Midnight Skater (2002) (V)

User Rating:

4.6/10   

Director:

Lucas Campbell

Writers:

Andrew Campbell (writer)
Lucas Campbell (writer)

Release Date:

10 September 2002 (USA)

Genre:

Comedy | Horror

Tagline:

What does he have to do with a psycho killer and a college campus full of blood-thirsty zombies?

Plot:

Centered in a small college town, a mysterious skateboarder has been spray painting the campus red prompting...

Plot Keywords:

Midnight Skater

Cast

Cory Maidens	...	Richard Norton
Mike Neeson	...	Midnight Skater
Nick Jackson	...	Bruce
Ashleigh Holeman	...	Kim
Lucas Campbell	...	Pete (as Luke Campbell)
Jen Meissner	...	Shelly
Roza Haidet	...	Annie
Andrew Campbell	...	Danny
Ezra Haidet	...	Alvin
Erin Gannon	...	Heather
Tom Cosma	...	Tim
Stacy Silvers	...	Dealer 1
John Ed Bishop	...	Dealer 2
Matt Kelley	...	Pizza Dude
Colleen McGuire	...	Victim 1

Runtime:

USA:100 min

Country:

USA

Language:

English

Color:

Color

Certification:

USA:Not Rated

Filming Locations:

Kent State University, Kent, Ohio, USA

Company:

Speed Freak Productions

Goofs:

Crew or equipment visible: In the very first shot the cameraman's shadow is visible alongside that of the midnight skater.

Quotes:

Richard Norton: That's the best sex *I* ever had with a dead body whose arm was cut off that I was using to spank myself on the ass!

Movie Connections:

Referenced in The Red Skulls (2005) (V)

Soundtrack:

Beware the Midnight Skater

amusing super-low budget gorefest; handy having a machete-wielding psycho when there's zombies!

Someone is skateboarding around a college campus at midnight, tagging buildings with graffiti. A group of students upset by that decide to try to identify him. Meanwhile, Richard is a psycho who kills women or any guy who angers him. Meanwhile, a Jay and Silent Bob-type pair of drug dealers are pushing "Z," which turns out to have the unfortunate side effect of turning people into zombies. Meanwhile, Richard's geeky roommate Alvin is making chainmail, and is getting annoyed by Richard's red "hair dye" in the shower, and the smelly "roadkill" in the trash.

So, there's actually a bunch of things going on here, which must all meet up somehow. There are a number of characters, but they're pretty easy to keep straight. The women are cute, particularly Victims 1 & 2, and Kim and Annie. The acting is pretty amateur-level, but not completely terrible. The zombies are mostly white-faced and black-eyed, though there are some gorier-looking ones. Gore effects, like arms or heads being cut off are pretty good, and covered with a lot of blood. No nudity in it, closest being a zombie in his underwear... although two guys have their (prostetic) penises exposed and they don't fare too well.

Marks against it include the terrible lighting. Night scenes are very grainy - the camera clearly wasn't designed for those. Indoor scenes tend to be very yellow, like the camera wasn't white-balanced. Sometimes people are poorly lit, while others are overlit. Sound is at times a problem - you can hear the edits as the background noise starts and stops. One bit seemed to have lost the dialog.

Apart from the theme song, the credits indicate the soundtrack is provided by CD Truth, Sexual Tension, Kill the Hippies, Lords of the Highway, Dexter Chumley Attack, and The Pirates Who Carve Out Your Eyes and {IMDb prohibited four letter word for urinate} In Your Eye Sockets (!). Can't say I noticed that much music in the movie. There's some surf music which steals a riff from the Munsters theme, and some sort of speed metal with gibberish singing.

What can I say? I was actually fairly amused for the whole running time. Not bad for a low, low budget movie.