Review of The Mean Season (1985) by Scott A — 30 Nov 2012

There are cliched stories and hackneyed dialogue to be found in every genre and sub-genre of film, but it seems to me that the serial killer movies are more prone to such pitfalls than other types. "The Mean Season" definitely stumbles into quite a few of those such pitfalls along the way, and that's made even worse here by the sad fact that this wasn't very original to begin with.

It was made at a time before this type of filmmaking was chic but it still doesn't have a very interesting story to tell. There's nothing fresh about this, the killer isn't particularly innovative or special and the finale is typical of its type. The usually reliable Kurt Russell is just fine in the lead role, but pretty much everyone else in the cast is wasted in supporting roles that are curiously underwritten.

Mariel Hemingway is supposed to flesh out the film by contributing to the backstory of her relationship with Russell, but in the end in predictable fashion, she's reduced to being just another screaming victim. Worse yet is Richard Jordan as the routine killer, mostly because you don't even see his face until the final two-thirds of the film. In reality, anyone could have played the part. The film also throws in several cheesy plot devices that range from terribly stale to ridiculously outdated, like the hilarious spinning newspapers to the "is it the killer or someone they know" scare tactics.

Much like the rest of "The Mean Season", they all seem shockingly outdated, even for a film that's nearly thirty years old. You won't see anything in this that you haven't seen done better a dozen times before in other better movies.