SnoReptilePlenty Memorable, crazy movie

Contentar Best movie of this year hands down!

BelSports This is a coming of age storyline that you've seen in one form or another for decades. It takes a truly unique voice to make yet another one worth watching.

Cristal The movie really just wants to entertain people.

soulexpress As soon as I saw Cameron's Mitchell's name in the cast list, I knew this movie would stink. If that guy ever did a good film, I've yet to see it. And yet, he's the best thing MEMORIAL VALLEY MASSACRE has to offer.Made at the tail end of the slasher-movie craze, this "Friday the 13th" retread is about a newly-opened campground terrorized by a serial killer—in this case, a feral teen-ager with gag teeth, a New York Dolls wig, and a Party Express caveman suit. Seems the kid was lost in the woods years ago during a botched ransom drop and doesn't want obnoxious campers despoiling his home. Can't say I blame him.The basic tenets of a slasher flick are here: remote location; lousy acting; shallow, obnoxious characters; killings that eschew feasibility; an authority figure (a park ranger named George) who wants the murders kept quiet; the young idealist (David, the owner's son) who defies him; a main character with a link to the killer; a tie-in with a holiday (in this case, Memorial Day); and plenty of room for a sequel. What it lacks are the scares and suspense of the genre's better films. We learn the killer's motives and identity way too soon, and the killings are light on the gore. There's also no nudity unless you count the wet T-shirt dance that a shapely lass performs in the rain. Is it really a slasher film without gratuitous nudity and gore?Some say this film is "so bad, it's good." I disagree; it's just bad.Item: The movie's tagline reads, "Just when you thought it was safe to go back in the tent…."Item: Early in the film, George pulls a dead dog up from deep in the camp's well. There are two ropes tied around the animal. It's never explained how they came to be tied to the dog's submerged carcass.Item: After George spends the first 15 minutes of the film insulting and berating David, he tells the kid, "It's nothing personal."Item: William Smith appears as a retired Brigadier General who is camping in a soundproofed Winnebago. He never leaves the mobile home, which makes me wonder what he's doing in the woods to begin with. The character also has no bearing on the storyline, which makes me think someone involved with the film owed Smith a favor.Item: The overly-dramatic score attempts (unsuccessfully) to elicit tension the film itself lacks.

Dragoneyed363 My summary really tells you all you need to know about this film, or all you really should expect from it. I had my hopes up for Memorial Valley Massacre, per say, because from the very beginning it seemed as if it had that good sense of cheesy B-Movie fun and I can always get a kick out of a B-Movie if it's done correctly.The movie does get really very stupid at times, but that's to be expected at the least, and at other points in the movie it gets so uninteresting that I forget I'm even watching it for a little while, that is, I kind of shied away and then remembered that it was still on. The plot isn't that great either and even though the acting was decent enough it gets weak at a few parts, but in the end, it entertains, and it has some decent murders, even though the killer is not scary, horrific, or intimidating in any way. For this type of film, they had very good character structure as well, such as, some of the characters are appealing and enjoyable, and even though it has a lot of problems, you really shouldn't expect it to be flawless to begin with, because of course it's going to disappoint in a few areas, but it is too lighthearted for me to hate, though it is certainly no masterpiece. Overall, Memorial Valley Massacre shouldn't be taken too seriously, at all. Put yourself in the right mood and you can find it somewhat likable, I'm positive.

sol1218 **SPOILERS** The movie "Memorial Valley Massacre" tries to be different from your average run of the mill killer on the loose films and in a way it succeeded it what it set out to do.The villain in the film a clean shaven cave boy,John Caso, does kill more then half the cast in the movie by the time its over but at the same time you can't hold it against him for what he does. The cave boy we later find out was abandoned by his father and never had a normal childhood. This instilled a deep resentment in the boy for the human race whom he held, together with his dad, responsible for the predicament that he finds himself in: Living in a cave and living off the scraps of tourists who vacation in the valley.All this killing and destruction would not have happened if it wasn't for real-estate tycoon Allen Sangster, Cameron Mitchell, deciding to build a campground in the valley that the cave boy dwelled in. With dozens of campers in the area the cave boy just went wild, in his hatred for civilized man, going on a rampage killing some dozen of them by the time the movie was over. We have to understand the cave boys frame of mind in what he did. Feeling that the campers represented his father the cave boy took it out on them for what his dad did to him by leaving him out in the woods to fend for himself at an early age.Besides the interesting and deep psychological aspects, father and son relationship,of the film the rest of the movie was just too hard to take seriously even if you tried. The cave boy not only survived in the wild for some 17 years he also somehow learned how to drive heavy earth moving equipment, like bulldozers, and how to start fires. Not by rubbing two rocks or sticks together but by releasing gas from a gas-tank and then having the unsuspecting victim light a match blowing himself, and anyone within 50 feet of him, to pieces.The cave boy at first has the local park ranger George Webster, John Kerry, feel that it's a killer bear that's doing all the killing in and around the "Memorial Valley" campground. Together with his assistant Allen Sangster's son David, Mark Mears, Webster sets out to track down the killer bear before he does any more damage. Later when two of the campers bikers Eddie & Leon, Eddie D. & Don S.Fambeau, helping in tracking down the bear instead find the cave boy's home, with scores of human body parts and bones in it, thing really start to get unraveled. The cave boy feeling he's the victim of a home invasion loses it. Mad at what Eddie and Leon did, in stealing his prized skull, the cave boy comes out in the open killing everyone, including Eddie & Leon, that he comes in contact with.The movie ends on a high note, of sorts, with the cave boy finally finding his old man who in fact, instead of abandoning him, was searching for the confused young man all these years. ****SPOILER ALERT**** The heart-breaking ending has the cave boy, in his efforts to keep people from finding his secret lair, unwittingly do in his old man. All this happens when father and son were about to reunite, after some 17 years, and forget about the past.

Jonny_Numb You know you're in trouble when a movie trots out the toilet paper before the 10-minute mark. A bunch of cranky campers have come out for the grand opening of Memorial Valley, which is plagued by negatory vibes (dead dog in the well); woe be unto the unfortunate souls who decide to stay, because a Beastmaster-type with poor oral hygiene is stalking our resident idiots (horny, mullet-headed teens; drunk program director; his Ivy League apprentice). Many phony-looking deaths ensue, plus a twist that's completely obvious the moment it's 'revealed.' "Memorial Valley Massacre" is an inferior rip on Wes Craven's "The Hills Have Eyes" (which wasn't that great to begin with), with a pulse that alternates between campy humor and stone-cold seriousness (or at least as much as a film like this can convey); as a result of the tonal indecision, it becomes an unintentional hoot, perfect for a MST3K-style skewering ("Space Mutiny" star Cameron Mitchell even has a cameo!).