Pieces

[Jack]

Got this in one of those 10 movies for $12 packs, and it's about what you'd expect for that sort of movie.  We begin with a little kid putting together a puzzle, slowly completing the figure of a naked woman.  Mom walks in the room and throws a fit, so the little kid gets an ax and shuts her up.  He also gets a saw and removes mom's head.  Then he goes back to his puzzle.  The cops show up, and the kid hides in the closet, pretending that the whole thing was done by some unknown assailant.

Flash forward to 1982.  Actually it looks more like they flashed forward to 1972;  I remember 1982 pretty well and this ain't it.  Odd, because it was made in 1982.  It was a Spanish production, and I guess most of the voices were dubbed, which perhaps explains the fact that the dialog is utterly atrocious throughout the whole movie.  We're on a college campus, and some girl is happily skateboarding down the street.  Some moving guys are taking a large mirror out of a truck, and we're left to assume that the skateboard chick crashed into it.  We don't see the crash, don't know who she is, don't hear anything about it afterwards.  Oh well...she was so happy on her skateboard.  Another girl is happily reading a book while getting some sun out in the grass.  An annoying maintenance guy starts up a chainsaw behind her, to trim a tree.  But actually he gives the girl a bit of a trim    And so our masked murderer is introduced.  The police are called in for a meeting with the dean.  A moderately spooky professor is hanging around as well, perhaps we can count his as a suspect.  The cops really don't follow what I would call correct police procedure.  Close down the campus?  Nope.  Assign people to actually work on the case?  Nope, not really.  They'll try to get somebody.  They promise to do some research though.

So we've got a group of three kids who I originally thought were going to be main characters.  They give us some really awful dialog.   One of the girls wants to get together with one of the guys for a little sex in the pool.  The pool is next to the library, and it's dark and deserted.  Our hot babe strips down and hops in the pool.  I will say one thing about this movie, no shortage of boobies.  So Mr. Chainsaw Killer hacks her up into a pile of parts.  I will say another thing about this movie, lots of gore.  The cops, not having any real employees of their own, enlist the help of this girl's boyfriend (well, ex-boyfriend) to do their investigation.  He knows everything about the campus, and I do mean everything.  They also have an ex-tennis star who works for them, and she's bored with desk work so she goes undercover as a tennis pro at the college.  We're treated to five minutes of her demonstrating her tennis skills.  And there's a female reporter who can't get any answers from the police, so she starts hanging around the campus as well.

At night people like to lurk around the campus.  The reporter gets hacked up.  We see a dance class, and one girl has to go "to the john".  We follow her from the killer's point of view for quite a while.  Oh wait, now we'll switch to some completely different scene for a while.  I guess the dance class was just tossed in there only to be forgotten about.  The tennis girl is walking around, and she's suddenly attacked by a Kung Fu guy.  Yup, just suddenly attacked.  She apparently does something to defend herself, I can only guess what it was since I couldn't see anything.  Kung Fu guy is on the ground.  The kid who's helping the cops shows up, and has a friendly "Hey, how's it going buddy?"  with Mr. Kung Fu.  It's his martial arts instructor.  He apparently just goes around campus attacking people for the fun of it, and everyone thinks it's normal.  Yup.  Anyhow, eventually we get back to the dance class, where the killer finally offs that chick.  And some other chick too if I remember correctly.

Eventually the kid who's helping the cops figures out who the murderer is, and they race to save the tennis chick who's only moments away from getting killed.  I have to say the plot was fairly descent, it had a lot going on and never got boring.  The editing often gave the movie a disjointed and amateurish feel.  Acting was awful, maybe it wasn't helped with the dubbing.  Lots of gore, a fair amount of nudity.  Kind of a "shocking" ending, I thought that was quite entertaining.  If you get the Fright Night 10 movie DVD pack for under $15, you'll get your money's worth with this one.

[indianasmith]

I sw that one when I was in the Navy!!  I remember it being gory and goofy, with a plentiful serving of boobs and blood.

[The Unknown Murderer]

I haven't seen this one yet, despite hearing about it WAAAAAY back in the fourth grade (!). That would have been, oh, 1985?

My main reason for wanting to watch it is because 'Bluto' From Robert Altman's Popeye is in it.

And it's Pieces. Seems every horror aficionado should see it at least once. That, and I'm a bit of a sadomasochist.

[skuts]

Saw this in NYC when it opened on a double bill with TCSM. Some idiot actually bought a 3 year old to this double feature which cried all through Chainsaw until the audience politely asked them to leave. But I digress.
Pieces was one of the funniest films I'd ever seen. It seemed to have been cobbled together from at least three other movies and my date and I were laughing so hard we had tears running down. After the show, one woman with her boyfriend exclaimed it was the scariest movie she ever saw. The boyfriend said he would never take her to another one of these movies, prompting another laugh fit from me.
Overall, a good time was had by all. (Except maybe the 3 year old kid who's probably locked up in Rikers by now.)

[Allhallowsday]

This movie does have a wet-her-pants scene (the thought of which is rooted in another old thread "Who p**sed themselves?" or whatever it was...)  and CHRISTOPHER GEORGE describes "the horror... the terror, this girl must have felt..."  I saw this in the theatre when it was new...          

[RCMerchant]

The kung Fu teacher was the clincher,for me. 

[Sister Grace]

I saw this movie when i was young and then again recently. I remember the beginning really well and how lucky the kid was to get away with it because the mother reminded me of my very staunch grand-mother. Anywho...this is one of those on of those movies you'd find on the shelf at the local independent video store when you were a kid. For some reason, I remember my brother and I would often rent this on fridays when you could get five movies for five days along with I Dismember Mama, Forever Evil, and Edge of Insanity (Anthony Perkins). VHS heaven! Those were the days....

[voltron]

Well, the tennis playing (padding?) made for some, ahem, riveting entertainment. 

[hellbilly]

I love Pieces, never fails to entertain. Fans of Pieces should rejoice:



Should street in October 

[Torgo]

The kung Fu teacher was the clincher,for me. 

Ditto.   First time I saws this flick and it got to that scene I just looked around at my friends and said "What the hell?!"

[Cult Movie Mania]

Come on, show Pieces some love!  You simply can't beat this mix of carnage, funbags and Euro Trash filmmaking!  I was lucky enough to have seen this during its initial release ('83 or '84) at the Plaza Twin Theaters in St. Petersburg, FL (now defunct).  It was my first chainsaw murder!

What I liked about Pieces (and other films during the period, Mausoleum, Mortuary, 7 Doors of Death, and countess others) is that it truly delivered.

Favorite scene: When Linda Day George shouts "You BASTARD!!!" on the tennis courts.  Man, I remember laughing to tears...

Pieces has a heralded place in my den, as its one of select movie posters on the wall.

[Eddietom]

I saw Pieces years ago. I don't remember much of it anymore, but didn't it have some really random scene in the beginning where someone skateboards into a sheet of glass. I was all 'LOL WTF was that all about' and couldn't stop cracking up. Also, I'll watch anything with Paul L. Smith (the Bluto dude) I love that guy.