Meat Loaf

(On Cable TV, April 2022) I’m not sure it’s right to say that there’s a lot of opportunity wasted in Stage Fright – after all, what’s the reasonable ceiling on a camp slasher film adopting musical comedy tropes? Still, there’s a sense that the film achieves only a portion of its potential. As someone who loathes slashers but likes musicals, I probably shouldn’t be surprised at my mixed reaction: the musical aspects buoy my reaction to the slasher elements, and the slasher elements limit my liking of the musical bits. That tension comes into play from even the first sequence, as the joy of seeing Minnie Driver (yay!) as a Broadway star is almost immediately cut short by her being the first victim in a series of gory murders. The story really picks up ten years later, as her children are on the staff of a musical summer camp teetering on the edge of bankruptcy. But financial problems soon become the least of their worries when people start being killed (once again with maximum gore) all over the camp. The rest is rather standard slasher material, with kills every few minutes to keep audiences awake (or unimpressed, if they don’t like the genre) until a conclusion that’s slightly better than average for the genre. In between the kills, we have musical sequences (not an easy structural conceit!) – nothing particularly memorable, but enough to establish the film’s dual allegiances. Allie MacDonald is not bad as the plucky final girl, which Meat Loaf seems to have the most fun in a role that’s not particularly glamorous. There’s clearly a novelty to Stage Fright that will interest fans of genre hybridization, and a few cute quirks here and there that show how clever writer-director Jerome Sable can be. But there’s something missing, or a clear limit to how good this blend of elements can be. Perhaps pulled back by the different directions of its inspirations, Stage Fright may be worth a very marginal curious look, but don’t expect much conventional satisfaction no matter which way you approach it.