Valentine (2001)

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The worst movies I have seen

44%
Overall Rating

Ranked #3,069
...out of 20,736 movies

Genres / Traits: Horror Slasher Film Teen Horror Thriller Valentine's Day

Valentine's Day 1988: At the school dance, geeky Jeremy Melton bravely faces one rejection after the other when asking four popular girls to dance with him. A fifth girl, plump and insecure, agrees, but they end up making out under the bleachers. When a group of school bullies catches them, the girl claims that Jeremy attacked her. This causes them to strip off his clothes and beat him up in front of the entire school. Flash forward to 2001. We meet the five girls who were in that school gym: Kate, Paige, Shelly, Lily and the formerly plump Dorothy. They are all in their 20's now and trying to sort out their love lives, which is appropriate, since Valentine's Day is coming up. After a disastrous date with a loser, one of the girls, a pre-med student, is murdered by a Cherub-mask wearing killer who sent her a death threat in the form of a Valentine card prior to the attack. After the four remaining girls are reunited at her funeral, they all start receiving threatening cards and messages. At first they don't know who would want to hurt them, but eventually they figure that maybe Jeremy is responsible. Police records show that Jeremy has completely disappeared, so no one knows what he looks like. Could the formerly nerdish Jeremy have had plastic surgery and turned into one of the girls' handsome boyfriends? Who ever it is, the lone survivor has to put a stop to this spurned individual's murder spree before she, too, becomes a valentine to die for. --IMDb

Review by Chad
Added: July 15, 2006

What could be better than watching a bunch of spoiled rich girls get picked off one by one by a killer in a cherub mask? Not much, unless all of that is happening in a movie entitled Valentine. I'm not quite sure why I expected this to be any better than the flood of similar releases, but I decided to tough it out anyway... and the result sure as hell wasn't a pretty picture.

Ah, the formulaic Hollywood slasher flick. You take a bunch of talentless yet pretty ladies, throw in some goreless murders, come up with a nonsensical surprise ending, and put some sort of semi-unique twist on the whole thing in order to make snazzy posters and tag lines. Throw in a few red herrings to keep the audience "guessing", and bam - instant #1 movie of the week. This movie stays true to that formula in every sense of the word; there's no inspiration to be found here, there's nothing original, and it truly feels like every other slasher that Hollywood has pumped out in the last ten years.

The storyline is silliness at its best (or worst, depending on how you look at it). At a high school dance, a young nerd asks four ladies to dance, and each rejects him with some harsh words. On his fifth attempt at scoring a dance, he finally succeeds when he convinces a chubby outcast to spend some time with him; but when some of the other dancers in attendance catch them making out under the bleachers, she claims that he forced himself on her in order to save herself the embarrassment of being caught swapping spit with a nerd such as him. He's sent to juvenile hall, and we then flash-forward to thirteen years later.

All of the ladies who rejected this poor nerd are still friends, and the chubby outcast has joined their little clique. The group of friends - Paige Prescott (Denise Richards), Dorothy Wheeler (Jessica Capshaw), Kate Davies (Marley Shelton), Lily Voight (Jessica Cauffiel) and Shelley Fisher (Katherine Heigl) - all start to receive threatening Valentine's Day letters, which feature such cute notes as "Roses are red / Violets are blue / They'll need your dental records / To identify you". It's all revealed to be a huge joke by one of the members, and the group lives happily ever after... oh, wait, Hollywood slasher film. The group gets picked off one by one in what turns out to be some of the most mundane death scenes ever to be found in an R-rated film, the final twist is revealed (a twist that is actually easily guessed by the midway point of the film), roll credits. Angel himself (David Boreanaz) also stars as the boyfriend of one of these young ladies.

Directly inspired by Scream, this movie brings absolutely nothing new to the table, but unlike Scream, this one isn't even enjoyable in a cheesy sort of way. The acting found here is atrocious, the death sequences have been cut to bits so as not to offend anyone during a "sensitive time" (thanks, Warner), and the twist... well, let me put it to you like this: it's easy to figure it out if you have half a brain, but even if you don't, Denise Richards revealed the twist during a national interview while promoting the film. That'll bring Joe Viewer into the theater, won't it?

Of course, you don't watch a slasher film for qualities such as acting or storyline; no, you watch for buckets of blood and plenty of T&A, neither of which is found here. When a woman has her throat slit, you'd sort of expect a little bit of blood, even a small trickle... but in this film, you don't even get that. You've got five ladies here, all of which look quite good, yet we don't even see a panty-shot throughout the entire film. So, what you basically wind up with when renting this movie is horrible acting, predictable "jump" scares which come courtesy of the musical score, a predictable ending, no gore, and no woman-flesh. Is this really supposed to pass for a slasher, or hell, even a horror flick?

In one scene, a woman decides that washing her hair in the toilet is a fine idea after the water in her apartment has been shut off. If only something else could have wound up in that toilet... something like, I don't know, the script for this film. 1/10.