Bloody Birthday (1981)

Part 2 of my Spooky Birthday Double Feature!

Trailer:

*Spoilers Throughout*

What’s It About: Three kids are born at the same time during a solar eclipse, which makes them evil and devoid of emotion, somehow.

Here are some of my observations as I watched the film:

• Directed by Ed Hunt, Mike’s brother.
• Really, solar eclipse? We’re off to a dumb start.
• Just when I’m wondering if this was made for TV we see a nipple, so I guess not.
• So two teens are making it in a big hole in the ground when they get hit with a shovel and buried alive. If I had a nickel for every one of my first dates that ended like that…
• Hey it’s that kid from E.T.!
• Really? There’s a cop teaching a bunch of 5th graders about murder? And he’s questioning them? Just because a jumprope was found at the scene? Oh, he’s the evil girl’s dad.
• These murderous kids are totally going to be gunning for their bitchy teacher. She’s an unreasonable c-word.
• So the two evil boys, Curtis and Steven, spy through a peephole on the evil girl’s (Debbie) older sister dancing around in her room nude. NICE! Bonus: she has amazing boobs! Is that Julie Brown? I’ve always loved her.

Lucky

Bastards

• Oh shit they beat Debbie’s sheriff dad to death with a baseball bat for no real reason! Awesome!
• They make it look like he fell down the steps. And it works! Nice job.
• Haha his name is (was) Sheriff Brody. It’s not too good, is it, Chief?
• Next the kids lock the E.T. boy (Timmy) in a junkyard fridge during hide and seek. Good times.
• This kid Curtis has a shit-eating grin so big it cleaned out an Applebee’s.
• Timmy gets out of the hot box like a junior MacGuyver, the tries to tell his sister (Joyce) about evil Curtis, but she thinks he’s full of shit.
• Hahaha, Timmy admits he’s paid for the peep show too! That’s so fantastic.
• The kids are plotting against the teacher I KNEW IT!!
• Wow, Curtis shoots her in the school! Nobody hears it, of course. And he ruins his Member’s Only jacket.
• Timmy beats the crap out of Curtis while saying (I think), “Chicken pox!” OK.
• Joyce finds the teacher in the closet. Nobody’s too broken up about it.
• The kids lure Joyce to the junkyard with a fake Timmy note. Then they try to run her over after they hotwire a junk car somehow. And it has plenty of gas.
• Joyce does that running in a straight line instead of to the side thing. Fortunately it works out for her.
• This kid Curtis is constantly sneaking out of his house. Even if there wasn’t that whole eclipse thing he’d probably turn out like a shit anyway because of his lack of parental supervision.
• He REALLY wants to shoot people.
• Oh jesus, we’re getting into some astrology horsestuff. Apparently the eclipse was blocking Saturn, which “controls your emotions and the way you treat people.” Shut the f up. This movie just went down a few notches.
• Wait, more boobs! Back up two notches!
• These horny teens pull their windowless van to the curb along a residential street. Why not someplace a little more secluded?
• Of course, Curtis shoots them. Again, everyone in this town is incapable of hearing gunfire.
• Ant poison!
• Curtis is doing like 86% of the killing here. The other two need to step it up.
• Nooooo! Joyce spilled the beans to Beverly about the peephole! You c-blocker! Of course, how did she never notice that giant hole in her room before?
• There’s a clown at this party wearing a shirt that says “I Can’t Say No.” What?? Hahahaha! This movie is crazy.

This might be my favorite image I’ve ever posted to this site.

• Curtis tricks Joyce into thinking he put ant poison on the cake, but he just tricked her into making her yell at him in front of everyone and look nuts.
• Hey it’s that racist kid from Porky’s!
• The “feel good” music in this movie is truly awful.
• Beverly finds Debbie’s scrapbook of newspaper clippings of their murders. Their mom makes Beverly burn the book in the fireplace. Why not just rip out the pages?
• So Debbie shoots her in the eye with a bow and arrow through the peep hole. There go the shows…
• The boys come over to help clean up, and they just put Beverly in a blanket and set her out by the trash. The perfect crime.
• Debbie’s mom is having a rough week.
• This movie really doesn’t have a plot at all. It’s just these kids killing people.
• Steven really doesn’t do much. Ever since he beat Sheriff Brody to death with a baseball bat, all he’s done is dress up like The Town That Dreaded Sundown and tried to run over Joyce in the junkyard.
• Some random boy comes by and throws rocks at Debbie’s house, so they chase him down and strangle him with a garden hose. Joyce notices and breaks it up. She’s totally next on their shit list.
• That boy was wearing a sweater with a shirt underneath and pants, while Joyce and Timmy were wearing tank tops and shorts.
• Debbie is almost always wearing a nightgown.
• Joyce and Timmy are coerced into babysitting for Debbie, and of course Curtis and Steven come over and Curtis shoots at them.
• A kid that small shooting a gun that big would probably knock him back ass over teakettle, but it barely jerks his wrist.

“Go ahead, make my bloody birthday…”

• They subdue a knife-wielding Steven by throwing a fish tank at his hand and locking him in a steamer trunk. He’s so stupid.
• Curtis runs out of bullets, so Timmy beats the snot out of him again and they hogtie him.
• Debbie gets away and bumps into her very-coincidentally arriving mom. Debbie pins the blame on the boys and they shake the scene.
• Curtis and Steven are arrested and taken away, presumably to the Bad Boys Jail where my parents always threatened to send me.
• Debbie and her mom go on the lam, and Debbie promises she’ll be good, but the last shot is of a mechanic she murdered. Kids these days!

Is It Actually Scary: Not scary at all, just really really messed up.

How Much Gore: Pretty fair amount of blood. There could’ve been more.

Best Scene: The initial peep hole scene is beyond sensational, beating the sheriff to death was probably my favorite kill. But for now, enjoy this great compilation of Curtis being a little bastard:

Worst Scene: Definitely the part where Joyce reads the astrology charts for the kids. SATURN DOESN’T CONTROL MY EMOTIONS, JOYCE YOU BITCH!!!

Any Nudity: A really surprising amount of naked boobies in this. I wasn’t expecting that in a movie that revolves around kids.

Overall: After liking Happy Birthday to Me, I was fully prepared for Bloody Birthday to let me down. It didn’t at all! It’s not a great movie by any means and doesn’t really have a plot or even a narrative structure, and feels a lot like a low-budget CBS Special except for the blood and boobs, but it’s fun and full of surprising moments. The fact that it’s pretty normal kids going around murdering people without remorse is pretty disturbing, especially when that kind of thing happens far too often these days. But the kills in this border on comical. Like Debbie shooting her sister in the eye with an arrow through a peep hole is pretty funny, and Curtis’s smile as he shoots someone in the face will melt your cold heart. So give it a try! You can’t say no! YoU CAn’T!

Score: 7 peep holes (out of 10)