As you cats n’ creeps well know; I love me some sex and violence… and since Pickaxe throws that at us in the first couple of minutes it has yours cruelly’s attention from the get-go!
Anyway, it’s the late ’80s, and Adrienne (legendary scream queen Tiffany Shepis) has just been set-free from the loony bin; where she found herself after seeing her friends murdered by Satanic sicko Alex Black… whom she ultimately defeated with the help of Deputy Mathews (Phantasm‘s A. Michael Baldwin).
Anyhow, she’s now a drunk, he’s now a Sheriff looking for a missing couple, and soon the woods are filled with more victi… err, I mean teenagers like Jamie (Elizabeth Redpath), Heather (Ashley-Marie Zgabay), and various dopey dudes, a stoner, a nerd, and a slut… all on their way to a rock concert in then middle of nowhere, where they are menaced by the resurrected form of ol’ Arcane Alex. Boobs and blood are splashed across the screen in equal measure, and our heroes will have to use all of their smarts to survive… so they are most likely going to die.
Pickaxe really caught me by surprise… it’s gory, funny, and well acted, and definitely not your typical ’80’s slasher throwback. Rather this fright flick is filled to the brim with genuinely hilarious moments, lovable characters (despite their faults), and a real sense of what makes the slasher genre work, while still successfully lampooning it to side-splitting result.
Also of note are the copious amounts of grizzly gore splashed across the screen, realized with practical effects wizardry no less, as well as the plentiful amounts of comely lasses in various states of undress. Look, I never put on any airs about what floats my boat…
If I had to single out anything negative it’s that the sound is lacking in some scenes. An extra pass on the sound design would have worked wonders, but I get the fact that money can be tight, and if push comes to shove, effects would always be my top choice for the rationing of the ol’ dough-re-mi.
As for extras on this DVD we get… nada. Oh well, time saved for me I guess…
Bottom line; Pickaxe is a boobs and blood showcase that manages to be funny, full of heart, and faithful to the stalk n’ slay genre and gets the ol’ (severed) thumbs up from this revoltin’ reviewer!
