Released a few years after the big slasher boom of the early 1980s, I wouldn’t be surprised if not many people had heard of Evil Laugh.
This 1986 slasher, directed by Dominick Brascia pits a number of teens (mostly in their 30s), against an unseen killer, with a err…evil laugh.
Some my recognise Brascia’s name from his turn as the annoying Joey from Friday the 13th: A New Beginning, and digging a little further he was also involved in a messy sexual abuse scandal shortly before passing away in 2018.
Anyways, back to the film. The budget is clearly low but Evil Laugh certainly makes the most of its limited resources, and also gives us one of the first meta slashers.
We openly have a character who talks about the tropes of a slasher film and feels like a precursor to Randy from Scream.
The disguise of the killer looks like some kind of modified ski mask and we have a minor mythology akin to Friday the 13th, which makes Evil Laugh feel very in tune with the slasher heyday.
While the finale feels a bit rushed, there is enough here to service the most adamant slasher fan.
Watch Evil Laugh on YouTube below –
Bloody Flicks 