Written by Timothy Bond And Peter Jobin And John Saxton And John Beaird
Directed by J. Lee Thompson
Virginia: "Happy birthday to me. Happy birthday to me. Happy birthday dear Ginny. Happy birthday to me."
Trailing through some 1980s horror, this was something I wasn't even aware existed but I decided to watch it last night. It's a birthday and people ended up dying because the surprise villain wanted them to.
Starring Little House On The Prairie actress, Melissa Sue Anderson, she played a troubled young woman named Virginia "Ginny" Wainwright. Pretty, popular and a member of the Top 10 at Crawford Academy, Ginny seemed to have a charmed enough existence.
Except, she was undergoing therapy by Dr David Faraday (Glenn Ford) to unlock suppressed memories while also having a tense relationship with her father, Harold (Lawrence Dane) following the death of her mother, Estelle (Sharon Acker), a year ago. I mean, their whole relationship felt very off from their first scene together.
On top of that as the movie progressed, the majority of the Top 10 were being killed off by a mystery killer, one by one. Needless to say, in some rather brutal ways with their past times being used in their demise. Being into fitness certainly didn't help one character.
While there was another character who was intentionally being made to look like a potential psychopath, the movie somewhat tried to subvert things. Flashbacks provided context to one character's death while the present day saw a darker side to Ginny emerge.
Then things really took a wild turn. It turned out that best friend Ann Thompson (Tracey E. Bregman) was an even bigger menace than Ginny and they were half sisters. While I appreciated the attempt of subversion, the twist doesn't land particularly well even though the movie ended on a macabre note.
- Ann wore a latex mask of Ginny to gaslight the latter for the third act of the movie.
- The pub was called The Silent Sister, Rudi (David Eisner) had fun referencing Quasimodo and first victim Bernadette O'Hara (Lesleh Donaldson) made crude jokes about Mrs Patterson's (Frances Hyland) dog.
- Standout music: A rather creepy use of Happy Birthday during the final scene of the movie.
- Chronology: Took place during Ginny's 18th birthday. The movie's set in New York.
Happy Birthday To Me isn't quite as horrible as it's reputation would imply but it's definitely not a classic. The twist in theory should've worked but it felt unearned and not well explored either. Serviceable at best.
Rating: 6 out of 10
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