Pieces

Pieces (1982)

This movie opens in the past with a young boy putting together a jigsaw puzzle of a naked woman. His mother finds him and freaks out. She tells him to get a garbage bag and starts to search his room, threatening to find the rest and toss it all out. The young boy returns with an axe and you can guess what happens next. The action then moves to the present where a killer is stalking a college campus killing off young women and taking pieces of the body away with him. But who is the killer? After more killings the police are forced to put an undercover police detective on campus as bait to try and lure the killer out before the body count gets too high, but will she too become a victim?

So lets start of the review by talking just a bit about the movie. If you were to just look at the dialogue, and story structure Pieces isn’t a very good movie. Some of the dialogue is incredibly dumb, “Right now we're just buying clothes without labels and trying them on for size.” This previous quote is a prime example of the kind of lines that fill the movie from beginning to end. In fact that isn’t even silliest thing you will hear said while watching this movie. The narrative is all over the place with random characters that show up for no apparent reason (think karate professor), and situations that are completely unbelievable (hiding a chainsaw behind your back?). Plus are the police really so short of officers that they use a college kid as an investigator and backup? Hell the ending itself is bizarre and out of left field. But the craziest thing about all of these issues is how they all come together to make one of the best cheesy movies of all time. Really the dialogue combined with the insanely nutty plot somehow click together to make one of the most entertaining horror films you will ever watch. I’ve seen this movie at least ten times (never quite like this, but more on that later) and it is always a good time. I’ve also shown this movie to many friends, all of who have become fans after one viewing. If you haven’t seen Pieces then you are missing out big time.

Now I would love this movie if all it had going for it were what I’ve already mentioned. But Pieces also promises and delivers some great kills and gore. From the first kill, which is a nifty axe to the face to the last “attack” which will have all the men watching cringing this movie is balls to the wall and in your face with the red stuff. Along the way we get limbs hacked off, piles of body parts lying around, and a killing on a waterbed that involves an iconic image I’m sure genre fans will recognize. All this and a couple of things that I don’t want to spoil make Pieces a bloody good time. I also wanted to mention that along with the copious amounts of blood we get a nice bit of nudity. There are plenty of naked girls doing bad things before they become victims. This is kind of a necessary and expected companion to the blood in a horror film like this. Just though I would mention it.

In addition to this being a review of the movie Pieces it is a review for the new 2-disc set of the film from the fine people at Grindhouse Releasing. When I heard that someone was going to put together a special edition of this movie I was both excited and shocked. I’ve seen the cut, grainy copies of this movie that are available on many of the budget discs or that are floating around the internet. But I tell you right now that you have never really seen this movie until you have seen this DVD. I’ve never seen the movie look this good ever! It makes a huge difference in the kills and gore scenes. I always liked this movie, but after watching the movie restored I love it. If that weren’t enough there are a couple of interviews and one really neat special feature on the DVD. There is an option to watch the movie with an audio track that was recorded with a live audience in a movie theater. The idea of it really didn’t thrill me, but I ended up watching the movie a second time with this audio track. On the second disc of the set there are a couple of interviews. The first one is called Pieces of Juan and is an interview with director Juan Piquer Simón. He discusses his career both before and after Pieces in addition to telling some great stories about shooting Pieces. There is one awesome story about an actor and a bag of ice that had me laughing so hard I woke up my family. The other interview is called The Reddest Herring and is an in-depth discussion with actor Paul L. Smith. Ironically there isn’t a whole lot about Pieces in this interview, but Smith is such an interesting guy who has led an amazing life that I was fascinated. Both interviews are over an hour long and are some of the best I’ve ever seen included as extras on a DVD. For more information about this and other great releases head check out Grindhouse Releasing at http://www.grindhousereleasing.com/

Well looks like I’m just about done with my review here. To wrap it up I want to look at a line that jumps out from my notes. “Pieces is the perfect cheesy movie.” I can’t really say it better than that. I’ve been debating in with myself what sort of rating it deserves, but given how much fun I’ve had with it over the last couple of days I think it is a no brainer.

4 out of 4

reviewed by John Shatzer