Summer of ’84 Review
When we think of 80s horror movies we don’t think of movies with a premise like this, let’s get that straight. The 80s gave us films that had premises which required both effort and imagination to be worth seeing. Even the 90s, despite being more bland and on Xanax, compared to the decade that came before, had intelligence and an added sense of (blunt) realism to be entertaining. And the 2000s were a time when it felt like almost anyone could make a film as long as you had a camera (seeing as Paranormal Activity’s existence didn’t provide that many counterarguments (nor did its many copycats)). The only reason Summer of ’84 works anyway is because it almost seems like it’s walking back in time with you towards the 80s by shedding the flaws of each decade that came after it as it goes along. This is why the premise starts out as typical as you would expect from the 10s and the 00s (especially when you come to notice the anachronisms) despite the music, and cinematography, giving you the feeling halfway into the movie. Yet much like Dr. Sleep it’s not until the film’s rising action that it sheds the worst of the 2000s’ violent era in horror, and the climax, which reminds us of how twist endings saturated the 90s, that the music starts to make sense once the quick yet effective homage to every 80s slasher film ever sets in. So in a way this was more to 80s horror to what Kill Bill was to chambara films: style over substance, even as the style was masterfully executed and the substance still kicked in by the end.