The Cheerleader Sleepover Slaughter

I'm pretty certain I'm no 'cinema snob' - most of the films in my DVD collection contain zombies or masked serial killers. What I'm trying to say is that I don't generally look for great acting performances or deep character arcs. As long as a film entertains me for an hour and a half then I'm happy.

A killer is 'despatching' a group of cheerleaders one by one - and that's about it. He does it in a way that, granted may be brutal, but it's nothing you haven't seen in a hundred other 'slasher' films.

Sadly, despite the obviously 'B-movie-esque' title, 'Cheerleader Sleepover Slaughter' is just too much of a B-movie to even be added to that 'so-bad-it's-good' category. The acting is awful. You can tell the 'actors' are remembering their lines as they say them. Plus the direction is dire. Scenes go on way too long and aren't even that relevant to the story. And, I don't know whether it's just me, or did half the shots get filmed without the use of a tripod?

I guess it should be given props for having practical make-up effects which are realistic, although not particularly inventive. Oh, and it has some nudity if you're into that. I suppose the best thing I can say about it is that it's short - just slightly over an hour, so it won't waste too much of your time if you're forced to watch it.

Preparing for an upcoming game, the members of a high school cheerleading squad try to put the strange disappearances of their teammates behind them to partake in a special sleepover, but when they find a mysterious killer has arrived learn the connection behind it that puts them in danger.

This here wasn't too bad of an indie effort. That this one serves as an excuse to provide the basic barebones setup of a slasher is a nice touch, getting a great setup of their relationships together while also giving enough of a look into their personal lives to understand the situation. As the bodies dropping is made all the more unaware of due to the events taking place that could just be written off and setting up the mystery about their disappearances leading up to the fateful slumber party, there's some fun to be had here involving the water wannabe trying to get on the squad while bringing up the kind of simplistic slasher setup featuring the killer going around knocking them off to set the stage for the final half. The final half, featuring the killer's motivations while also dealing with the series of fun encounters and ambushes around the house during the main slumber party, has quite a lot to like here as the kills are better than expected and pulled off incredibly well. Putting all the main stalking here after a few brief bits beforehand is a nice move with a lot to like here and is certainly enough to hold it up over its main but somewhat detrimental flaw in the low-budget origins being quite obvious. It's mostly on the sight of the casting as the sight of the pierced, tattooed, and mature look for high-school teenagers is somewhat comical, but also the singular-location setup that has no interaction from anyone else or its length that still needs padding show this off and are a factor against this one.

Rated Unrated/R: Graphic Violence, Graphic Language and Full Nudity.

These low budget amateurish high school slasher films have been prominent for many decades. This film isn't original or anything special. The production value and camera quality is clearly lower budget. The actors are all unknowns as their acting talent shows.

Director Chris Leto whom directed Die Die Delta Pie in 2013, sees this film as somewhat of a twist sequel or connected in the same universe (there is a brief mention by lead character Lori referring to the 2013 film late in the film). For comparisons sake, this film is slightly better than Die Die Delta Pie though both aren't good.

There is no suspense or any real mystery regarding who the killer is, as we do see the killer's face in the beginning (although it's brief and it is a face mask but hard to tell).

The gore and kills are better here and do look more realistic but overall quite generic. Also the typical brief nudity to satisfy few. Overall the film isn't anything special but one good thing is it's one hour runtime.