John Waters’ Least Talked About Film Should Be a Mother’s Day Classic…But I Get Why It Isn’t. When a good movie flops, sometimes you find yourself wondering why. When a comedy-horror movie flops, you know exactly why.
Why Serial Mom Flopped: A Comedy-Horror Conundrum
There are plenty of reviewers who simply don’t like horror as a genre but still end up reviewing horror films out of obligation. Even worse, comedy is so violently subjective for some folks that buying a ticket to one might as well be a ride on a mechanical bull. So, I wasn’t so surprised filing through the Serial Mom reviews of the past to see it wasn’t so popular out the gate; its only crime is not being for everybody.
Like some of my past recommendations for movies, Serial Mom errs away from horror; this is especially evident towards the film’s end, where it takes a crime film slant thanks to a prolonged courtroom sequence, but it gets back on track by the end. If you’re able to get past that fact, I’d say go ahead and watch.
Comedy-Horror vs. Horror-Comedy: Where Serial Mom Shines
Still, it’s a comedy-horror instead of the more typical horror-comedy we see. It’s able to invoke a creepy concept and extract humor from it, as opposed to making a horrifying film and injecting humor into it. Every element of this movie is just a few inches off the mark for evoking fear from viewers. Still, I would say the same of something like Tucker & Dale vs. Evil, or even Dead/Alive, which doesn’t scare but uses horror movie tropes and a horror premise to create genuinely gut-busting humor. In the same vein, I got a lot of laughs out of Serial Mom, and not in a so-bad-it’s-good way either.
Serial Mom’s Premise: A Suburban Killer with a Twist
If you haven’t guessed the film’s premise based on the title, you’ve got bigger problems than film critique. Still, the long and short of it is that the picture-perfect suburban housewife Beverly Sutphin, played by Kathleen Turner, is a serial killer who utilizes her murderous talents on all the people who slightly inconvenience her and her family. What follows is a pretty slapstick series of murders, ranging from victims having their livers ripped out with a fire poker, to being crushed by falling air conditioners, to getting set on fire with a lighter and hairspray. There aren’t any truly innovative kills here, but they are pretty good punchlines to the various beats in Beverly’s rampage.
Kathleen Turner’s Performance: The Heart of Serial Mom
Turner is undoubtedly the best part of this film and fits the role perfectly. Her line delivery tends to be drier than that meatloaf she’s serving, and the equally dry humor benefits from it. Unlike many slashers, she treats everything with a rage so subdued it borders on mild discomfort to slight indifference, and just seeing her reactions to the murders she’s committing puts a smile on my face. She isn’t as overtly deranged as other horror moms like Pamela Voorhees & Mrs. Loomis, but more like Principal Wilkins from Trick r’ Treat.
Supporting Cast: Hits and Misses
As for the rest of the cast, Sam Waterston is the same character actor he’s always been but doesn’t bring anything fresh to the table. Ricki Lake is the white bread toast of the picture-perfect family breakfast that is this cast: bland but not offensively bad. Honestly, Matthew Lillard is the only other actor who stands out here. He is essentially playing an earnest version of Stu Macher through his character Chip (i.e., not a serial killer who gets his head crushed by a T.V., but still a complete doofus who loves horror movies). He does a good job in this but doesn’t cut loose as much as I’d like; although, as some will notice, this serves as an amusing unintentional prequel to Scream that shows how Stu got to be so crazy, so I’ll probably rewatch them as a double feature.
Cinematography and Soundtrack: A Nod to 1950s Satire
The rest of the cinematography is on point, with editing in this film that is also pretty conducive to the atmosphere since transitions and musical stings set up scenes to emulate a 1950’s comedy show, more reminiscent of Leave It to Beaver than something like I Love Lucy. Scoring most of the movie is a fantastic soundtrack by Basil Poledouris, where the whimsy of Beverly’s less-than-perfect life and the script’s satirical humor is supercharged by it, bringing borderline cartoonish energy to the rampage she’s going on. Poledouris didn’t have to go this hard on the soundtrack, but
I suppose collaborating with a cinema legend like John Waters means you’ve got to bring your A-game.
BOTTOMLINE: Ultimately, the movie drags a bit longer than necessary with the court procedural element that takes up its final reel. You’re mainly waiting for Beverly to go nuts again for a good chunk of the film if you’re here for horror first. Still, the movie is surprisingly funny, and if you keep an open mind, you’ll get plenty of laughs out of it for what it is: a well-written John Waters movie with a heaping helping of unorthodox humor.