Review of Pieces (1982) by Ryan H — 27 Oct 2012

I'm really confused about this one. While watching it I was trying to figure out if it was intentionally so bad it was funny, or if it was all trying to be serious. The script doesn't work at all.

We don't have a single character to follow. It doesn't know if it wants to follow the college stud, the lieutenant, the new tennis coach, or the dean of the school. And it opens in a completely ridiculous way.

The little boy's putting together a puzzle of a naked woman and his mother comes in yelling at him and wants to burn it. But that's not okay for the boy because he likes puzzles of naked women, so he kills his cunt of a mother.

When the police rush upstairs they find the head of the woman in the closet and the little boy in the bathroom crying, asking where his mom is. The police never once suspect the boy killed his mother, but also don't care about searching anymore once they find him.

Cut to 40 years later and the murders are happening again. Why? No one knows. Even the ending doesn't explain why he waited 40 years. Probably just because it seemed good at the time. The film works in a way that if the camera doesn't see something the character can't see it either.

Do you want a killer to walk around a pool and surprise a girl, but there's no place to hide? That's okay, because if we don't see exactly where the man is then we might be able to believe he's just found a really good spot.

This girl dies because the college stud was getting some from another girl that we never saw. His geeky friend gives him a note for some reason, I never really understood that business, but it had to do with the topless girl in the pool.

There's the brilliant moment at the pool when the lieutenant asks the anatomy professor if he thinks it looks like the body had been chopped up by the chainsaw by the pool. And even though they find the weapon, it continues to be used later on in the film.

Go figure. Then there's one of the best scenes in cinema history where the tennis coach walks around on campus at night and runs into an asian guy who ends up using kung fu on her, but when the stud shows up she knocks him on the ground and he asks what happened to him.

The asian guy explains that he was running and the next thing he knew he was on the ground. Bad chop suey. Racist, hilarious, and pointless. There's a scene that opens up with the geeky kid saying "well, see ya later.

" Seriously, just the stud and the geeky kid standing in the hall and he says that line and almost walks away, but is stopped by the lieutenant. There's an aerobics scene where it seems like the girl's going to get killed when she goes to the bathroom and nothing happens even though the killer followed her all the way down.

And lets not forget the ultimate "Bastard! Bastard! BASTARD!" from the tennis coach when she realizes the music was played on campus to drown out the screams of the victim. And spoiler alert, the killer ends up being the dean.

What's so great about this twist? Nothing. Really, it has no relevance because there are never any true characters. I'm only pointing out how bad it is because that's what makes it so fun.

Everyone in the theater laughed throughout the film. And the final shot of the stud getting his balls squeezed off by the woman who was made out of the pieces of the victimes was just the icing on the cake.

A really great time to spend with friends.