Happy Birthday, souhaitez ne jamais être invité

I enjoyed this movie, but I'm pretty sure a few trims wouldn't hurt it. There are a few plot lines that seem to go nowhere and the whole thing is a bit too convoluted for its own good. It's nice to see Melissa Sue Anderson as a bad girl and slasher movie final girl all in one and the makeup effects are great. That ending is completely ridiculous and I loved every second of it.

This is the story of Ginny, the aftermath of a car accident she was involved in and that cause her mother's death. It all started going bad before that, divorced parents, living with an abusive mother, Ginny wasn't popular, didn't have any friends, all in all a childhood to forget. Due to the car accident, she undergone extensive brain surgery, the consequence was frequent blackouts. Once at the Crawford Academy, she finally started getting along with the popular kids but not for long because they all started to mysteriously disappear. Who's to blame, are Ginny's blackouts related to this events??

I consider this to be a very good slasher movie. The cast is as good as it gets in this genre. The killings are original and imaginative. The death of Dr. David Faraday (Glenn Ford) is particularly bloody and Ginny's brain surgery is also pretty graphic and worth watching. The only negative aspect is the exaggerated amount of "twists", it is a good plot but taken a little to far in my opinion. Still a must watch slasher.

Virginia (Melissa Sue Anderson) finds her friends from private school slowly disappearing. She was unconscious after a bad accident on her previous birthday. She recovered but lost her memories after some dangerous brain surgery. Now her birthday is coming up again.

There is a lot to like in this B-horror movie. The possibility of Virginia doing the killing is quite compelling. The kills are competent without being ridiculous. This is more of a serial killer movie than a slasher splatter horror. And I like the reveal of what happened in the previous birthday. Everything is working toward a very good B-horror. But then the ending pulls a Scooby Doo. It is really unacceptable to stupid it up like that.

Also Melissa Sue Anderson best known for 'Little House on the Prairie' doesn't have enough screen presence. She needs to own this movie, but mostly she remains the shy quiet girl in the background. The camera really needs to follow her more.

The teenager Virginia Wainwright (Melissa Sue Anderson) studies in the traditional Crawford Academy and belongs to a group of wealthy friends named The Top Ten. Virginia had a serious car accident a couple of years ago where her mother died. Now she lives with her father and is psychologically treated by the prominent Dr. David Faraday (Glenn Ford). She has also frequent blackouts but she is slowly recovering her memory. When one by one of her friends are murdered and disappears, Virginia starts to believe that she is the killer, but Dr. Faraday does not think so. Who might be the serial-killer?

"Happy Birthday to Me" is a creepy slasher with a good story with many twists. When it seems to have disclosed the killer and the motive, there is one last unexpected twist that surprises the viewer. The conclusion is extremely dark and makes this movie one of the best in the genre. My vote is seven.

Title (Brazil): "Feliz Aniversário para Mim" ("Happy Birthday to Me")

Note: On 30 Jun 2020, I saw this film again.

A nearly 2 hour excuse to showcase some grisly deaths and silly plot twists, but that's not a bad thing. I did sometimes wonder if the film's content really supported the run time, but the pacing isn't terrible, so you don't spend most of the movie checking your watch. It's nice to see Melissa Sue Anderson in something other than Little House on the Prairie and she's really likable in this as the birthday girl with memory problems whose friends keep disappearing and she might be the one responsible. The finale is one of the silliest and most entertaining conclusions I've ever seen.