Valentine

 

In a similarly strained and homogenized culture from the early 2000's, Valentine sits among it's peers as a solid piece of work that delights and shines the smiles of fans which love films like the Scream franchise and I Know What You Did Last Summer. I've always been a big fan of Scream and am honestly stoked about the release of Scream 7 towards the end of this month-also, valentine's day is going to be here in less than a week as well, so what better time than now to consume something like a sleek and cleanly produced slasher such as Valentine. This was put out in 2001 and I swear that I watched this at an ex-girlfriend's house when I was with them at the time, but I might also be thinking of the My Bloody Valentine remake. Either way, Valentine is a fantastic entry and if you are indeed a fan of this type of mainstream slasher from that era, you can't miss this. It's chock full of actors that we all know like Denise Richards, Katherine Heigl, Daniel Cosgrove-the list here is heavy and it definitely adds the weight that it needs to carry itself. Valentine starts off with our five girls at a valentine's day dance during what seems like junior high with this buck-toothed nerd named Jeremy Melton. Every single one of them says no to him when he asks them individually if they would like to dance, but the only one that doesn't quite say no to him is Dorothy, and they end up making out under the bleachers. We'll get to this point later, but here in seventh grade or whatever age they are, Dorothy is a bigger girl (which I was secretly cheering Jeremy on for landing) and we all know how teens and pre-teens are-they are both targets because of their 'imperfections'. So a group of asshole boys decide that it would be hilarious to dump the dance punch on him, make fun of him and bully him for making out with Dorothy, whom I already mentioned, was a big girl. Now we need to fast forward ten plus years when everyone is in their early twenties and are past all of the bullshit that took place a decade prior. Here's where I have to point out the structure of Valentine being weak and strong at the same time because the amount of red herrings on display here is fucking staggering because it quite literally could be anyone-but if you can cut through everything as the film progresses, you'll be able to figure out who is the one wearing the cherub mask while they disfigure all of our main ladies on valentine's day. The five are Paige, Kate, Lily, Dorothy and Shelley. Shelley is the first one to bite it pretty early here, probably within the first fifteen or maybe even twenty minutes. The other tell here too is when said ladies are going to get whacked, they receive a valentine's day card that say things like "'Tis a well know fact that beauty is skin deep, savor the taste... you are what you eat. Love JM" which is a direct line to make you think that this shit is happening and the girls are getting snuffed because of that Jeremy Melton kid. Easy enough, right? It's not that simple. There's also a Jason Marquette who is creepy and talks about himself in third person and happens to have the JM initials-but there's also Evan Wheeler, Gary Taylor, Campbell Morris, Max Raimi... the list of possibilities for who the killer cherub is here like I said earlier is staggering. As I stated though, if you're really paying attention and are able to slice through everything that's going on, you'll get it. I did actually predict who was the one unaliving everyone, and to be honest when Valentine came to a close, it was satisfying. It really was. I'm a fan of slashers anyway so me digging this movie wasn't to difficult and having some of the specific actresses that are here helped things too-but I really enjoyed this flick. I'm going to end here with saying what my favorite kill was and that was probably how Denise Richards' character (Paige) gets hers-she's chillin' in the hot tub at Dorothy's valentines party, and out of nowhere the cherub comes outside and slides the plastic cover over the hot tub. He also has a giant concrete drill and is trying to drill her to death while she's trapped in the hot tub, and eventually clips her shoulder, which leads to him just taking the cover off and tossing the drill in the water to fry her ass. What a great way to go out. Happy Valentine's Day and savor that flavor. You are what you eat. So I'm going to eat a bunch of chocolate. Also, Dorothy is the big girl in the beginning of the film, and she ends up being a rich, sexy, snobby woman who talks through her teeth all the time and it really bothered me. There's that piece of information. I'm done now.