A decades-old folk tale surrounding a deranged murderer killing those who celebrate Valentine's Day turns out to be true to legend when a group defies the killer's order and people start turning up dead.
My Bloody Valentine is a 1981 Canadian slasher film directed by George Mihalka and written by John Beaird. I saw this was back in the 80's and thought it was rather shitty. However after watching it again nearly 30 years later I realized it's not really that bad. It's a pretty solid slasher film.
Valentine's Day is coming around and the young people of the small mining town of Valentine's Bluffs are organizing a party. A few decades earlier an explosion at the mine trapped six miners underground. One, Harry Warden, survived, though in a deranged state. Warden is sent to a mental hospital but escapes and murders those he deems responsible for the mine accident. Now people are being brutally murdered again, and the townsfolk suspect that it is the work of Harry Warden.
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| Harry's out to steal your heart |
While the film doesn't re-invent the wheel for slasher movies, it still manages to stand out well from the rest of it's kind. Although the acting isn't remarkable, I found that the three leads were competent enough and the script gave us enough time to get to know them. There's an interesting sub-plot that builds between T.J. (Kelman), Axel (Affleck) and Sarah (Hallier). Apparently T.J. was with Sarah before he went away for a while without telling anyone where he was going. Now he's returned and his buddy Axel is with his old flame. Cue the flying sparks! The rest of the wacky cast members are so cheery and carefree that you just know something dreadful is going to happen to them! There's a practical joker (who surprisingly isn't the fat guy), a couple of overly randy teens and even a hammy old guy who tells the kids that they're doomed just like Ralph over at Camp Crystal Lake!
This film has a number of strengths. A man dressed in full mining gear is in fact quite scary. The gas mask he wears also gives his breathing a Darth Vader kind of effect. A pick ax is one hell of a weapon, too. There are some very funny characters that make up this town. The mayor and the police chief are so serious it's almost laughable. The young men who work in the mine are a rowdy bunch who love to drink Moosehead beer. It's my guess that Moosehead beer donated a good chunk of change to this movie due to how much you see of their product.
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| It's such a coal movie, you'll want to see it over and over again |
"My Bloody Valentine" has also been the source of much controversy in the 28 years since it was released, largely due to the fact that at least five minutes of on-screen gore were cut from the film (additionally, none of this lost footage contains any extra sex or nudity); virtually every death scene in the movie was trimmed in some fashion by the MPAA. This lost footage was restored in the recently released extended cut of the film. If this movie were released today, I seriously doubt that these cuts would be enforced by the MPAA, but I guess one can understand why they were made back in '81; they are quite nasty and will surely please gore-hounds, but with this new extended cut of the film you get the feeling that you're watching the complete movie, one that is finally free of the ugly influence of censorship.
Go in with fairly limited expectations, a sense of humor, and 'My Bloody Valentine' will prove a fun experience,
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| Cross your heart...and hope to die. |
Trivia:
The film was shot in authentic mines which were often as much as 900 feet underground. Only certain lighting devices could be used in the mines because of the potential danger of methane explosions.
In an interview with TerrorTrap.com director George Mihalka said that the shooting location at Sydney Mines, Nova Scotia was chosen because of its rustic atmospheric appearance. However when the locals found out that a movie was to be shot there they decided to spend $50,000 to have the mine painted and cleaned! This, of course, diminished the reason that the production wanted the location to begin with. Mihalka said that $75,000 of the films budget was then used to return the mine to its original state for shooting.
In a recent interview, actor Neil Affleck revealed that he still has the miner's helmet that he wore in the film.
Producers André Link and John Dunning said the films origin came about when they sought to find a holiday which a slasher film had not been set on during the "slasher flick boom" of the early 1980s. They settled on Valentine's Day and in order to keep the idea from being copied they made the films working title "The Secret", though they had the release title in mind the whole time.
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| Sarah, be My Bloody Valentine! |
According to makeup effects artist Thomas R. Burman, one of his gory creations was realistic enough that director George Mihalka threw up at the sight of it.
The caption near the beginning states "Thursday February 12th", indicating that the dance will be on Saturday the 14th. That means Friday the 13th falls in between them. The Friday the 13th (1980) series was released by Paramount and the plot of My Bloody Valentine (1981) is similar to the Friday the 13th (1980) films.
Actor Carl Marotte said while in his death scene makeup that no one would eat lunch near him.
The folk ballad that plays over the ending credits was added by composer Paul Zaza as an afterthought. The uncredited singer who does the vocal for the ballad was Scottish-Canadian tenor John McDermott.
Quentin Tarantino has named My Bloody Valentine as his all-time favorite slasher film.
George Mihalka approached Paramount in 2001 with a synopsis for a sequel, but due to poor box office records with the original film, they declined.
According to an interview by The Terror Trap, composer Paul Zaza spoke about wanting to create a different kind of musical motif for each of the individual murders, as well as make the music have a "dripping, damp, creepy sound to it, like in the mine setting itself." He also stated that the end credits song, "The Ballad of Harry Warden", was written because the movie producers wanted a song that could be a hit single on a vinyl record, but they ran out of funding and so "The Ballad of Harry Warden" was written instead. Most of the soundtrack to My Bloody Valentine (1981) was never commercially released.
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| There's more than one way to lose your heart... |
In the ending credits the song lines say, "and those still alive, know the secret survives..." this is referring to the movie's originally intended title, 'The Secret'.
One of the makeup designers once shipped a dummy corpse to the set in a coffin, which caused much alarm when it arrived at Canadian customs.
My Bloody Valentine (1981) was filmed in Sydney Mines during Cape Breton's economic crisis with the Sydney Steel Corporation. They had pollution problems and were trying to decide whether or not to shut the factory down. It was thought that the filming of My Bloody Valentine (1981) would promote tourism in the province, but it wasn't very effective.
In the Sysco book series, taking place in the same location as this movie was filmed in, the main character Sysco quotes the movie when speaking to her friend, Alecto. She says, "Alecto, be my bloody valentine!" which is a line in the movie, the memorable line the killer shouts as he goes down into the tunnels shouting, "Sarah be my bloody valentine!"
Most of the houses seen in the scenery of the film were company houses (houses built by the Cape Breton coal mining companies for miners). As of 2015, several of them were still standing.
In the fiction novel "Smog City" (ISBN 978-1502469748), the main character visits the small town of Sydney Mines, Nova Scotia while wearing a My Bloody Valentine movie t-shirt. In an interview, the author of the novel stated that this was a homage to My Bloody Valentine (1981) because it was her favorite movie and she often visited Sydney Mines in real-life.
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| Heart. Burn. |
Nowhere in the film does it ever say what kind of mine the fictional Hanniger Mine is. However, the general assumption from viewers is that it's a coal mine, and it was filmed in a coal mine setting.
The MPAA cut more than 5 minutes out of the film before it came out; mostly because the movie was released shortly after John Lennon died, and there was a major backlash against violent movies
The Esso gas station, seen when Chief Newby drives away and radios in to the police station, still exists as of 2015, though it has been modernized a great deal in the past few decades.
Entertainment Weekly ranked this Number 17 on their "Guilty Pleasures: Testosterone Edition" list in their March 30, 2007 issue.
Star Neil Affleck said that the identity of the film's killer was kept a secret even from the cast because the filmmakers liked the idea of the mystery being real among the actors. However, Affleck figured out that he was the killer when, after being cast, he was sent to the make up effects department to be fitted for a fake arm that would be ripped off the killer in the film's finale.
Body Count: 12
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| This Valentine's Day, romance is DEAD. |
