A serious look at the unique 1993 Ted Raimi serial killer shocker
Any movie that contains a rare leading turn from perennial bit parter Ted Raimi, and that features Ricki Lake and controversial skin flick starlet Traci Lords among its supporting cast has to be special.
Has to be.
So believe me when I tell you that SKINNER (1993) is.
An awesome yet long forgotten footnote in the wave of serial killer chillers instigated by the success of THE SILENCE OF THE LAMBS (1991), SKINNER is the best kept secret of the subgenre’s boom period. Seductively out of step, it’s also something of an anomaly too. Less procedural-based a la SEVEN (1995) or COPYCAT (1995), SKINNER is more an oneiric dissection of a truly twisted mind; a sort of cross between the slice o’ life misery of HENRY: PORTRAIT OF A SERIAL KILLER (1986) and the candy-coloured surrealism of SUSPIRIA (1977), to which its lurid lighting owes an unmistakable debt. Powerful, vibrant, off-kilter, and beguiling, the film pulls you in the second Raimi’s eponymous psycho drifts into Los Angeles in its dream-tinged opening.
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