Cut

A group of film students decide to complete a slasher film, Hot Blooded, whose production ended when life imitated art and the actor playing the film's maniac, Scarman, killed the director.

The students' professor - who worked on Hot Blooded - tries to warn them off, telling them the film is cursed. Of course they don't listen, instead buying the rights to Hot Blooded and recruiting its old star, now languishing in American TV.

After screening the lost footage, the film crew heads off to the isolated house/set used for the original film and commence shooting. Then the murders begin...

This tongue-in-cheek parody of the slasher film is an absolute riot from beginning to end. It's so knowingly bad that it transcends naffness and instead attains a perverse brilliance.

The acting is intentionally piss poor in the manner of Peter Jackson's Bad Taste. Molly Ringwald - the only recognisable name in the cast bar a cameo from Kylie Minogue - displays a nice line in self-parody as the drama queen on the skids, although it has to be said that she's way too old to play the teenager in the film-within-the-film.

Cut takes the slasher film's self-reflexivity to new heights - or is that depths? Scarman, a burns victim wearing a fright mask and boiler suit and wielding a pair of garden shears, might be summarised as part Michael Myers, part Freddy Krueger and part Cropsy from the Burning. The whole killer comes back to haunt the film idea is part Scream II/III, part Wes Craven's New Nightmare and part Boogeyman II.

Indeed, there's scarcely an original moment in the entire film. The students act like idiots, all but lining themselves up to be killed off and the ketchup flows liberally...

Some gratuitious nudity and sex to go with the violence would have been nice. But I suppose one can't have everything.

Cut may not be the apogee of film art, but as mindless late night entertainment it does the job nicely.