Eli Roth’s new movie Thanksgiving (which is an expansion of the parody trailer “Thanksgiving” that was created for the 2007 throwback double feature Grindhouse) is set to premiere on November 17, which means the discourse around “Thanksgiving” is being taken out of tin foil and re-heated once more. This annoys me because I thought I’d never have to read about the idea behind the trailer again.
The Origins of Holiday Slasher Films
The story goes like this: In the 1970s and 1980s, the slasher genre was obsessed with movies centered around holidays or special occasions. Silent Night, Deadly Night. Black Christmas. Halloween. My Bloody Valentine, New Year’s Evil, Mother’s Day, April Fool’s Day, Happy Birthday to Me, Prom Night, Friday the 13th, and so on. You get the picture. Roth came up with the idea to create a trailer for a fake early ‘80s slasher based around Thanksgiving because when he was a kid, “every November we were waiting for the Thanksgiving slasher movie.”
But here’s the thing. There were actually two 1980s slashers set on Thanksgiving. To be fair to the young Roth, these Thanksgiving movies were not huge releases, nor were they actually released around the Thanksgiving holiday, so he can be forgiven for not being aware of them at the time. But they existed, dammit, and there was plenty of time between 1989 and 2007 to look into this. “Thanksgiving” is thus not really filling a void at all. He shoulda done Columbus Day, just saying.
Exploring Forgotten Thanksgiving Horror Films
The moral of the story is that I’m an insufferable pedant. Don’t be like me. But do come with me on a journey through the pair of movies that prove Eli Roth wrong. We’ll take a look at what they have to offer and rate them on how Thanksgiving-y they actually are, on a scale from one to five turkeys.
Home Sweet Home (1981)
Home Sweet Home isn’t a terribly memorable slasher movie, unfortunately. However, it does have the distinction of being the first of just a scant few 1980s slashers to be directed by a woman (documentarian Nettie Peña).
The movie is entirely watchable, though, because it is so thoroughly weird and random. Even its opening scene is disorienting: A man who seems to be hanging out in the L.A. riverbed proffers beer directly to the camera before the killer leaps into frame on the reverse shot and strangles him to death. Who is this man? And who is he offering the beer to? Is it us? We’ll never know. RIP Beer Man.
This is also a movie where a teenage boy named Mistake runs around with an electric guitar amp strapped to his back while slathered in faux KISS makeup, making him look less “Starchild” and more “mime on laundry day.” Once the escaped mental patient descends on the ranch and the slashing heats up, things get a bit dull and bloodless, but it never stops offering up unpredictable and strange encounters with a vast ensemble of characters who seem to have learned about human behavior via correspondence course.
This off-kilter vibe extends to the cast, which randomly includes then-five-year-old Hocus Pocus star Vinessa Shaw. Also, as the killer, we have Jake “Uncle of Hailee” Steinfeld, the Body by Jake workout mogul who was known for being a personal trainer for celebrities, including Harrison Ford.
How Thanksgiving-y Is It? You’d be forgiven for forgetting Home Sweet Home is set on Thanksgiving in the first place. The only real indications that this is the case are the fact that the group is gathered for a turkey dinner and several mentions of Thanksgiving in the copy on the VHS box.
1 out of 5 turkeys
Blood Rage (1987)
Hoo boy. If you thought Home Sweet Home was weird, get ready for Blood Rage. So this movie is about a young man breaking out of a mental institution and coming home, at which point a bunch of killings happen. Seems straightforward, right? Wrong. The killings are actually perpetrated by his twin brother, who framed him in the first place and is mostly just mad that his mother (Mary Hartman, Mary Hartman’s Louise Lasser) is getting engaged. It’s all very Oedipal.
Blood Rage is a family drama potboiler that keeps crashing headlong into a 1980s slasher movie, complete with ooey gooey gore from future Terminator 2 effects guru Ed French. It’s all very heady and exciting, even if the third act could probably have used some tightening up. Also, it’s the only slasher movie I can recall where the killer stops to take a pee break, which is well worth the price of admission.
This movie probably still rests in the “bad-good” camp, but it’s weighted so much toward the good that it’s hard even to tell the difference. In addition to Lasser and French consistently bringing the house down, Mark Soper gives a surprisingly complex performance as both twins.
How Thanksgiving-y Is It? Solidly Thanksgiving-y. The kills and many individual scenes aren’t specifically themed after the holiday, alas. But it does take place explicitly on Thanksgiving night. There’s a football game complete with tiny short shorts, Terry can’t stop pointing at his bloody blade and remarking “It’s not cranberry sauce,” and Louise Lasser has a sublime freakout scene where she sits on the floor in front of the fridge and desperately chows down on leftovers. Plus, what’s more Thanksgiving-y than a movie about what happens when a relative you can’t stand comes to town?
3 out of 5 turkeys
Can Eli Roth’s Thanksgiving Outshine the Classics?
This does in fact leave some wiggle room for Eli Roth’s Thanksgiving to out-festive both of these titles put together. That remains to be seen, but hopefully the new movie is a true cornucopia of Thanksgiving-ified fun.
Then maybe I’ll stop complaining. Probably not. But maybe.