MANIAC (2012) ¢ ¢
D: Franck Khalfoun
Elijah Wood, Nora Arnezeder, Megan Duffy,
Genevieve Alexandra, Liane Balaban, Jan Broberg
Frodo the psycho killer. A blood-and-guts slasher movie in which the former hobbit plays a young man with significant mother issues who works in the family's old mannequin shop and goes around at night stalking and killing women and scalping them. Parallels to "Psycho" are not coincidental, but there's a big difference between Janet Leigh being stabbed in the shower (in black and white, with Hitchcock and Herrmann pulling the strings) and Elijah Wood with a straight razor slicing the top of somebody's head off. The singular focus on women as frightened, helpless victims is fairly disturbing, but it's not like this is the only film out there that revels in that. The scalpings are extremely graphic. Fans of that sort of thing should have a good time.
