Exoticalot People are voting emotionally.

Dorathen Better Late Then Never

Hadrina The movie's neither hopeful in contrived ways, nor hopeless in different contrived ways. Somehow it manages to be wonderful

Skyler Great movie. Not sure what people expected but I found it highly entertaining.

TheBlueHairedLawyer Eric is a really nice guy, but his mind isn't in the pressures of reality. He spends nearly all his time thinking of, and watching, old movies (Creature from the Black Lagoon, The Mummy, Night of the Living Dead, etc.) using an old-fashioned projector in his dim bedroom. His aunt Stella has taken him in but is confined to a wheelchair and blames him for it.One day he meets a Marilyn Monroe lookalike at the local city diner, and when she accidentally stands him up for a movie date he sadly walks home to watch his movies alone, only to have his aunt destroy his beloved projector. Horrified, he snaps and shoves her down the stairs, and soon afterwards goes on a murder rampage to get back at everyone who dragged him down in life.Fade to Black is an action-packed and hilarious yet underrated slasher film. It deserves more of an audience, that's for sure. With its catchy 80's soundtrack, decent acting and original plot, if you're a slasher fan or even if you just want a movie to watch this is one to add to your list! It does have one or two flaws: it starts of rather boring and many of the inside jokes Eric tells reference films that most people haven't actually watched so it's hard to get what he finds so funny. Overall though, it isn't bad.

acidburn-10 The plot = A young man named whose obsessed with classic movies, is driven to madness and decides to make his fantasies real, by murdering those who've wronged him."Fade To Black" is a reasonably entertaining movie, it's not brilliant but it's not terrible either, many movies from this era justified they're maniac's actions with a brief back story, here we get to see the main character slowly descending into madness, an angle which was interesting and I did like for part of the time, but there were times where it just seemed too far-fetched and unbelievable.This movie could have been one of those defining moments of the slasher genre, but sadly it doesn't quite build enough steam. The supporting cast aren't given enough screen time to be fleshed out or to be cared about, and none of the murders build any real tension or decent gore effects. Although there some interesting set pieces but all that falls flat, although the main character's obsession between fantasy and reality was fun and interesting showing clips from different movies but its abruptness and simplicity leaves you unfulfilled and doesn't deliver as much as it could have.Dennis Christopher gives a pretty good performance as the lead Eric his descend into madness was memorable, but he doesn't always comes across as very menacing, but he is the only cast member that's even fleshed out. Linda Kerridge (Marilyn) gives an OK performance as the centre of Eric's obsession but she kind of falls apart at the end, but she was beautiful. and it's also worth pointing out is that we get a young Mickey Rourke here in a minor role and does alright in his small amount of screen time, another big star making they're mark in a slasher before going on to bigger success.All in all "Fade To Black" is not as brilliant or memorable as it could of been and this could have been up there with some of the other 80's slasher greats (Friday The 13th, My Bloody Valentine, House On Sorority Row, Happy Birthday To Me) but sadly due to the many faults this just becomes average.

rokcomx A cinema devotee murders via movie scene recreations - rarely has Hollywood portrayed its own audience as potential serial killers who emulate what they see on screen. The surprise here is that the killer's inspiration isn't always horror movies, but rather gangster flicks and even Hopalong Cassidy westerns, genres whose inherent violence is often overlooked, or at least under acknowledged.Dennis Christopher - lauded for his geeky role in Breaking Away - found perhaps his greatest role as movie buff Eric Binford, a shy pasty-faced loner and mama's boy who works on the outskirts of the movie biz and patterns every aspect of his life after the films he adores. When bullies drive him over the edge (one played by young Mickey Rourke!), he retreats into a dream world that allows him to act out his revenge fantasies, at first seeking only to frighten.However, when his first scare tactics result in homicide (his boss has a heart attack, a bully running away from him accidentally impales himself on a fence), Binford takes it to the next lethal step --- Film buffs will love all the winking references to classic cinema, and the Marilyn Monroe look-a-like lead actress does one of the most convincing impersonations ever. The finale on the roof of Grauman's Chinese Theater in Hollywood echoes several specific movies, in particular James Cagney's White Heat (with snippets of Cagney actually edited into the action), but it manages to be unnervingly unique in its own right, mainly because we've come to sympathize and even care for Eric Binford.I eagerly await a proper DVD release of this 1980 cult classic!

lost-in-limbo The low-budget production had the premise (innovative and creepy), but the execution of it seemed a little off when it had to count. I wouldn't call it just a horror film, as it had a bit of everything in it. For old-school Hollywood film-buffs it was ripe with numerous knowing film references (inter-cutting snippets of features), where our smugly weedy protagonist (a multi-layered, skin-crawling performance by Dennis Christopher) begins to confuse fictional with reality after everything in his life begins to crumble as his realises there's only one way to escape it. He begins role-playing characters and scenes with nothing but conviction. While these sequences were creative, it just seems to take away from the underlining horror.The dark humour seems to fit, but the script is sorely underwritten due to some stringy sub-plots (mainly that of Thomason's character) that are poorly thought out. Not that they couldn't added anything, but they could've if a little more exposition was spent on them. Instead they feel trivial. The backdrop is interestingly displayed with the director Vernon Zimmerman using genuine locations where it cooked up some gritty atmospherics. Some moments were kind of overdone (when the unstable homicidal nature and identity crises kicks in, when the torment gets out of hand), but it keeps you highly involved. I didn't find it particularly suspenseful (other than the climax), but the way it's organised shows enough drive and originality.Other than Christopher, the rest of the cast (featuring the likes of Norman Burton, Tim Thomason, Eve Brent, Morgan Paull, and John Steadman) are mildly okay. A perky Linda Kerridge (the Marilyn Monroe look-alike) has a good screen presence and there's a small role for Mickey Rourke. Craig Safan's smoking, uncanny score works a treat.