s not time for a new post.
- Now it’s time for a sneak peek at next week’s movie. It will still be a few days before Christmas, which means it will be another Christmas movie. I want to finish up my Lifetime Christmas four-pack, so I’m going to watch the final movie in that set. It’s called The March Sisters at Christmas. I hope you enjoy whatever I write about it. I’ll see you next week for that one.
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