Review of Behind the Mask: The Rise of Leslie Vernon (2006) by Kenny N — 20 Apr 2016

One of the best horror films I've seen in a long time. For 3/4ths of the film, we follow a plucky college student and aspiring journalist Taylor Gentry and her two cameramen as they film a documentary about Leslie Vernon, thought to be killed by angry vigilantes, but now, after many years, he is returning to his old home, where a group of sexy teens are holding a raucous party, to seek vengeance on the children of those who put him to death!.

..but when you first meet Leslie, he's a charming, intelligent, happy fellow, not a brooding Leatherface-like psychopath (or so it seems.) You see in the universe of this film, Freddy, Jason, Michael Myers, Chucky, they're all real, and serial killing, although still technically illegal, can be a viable career operation! But Leslie doesn't want to just knock off a couple of horny teens and then leave.

He wants to turn himself into the stuff of legends, like Freddy and the others. He wants a house full of kids from every walk of life (stoners, jocks, nerds, sexy cheerleaders), he wants to kill them all with a hand scythe (significant in his story, watch and find out why), he wants a signature mask and general "look", and, most of all, he wants to be defeated by a survivor girl, his Sally Hardesty, his Laurie Strode, who, by destroying him, will become a better person.

All of this is captured by the camera crew, and it's all so funny (believe it or not) and scary, you'll have a great time with it. Adding star power is Robert Englund as Leslie archnemesis ("Ahab," for those in the know), the late great Zelda Rubinstein as a librarian caught in the crossfire, and Scott Wilson as Leslie's mentor.

But this film is such a great deconstruction of the slasher genre (and a successful surgical repairing of it into something that stands up on it's own,) you'll want to see it again and again. I sure do.