• Straight to Video
• Director: Joseph D. Clark
• Written by: Joseph D. Clark
• Running Time: 78 minutes
• Language: English
• MPAA Rating: UNRATED
• Cast: Joseph D. Clark, Rockford Varcoe, Peter Mehren, Kesta Graham, Naomi Vondell, Elizabeth Innes, Neil Kulin, Jessica Psaila, Sean Clement, Phil Jacob, Kay Mehren

          There’s a curious shot at the beginning of “Bikini Party Massacre” that stands as a first clue in a film that outwardly feels like just another in a long line of passable slasher-in-the-woods flicks, that is until it blindsides you with a twist ending so shockingly unpredictable and original that audience members might very well feel duped. The shot involves the driver of a moving car, Jeff (writer, producer and director Joseph D. Clark), peering assiduously into the backseat for a few seconds before turning his attention back to the road. The seats are empty. Seemingly, he’s alone as his vehicle slowly crawls along a busy stretch of highway. Moments later, however, the car is fully loaded – five people suddenly occupy the various seats. Was it a coy editing trick or was there something more going on there? Even the similar sounding names of the characters; Randy, Mandy etc. are cause for concern or are the writers and editors being given too much credit?

          At the outset of the film, a young couple stumble upon what appears to be a corpse deep in the forest. The man is lying on his back; a knife is embedded deep into his stomach. The couple look on in shock as the film suddenly jumps backward several days.

          The man lying in the woods, we soon learn, is named Jeff, and he and his friends; Jake (Sean Clement), Rick (Phil Jacob who also worked as a composer on the film), Sandy (Jessica Psaila), Randy (Naomi Vondell) and Mandy (Elizabeth Inns), have saddled up and hit the road for a weekend of camping, drinking and general craziness. Lasting nearly thirty minutes, the trip itself adds some interesting composition to the events to come – namely in the form of two macabre and frightening back to back dream sequences from two separate characters sleeping in the car. Afterwards, the two dreamers get into a screaming match, hurling the most egregious insults at each until their respective boyfriends are able to reign them in. When their car runs out of gas, Jeff reluctantly hikes across a field to a nearby farmhouse to barter with an old woman for some fuel. In return, the woman, fancying herself some kind of psychic, demands payment in form of a palm reading. Jeff happily obliges, but is left stunned when she warns him about a looming danger in the woods – as revealed in a hectic but effective montage of gruesome images foreshadowing events to come. He doesn't heed her warning.

          Once the group arrives at their desired location, a fairly remote region in the Ottawa Valley in Ontario, Canada, they set up tents, break out the booze, wrangle into their bikinis, and collect some firewood before immediately heading down to the beach for fun in the sun. Translating quite well on screen, the group seems to be having a wonderful time, and I can only guess which moments of juvenile merriment were actually scripted and which just happened during filming and were included during post-production. In a campy scene (set to some over-the-top romantic music), which feels completely out of place here, Jeff engages in a little hanky panky after being seduced by the strange but beautiful Sandy. It’s pretty clear that Sandy is wrestling with a personal demon, which has exteriorized itself in the spirit of a sinister old man in a tuxedo who seems to be watching her every move. Even stranger, it’s a man that nobody but Sandy can see.

          As darkness blankets the forest, the group huddle around a small campfire and engage in a game of truth. Before the night is over, Sandy will have revealed the identity of the old man, her deceased father, and what he did to her as a child. With that dreary unearthing, the mirth comes to an end, and everyone agrees that it’s time for bed. The next day, the group find their camp invaded by a grizzled, crazed looking old man, who clambers inside Sandy’s tent and hovers above her menacingly until the guys intervene and force him away. With several suspects firmly established, the remainder of the film is comprised of the group of six being systematically stalked and murdered in some surprisingly imaginative and gruesome ways.

          As I said earlier, the film is constructed in such a way that it feels like the usual slasher fodder you’ve likely seen before, however, as the film draws to its conclusion and the killer is eventually revealed, something peculiar happens – things don’t unravel the way they should. The slasher genre is really quite predictable, as it usually tends to follow a formula; the revelation of the killer; the pieces of the puzzle fall into place neatly as the various suspects have been eliminated; then there’s a showdown between the killer and the final girl and at that point, the audience generally coasts to its customary ending.

          With “Bikini Party Massacre” the formula doesn’t work and the revelation of the killer only begets more questions, as do the actions of the various characters, who seem oblivious to each other’s plight even when they are inches away, screaming at them. The film’s twist ending arrives like a sucker punch, and for sure, it’ll leave the audience reeling. Some folks might even feel cheated however, Joseph D. Clark offers more than enough clues throughout and the audience need not feel duped. Clark does seem to take great joy in setting up the various culprits. The odd behaviour of at least two characters, will surely leave viewers suspicious of them from the outset. In my opinion, the startling conclusion of "Bikini Party Massacre" not only works to enrich the final product, placing it in front of many lesser films in this sub-genre, it also forces the viewer to revaluate what they’ve seen but what they will see in the remaining minutes before the eventual credit scrawl. It was like a breath of fresh air, and part of my joy came in a secondary viewing, finding the clues and attempting to make sense of them.

          "Bikini Party Massacre" can puchased from Amazon.com and from Mill Creek Entertainment.