The Burning

Alternate titles : Burning Revenge

Tagline : "A brutal, horrific act, made him kill, and kill, and kill"

The kids at Blackfoot summer camp decide to play a prank on the caretaker "Cropsey" (Lou David), who's a bit of a mean old bastard. The joke however goes terribly wrong and Cropsey is rushed to hospital suffering from horrendous burns.

Released 5 years later, healed although horribly disfigured, he returns to the area of the old summer camp, which has since been renamed Camp Stonewater, seeking revenge. Once there, he proceeds to do away with the poor kids and the camp councillors, turning them into mincemeat with his trusty old gardening shears.

Directed by Tony Maylem, who went on to be fired from the Rutger Hauer sci-fi film "Split Second", this is basically a clone of "Friday the 13th" if you hadn't guessed that already. Although that's not to say the film doesn't have its fair share of good gory moments, but then that's not surprising considering these were by the same effects guy, namely Tom Savini (the sultan of splatter himself).

Heavily censored in the UK upon its initial release back in the early 80s (it would be 2002 before the UK finally got to see the full uncut version). This one is most definitely a guilty pleasure of mine, though I can really only recommend this to other slasher movie fans, otherwise you may wish to stick with Friday the 13th. But if you love tacky old 80's horror films, be sure to check this one out.

Overall Marks : 6/10.

Terrifying Trivia

• Alternate Tag Lines : "Don't look he'll see you, don't breathe he'll hear you, don't move...you're dead", "A legend of terror isn't a campfire story anymore".
• Tom Savini actually passed up the opportunity to work on Friday the 13th part 2 to do this movie.
• The music was by Rick Wakeman, of the seventies rock band "Yes".
• A very young Holly Hunter (of "Crash" fame) and a teenage Jason Alexander (from "Seinfeld") both made their debut appearances in the film, as did US TV actor Fisher Stevens (from TVs "Early Edition").
• The success of "The Burning" helped launch "Mirimax" studios, as well as the producing careers of it's founders Bob and Harvey Weinstein.
• Based on an urban legend told to kids at Summer camps across America about a maniac named "Cropsey" who haunts the woods.
• The film's finale was shot in an abandoned copper mine that the location scouts discovered. There apparently so much dust in the location the director claimed he was still coughing it up weeks after filming had wrapped.
• The UK cinema version had been cut by the BBFC, but when originally released onto video - prior to the introduction of the Video recordings act - distributors Thorn-EMI released the original uncut version by accident. This was quickly replaced with the edited theatrical version after realising their mistake, but unfortunately this still found its way onto the governments "Video Nasties list" and they where prosecuted for obscenity. The 1995 re-issue by "Vipco" was even more heavily cut, though they did release an uncut version in Denmark. They finally managed to get the uncut version passed for a UK release in 2002.

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