The Prowler (Joseph Zito, 1981)
A jilted GI holds a decades-long grudge
The Prowler is a fairly standard slasher movie in terms of plot: an unknown killer terrorizes a small town, slaying a succession of young lovers and anyone else who happens to get in their way.
But The Prowler feels different than most slashers. In a way, it feels almost archaic. Like a throwback to an idealized America of yore. Part of it is the small town milieu which purposefully evokes a bygone era, similar to how Blue Velvet’s 1980’s feels like the 1950’s. Part of it is the film’s leisurely pacing (not a criticism).
Most obviously, of course, is the residual effect of the film’s 1945-set pre-credits sequence, which opens on newsreel footage celebrating the return of GIs following WWII. But it turns out that one of these veterans is a jilted lover, who received a “Dear John” letter while he was soldiering away overseas. Now he’s back home, and he intends to slay his ex-sweetheart and the guy she’s currently hooking up with on the night of her college’s graduation ball.
35 years later, that same college is about to have the first graduation ball since that bloody evening. And wouldn’t you know it, the prowler has returned: brutally murdering the college’s young women and their boyfriends. It’s up to college senior Pam and her police deputy boyfriend, Mark, to figure out what’s going on and put an end to the evening of terror.
And this is one of the more prominent aspects of the film that makes this community feel so nostalgically idyllic: As the town’s lone policeman investigates this pesky prowler, his civilian girlfriend naturally tags along as his informal deputy (flip-flopping between being a confidently capable individual and helpless damsel in distress at the drop of a hat).
But it’s more than that. This town is one where everyone knows each other. Everyone has some role to play in their society. Everything about it feels like a throwback. There are more similarities between 1945 and 1981 than there are differences — and how these two eras are alike is striking. (In both, for example, the young couples cheerfully copulate. It might be more brazen in 1981, but premarital sex is definitely happening in 1945 too.) The two periods color each other in The Prowler, causing each to be presented not as they normally would, and this gives the town and the film overall a certain timeless quality.
The overall effect of all this is — to put it as bluntly as possible — is that The Prowler appears to take place in a location (and times) of great innocence. The murders imposed on it are therefore all the more jarring.
And especially so considering how realistic the fatal injuries are.
The Prowler is notorious for its elaborate special effects, designed by legendary prosthetic makeup artist Tom Savini. We’re talking pitchforks piecing torsos, knives cutting deep into throats. It’s very detailed and convincing stuff. And as pedestrian a plot as The Prowler has, the death sequences are highly imaginative and sophisticated.
It’s definitely one of the more interesting slasher movies. Although at first glance it appears to be nothing more than one of the more hackneyed example of the subgenre, the reality is that it’s actually one of the more surprising and unexpected ones — and is fully deserving of the lingering contemplation it provokes.