Director: Lucky McKee, Chris Sivertson.
Starring: Caitlin Stasey, Sianoa Smit-McPhee, Brooke Butler, Tom Williamson, Amanda Grace Cooper, Reanin Johannink.
Running Time: 90 minutes.
Synopsis: A gang of cheerleaders embark on a supernatural path of vengeance in this wickedly ghoulish subversion of the high school movie.
From the title alone, you know what you’re going to get. This is pure, undiluted trash and it’s an utter hoot. From the roots of Roger Corman grow mighty oaks like John Waters, and ALL CHEERLEADERS DIE is a branch that leans towards dark skies, from which cheerleader outfits hang, drenched in blood.
Cult film makers Lucky McKee and Chris Sivertson co-write and direct this goofy piece of cheerleader-sploitation and they sure know how to drum up controversy. Sivertson is responsible for I KNOW WHO KILLED ME and things have only gotten sillier with his latest, while McKee did THE WOMAN. Yes, that THE WOMAN. Although there is pretty full on violence here, there’s nothing that compares to his previous piece of torture-porn. ALL CHEERLEADERS DIE may upset some people with its cocktail of sex and violence, but it has its tongue firmly in its cheek and is appealing to a cine-literate crowd of genre fans; they know their fanbase and are making a film for them. It’s a completely different animal to THE WOMAN, which is a very good thing.
In order to subvert a genre, you must set up that world quickly. McKee and Sivertson nail their colours to the mast pretty swiftly by jamming as many stereotypes into the opening few minutes as they can. Bitchy cheerleaders? Check. Gothy/wiccan type/possibly a lesbian because that means ‘outsider’? Check. Douchey jocks? Check. Stoners? Check. They really put the B into ‘subtle’ when the weed wagon shows up, the doors opening to reveal clouds of smoke and coughing white kids with a shirt that says ‘Make Weed Legal’. But having established the tropes and conventions, they can twist them around and try to create something original with them. None of which can be explained without spoilers, as the plot progresses at a fair old pace.
It takes a smart writer to do something truly new with such over-used character models and situations. Joss Whedon is, of course, the king of such things, with CABIN IN THE WOODS being his latest game changer. And it could be said that ‘subverting clichés’ is now itself a cliché. These knowing, wink-wink approaches to films can only justify so much. For instance, there are countless shots of nubile ladies in bikinis. The lens follows their arses like butt cheeks are magnetic and it seems cannibalism can be sexy when the killers are in their pants. The writers/directors can excuse this blatant objectification by claiming it’s a trope of the genre and they’re using it ironically. Essentially though, you still have scantily clad, thin, buxom women for the (primarily) male gaze. Laura Mulvey would be all up in McKee’s grill.
To be fair, it’s not like the women are objectified and then disposed of, like so many horror films tend to do. Or worse, are punished for being sexually active or even just attractive. The five female principals are all well-rounded with plenty of great dialogue. The writers/directors pull a neat little trick in yanking the rug out from who you think will be the main characters and, indeed, antiheroes. Caitlin Stasey does a cracking job as Maddy, the emotional core of the film, while Reanin Johannink, Brooke Butler and Amanda Grace Cooper deserve high praise for elevating themselves above disposable teens and becoming interesting people. Tom Williamson is delicious and (importantly) believable as jock-from-Hell Terry, and the brilliantly named Sianoa Smit-McPhee takes what could be the most clichéd character of all – the gothy, outsider, lesbian Leena – and gives her substance. The Bechdel Test is passed with flying colours, with the women actually having funny lines, which is something Seth MacFarlane and the team behind THE HANGOVER could take note of.
ALL CHEERLEADERS DIE is either a feminist film, or a particular type of man’s idea of what a feminist film could be. But it certainly is schlocky, funny, violent, clever and surprisingly sexy. It is a great unwind movie if you like this sort of thing and does what it sets out to do – entertain.
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