31 Days of Halloween - Day 12: Mother's Day (1980)

For the last few years I always do a 31 days of Halloween month. The past few years I re-read all the original Goosebumps books and before that I'd watch 31 horror movies. However I realized every single time I watched 31 Horror movies I exclusively picked ones I enjoyed. I decided to do something slightly different. I composed a list of every horror movie I owned and put them in alphabetical order. Then using a random number generator I generated 31 numbers and watched the movies that corresponded with those numbers. Some are great films and others… well… are less than fun let's say. I hope you enjoy!

Day 12: Mother's Day (Movie #329)

There's a chance that you are only familiar with Mother's Day because of the recent remake. The remake is a remake in name only and while in a lot of ways it is superior to the original I still prefer this version of the film.

This Troma film (directed by Lloyd's brother Charlie Kaufman) isn't as tromarific and other titles but it's obvious that the Kaufman brother's share a very similar sense of humor. The first 20 minutes or so of the movie basically is a college road trip film. However when the horror element squeaks in it's practically a pre-cusor to the torture porn genre.

That's not just me making up shit either. When I had Lloyd Kaufman on my podcast he mentioned that this movie was Eli Roth's (creator of Hostel) favorite film. Hostel along with Saw definitely helped ring in a couple years of demented psychological horror and torture. The only difference is Hostel didn't have a shitty plaster head in a birdcage… which makes this movie much much better.

Mother's Day follows a group of 3 female college friends who get together every year for a road trip and to relive their past memories. On a camping trip full of pot and skinny dipping the three find themselves kidnapped and in the home of two deranged brothers and their evil Mother. 

These boys will do anything to make Mama proud, including rape and murder. The film's sense of humor is very similar to Texas Chainsaw Massacre's having complete insane characters acting like a perfect family. One particularly memorable scene involves the brothers coming home to brag about how they beat and kidnapped the girls only to be disciplined by their mother for not wiping their feet before they entered the house.

In the end the film turns into a revenge film in a similar (but fair less dark) vein of Last House on the Left and I Spit On Your Grave. While it's a greatly flawed and ultra-low budget horror movie, there's just too much charm to not find enjoyment in Mother's Day.

Matt Kelly is the host of the popular podcast The Saint Mort Show, a frequent contributor to Geekscape.net, the founder of Chords for Cures and the co-writer/co-director of the upcoming comedy Describing the Moon. He also loves it when people surprise him with purchases from his Amazon Wishlist… just saying.