Creep   C+

Year Released: 1995
MPAA Rating: Not Rated
Director: Tim Ritter
Writer: Tim Ritter
Cast: Kathy Willets, Joel D. Wynkoop, Tom Karr, Patricia Paul.

Well, Creep is no Citizen Kane, but as pure exploitative slasher-movie trash, it serves its purpose. After convicted killer Angus Lynch (Joel D. Wynkoop) escapes from jail, he seeks out the strip joint his sister, Kascha (Kathy Willets), performs at. Together they embark on a murderous rampage, but their partnership ends quite abruptly after having sex in a cemetery next to their mother's corpse. Yeah, these two are really messed up. You see, Angus' mom made him dress up like a little girl as a child and do sexual things to her -- and she also made him screw his sister, and her boyfriend raped and beat him... so of course he would grow up to be a mass murderer! Quite Freudian, I believe.

But Angus may soon meet his match. Patricia Paul plays Jackie Ketchum (very funny, Tim), a new cop struggling with flashbacks of her mother's unsolved murder. In the flashbacks (black and white, using a strobe effect, of course), we see her mother killed by a masked thief as Jackie -- then a little girl -- witnesses the brutal act. Her father (Tom Karr) is a police officer, too, and it seems that everyone in this movie is haunted by his or her own personal demons. In fact, you won't like any of the characters. You might even feel dirty watching a movie without any decent characters worth caring about.

Ah, I just love the look of writer-director Tim Ritter's movies -- they look like home videos, and somehow that gives them their special charm. Creep, for the most part, is pure splatter junk -- very little suspense, flimsy characterizations, and murder scenes not too imaginative (nothing comes close to the death-by-sprinkler in Ritter's earlier splatter-fest Wicked Games). Creep does provide the slasher staples of loads of nudity and graphic violence, though. There's even a couple of scenes that have some convincingly graphic shots reminiscent of Tom Savini's excellent makeup effects in Friday the 13th, though not quite as elaborate. And, near the end, there was a shocking twist in the plot that really caught me off guard. Good moment, really unexpected.

If you're a fan of Ritter's other bloodbaths -- Truth or Dare (1986), Killing Spree, Wicked Games (1994) -- you'll probably love this one. Others, approach with caution.

Review published 02.04.2000.

Follow Michael Scrutchin on Twitter or Letterboxd.

Flipside Movie Emporium (FlipsideArchive.com)
© 2000-2008 Flipside Movie Emporium. All rights reserved.