Office Killer

Director - Cindy Sherman (Doll Clothes)
Starring - Carol Kane (Scrooged), Molly Ringwald (The Breakfast Club), and Jeanne Tripplehorn (Waterworld)
Release Date -1997
Genre - Horror/Comedy
Tagline - "Working here can be murder"
Favorite Quote - "You may think that once dead people are dead, that is the end of them. Not so. They leave memories, which are very much like dead people living inside of you"
Format - DVD (Personal Collection) (Midnight Horror 8 Film Collection)

Rating (Out of 5):

     When I was in middle school I stayed home from school because I was sick as shit.  I was shuffling through the channels and came across this little film on Cinemax or HBO.  I absolutely loved it.  This movie was unlike anything I had seen before.  This was not your typical horror movie made for the horror hounds, instead this is one of those horror movies made for movie lovers in general.  Not to be confused for theatrical shit released to the masses.  As I got older I looked for this movie on VHS and DVD and could not find it.  One day I was randomly looking through the $5 dollar bin at Wal-Mart and spotted another Midnight Horror Collection.  Always looking to add another one of these collections to my actual collection, I grabbed it.  When I grabbed it I was surprised to see that Office Killer was one of the films on this collection, so I bought it.

     The film follows Dorine Douglas (Kane), a magazine editor, who is rather odd and anti-social.  Most of her coworkers find her strange due to her lack of communication with them.  She also lives at home with her handicapped mother who was crippled in a car crash she caused resulting in her father dying.  One night, while working late, her computer crashes and she asks a fellow coworker to help her out.  While he is trying to fix the computer he is electrocuted.  Dorine flips shit and calls 911, however, when the operator comes on the line she hangs up and decides to take his body back to her pad.  Once inside her home, Dorine imagines that he is still alive and decides to add more people to her basement fan club.  She starts picking other coworkers and girls scouts and killing them before placing them in her basement.  At work Dorine is also starting to get noticed for her writing and computer skills.  Kim, one of Dorine's coworkers, despises Dorine and is constantly telling her superiors that something is not right with her.  Eventually they fire Kim for her negativity towards Dorine.  Dorine attacks her but she is able to get away.  Later, Dorine discovers that her mother had passed away while she was at work and because of her current fascination with death she is unaffected by this.  Kim's best friend, Norah (Tripplehorn), is missing after a lunch date with Dorine and her boyfriend goes to Dorine's to see if she knew where she was at.  Dorine had knocked her unconscious and placed her in the basement with the others, however, she wakes up while her boyfriend is there and he hears her.  Dorine then kills them both and calls Kim.  After the phone call, Kim calls the police.  Before the police arrives, Dorine douses the place with gas and burns it to the ground before heading off on her own now that her mother has passed on.

     I really enjoyed this movie after watching it for a second time.  It had been so many years since I last watch it and was still pleasantly surprised by it.  This movie catches a lot of shit, but for what it is, its very enjoyable.  I have seen people review this film and reference The Exorcist and Poltergeist.  Neither of these movies have anything in common with this film.  This movie is not story or budget rich.  This is just a straight forward movie made to entertain and NOT be a award winning film.  The acting is actually very good and so is the special effects.  Carol Kane is very good at portraying creepy characters.  She did a great job on her portrayal of Granny in the 90's Addams Family films and the ghost in Scrooged.  Her being cast as Dorine was brilliant.   The movie has some nice blood and gore with no CGI as well.  This is something of a rarity for this time.  During this time CGI was starting to take over regardless of the film's budget.  Also, the story is very original but nothing like the classics that it is often compared to.  The story reminds me of the Lucky McKee film May to an extent.  That is one film I am not really a fan of but would like to give it another chance.  My biggest complaint about this movie is the characters.  Aside from Kim and Dorine, the characters are a bit of a nuisance.  The acting is good but their development just seems halfassed and was just added to the film to pick up the running time.  I also did not like the ending.  I was just expecting something more from the film to close it out.  The ending we got just does not provide closure for the viewer and for a film where the killer lives and the film just ending is a big let down.  I want to know what became of her.  Other than those two complaints I liked this film a lot.  If you ever have the chance to watch this, then do it.  Just remember this not a horror classic, instead just a cheap, quick film made strictly for entertainment and not to be groundbreaking.