1/9/08: The Tripper (2007)It ended up as direct-to-video, but
The Tripper didn’t go without a fight. David Arquette took his directorial debut to the horror fans, bringing his pals—that being the cast—along to plenty of film fests to stir up some interest. The production certainly got some attention. In the end, though,
The Tripper slowly lost its buzz. Was it simply too classic of a slasher-film tribute? Or was it too right-wing in its depiction of Ronald Reagan as an axe-swinging destroyer of hippies?
Who cares? We’ve got Ronald Reagan swinging an axe and destroying hippies!
You might say this review contains SPOILERS, although nothing that’ll keep you from enjoying the movie. You’ll know what to expect if you’ve seen any
Friday the 13th film—or maybe
Hatchet, which was last year’s other sincere tribute to hacking hackery.
The Tripper still offers something special. For openers, there’s a quote from The Great Man himself: “A hippie is a person who walks like Tarzan, looks like Jane, and smells like Cheetah.”
We’re back in the ’60s, watching as a little kid views graphic war footage out of Vietnam. There’s a Cronkite-like news anchor spewing out Leftist drivel about how “this war—and perhaps all war—is undeniably evil.” We also hear California’s governor dismissing protests against wildlife development.
Meanwhile, the kid’s dad is watching over his ailing mom. His father is then called to a worksite, and he brings along his son. Turns out that the father cuts down trees for a living, and some hippies have formed a group hug around a massive Redwood. One hippie walks over, and he doesn’t care how about how he’s costing the kid’s dad an honest day’s work—and how the kid’s dad has to take care of a sick wife.
“If your wife has to die to save these trees,” says the hippie, “so be it.” A fight commences, and the kid’s dad gets arrested by the lazy cops. That’s okay, though. While the cops are distracted, the kid revs up a chainsaw and carves up some hippie hash.
Cut to our modern-day setting, as a new flock of young hippies head into those same woods to attend the Free Love Festival. They’re proving Reagan to be right about that whole Tarzan/Jane/Cheetah thing. They’re tripping on a wide variety of drugs, and almost run over a dog with their van. “I hate dogs,” says a hippie chick who’s probably an aspiring Muslim.
This is where industry types would start having doubts about picking up the film. A traditional slasher movie has a reliable mix of victims. It’s usually jocks and airhead sluts and one leering creep, plus the token good girl who survives. These hippies are all addled and obnoxious. You don’t feel too bad when one gets beaned in the head with a bottle by some local rednecks. There’s a token good girl, but she’s not virginal. The only reason that Samantha says no to drugs is that she’s suffering acid flashbacks on a regular basis.
So there’s the set-up. From there, you get a guy wearing a nice suit and a Ronald Reagan mask running through the woods and killing assorted hippies. You’re not encouraged to cheer for the victims. They’re all pretty loathsome. In fact,
The Tripper even dares to mention that the axe-killer isn’t the biggest threat in the forest. Two different hippies note that they’ll be in big trouble if they stumble across the crops of the local pot growers. We haven’t seen that topic addressed in a horror film since
Ticks.
There are three particularly fine moments, though. One is an
Invasion of the Body Snatchers tribute, as Samantha tries to get her pals to escape from the woods while they’d rather escape from reality. Her boyfriend seems to be comforting her, and then she realizes that the guy is simply stoned out of his mind. Thomas Jane—last mentioned here in
The Mist—plays the no-nonsense local sheriff, and gets a great scene where he improvises all kinds of fun admonishments to off-screen hippies. And there’s one hippie who finds out the logical results of equating the lives of dumb animals with human beings.
The Tripper has some Leftist twists, of course. Jane’s character ends up being more of a G.W. Bush conservative than a rock-ribbed Reaganite. You won't get the kind of vital distinction that's made in a film like
The Mad Bomber. There’s also a token creepy Republican, but that’s no big deal.
Actually, the film’s most Leftist moment helps the conservative cause. The credits roll under a speech by Robert Kennedy, Jr., and the simp is rambling on about all kinds of crap—including how Ronald Reagan killed “responsible journalism” by putting an end to the Fairness Doctrine. We’re happy to say that
The Tripper is the kind of film that’d get Rob-Rob screaming for an equal-time airing of—oh,
Fail-Safe, or some other classic comedy.
Make it your own: You can already get
cheap used DVDs of
The Tripper, and that’s a good deal. We haven’t even mentioned the fine cast and fun performances. There also lots of enjoyable small references buried in the script. You’ll also get a commentary with Arquette (who co-wrote the screenplay) and a lot of the actors. We’ve only listened to a few chapters with the commentary, but the talk doesn’t seem to be political. It’s mainly everyone talking about what a blast it was to make the thing.
