Evil Laugh



The large foster home located outside of town is maintained by a young man named Martin. The foster children, often abused and neglected and through with putting up with all of Martin’s shit, accuse him of molesting them in an effort to get him to leave. Martin is admittedly not very nice to the children, but he steadfastly insists that he never once did anything like that to them. And he’s right. After a thorough police investigation Martin is finally vindicated, when the children admit he’s never once touched them. But by now the damage has already been done. Martin’s name has been dragged through the mud and that… Well, that will just not stand. So one night, while the children are all asleep, Martin goes on a killing spree, cutting up all the children before killing himself, and causing the foster home to be shut down.

Ten years later, a med student named Jerry invites all of his med school friends over to help him clean up the new “house” he’s just bought. His friends are all supposed to meet him there, but once they arrive, Jerry is nowhere to be found. But oddly enough, the house is stocked with food for them. So the group decides to stay and help just like they planned… Only to find out later that the house is supposedly haunted by Martin’s vengeful spirit. But that whole ghost thing is probably just a silly local rumor…right?



Evil Laugh is yet another low-budget American horror slasher from 1986 with a very familiar plot. You’ve got a group of horny nit-wits in an isolated location, where they really shouldn’t be, and some psycho starts attacking them with a variety of blunt and pointy instruments. The only real difference is that they aged the “kids” up a little bit to somewhere in their mid-20s, so you can’t add “underage drinking” to your list of growing grievances against them. The one interesting standout about the film is that it’s an early example of self-aware slasher, because at least one character, Barney, is well versed enough in horror lore to know that it’s a bad idea to stay at places where horrible things have happened in the past, and it’s an even WORSE idea to have sex at such a location. Not that anyone listens to him of course, because this movie wasn’t directed by Wes Craven and wasn’t nearly as good as Scream, so nobody gave a shit. But I do think it’s an interesting reminder that self-aware horror did exist before the 90s. It’s just a shame it wasn’t a better film, or else it might have actually been remembered for it.



I can’t lie though. I actually kind of liked this movie. Perhaps more than I should have. And that’s partly because it’s actually rather competently made. As in, you can tell they had at least a bit of a budget and that things like framing and scene planning were probably thought out and junk. It’s not perfect, and there’s not really anything here that I’d consider “artfully” done, but you can tell that they were trying and that at least one of the people behind the camera went to film school, so their efforts are greatly appreciated. Especially during the scenes at night or in the dark that end up being– now, prepare to be shocked here – WELL LIT. Yes, you can actually SEE things in this movie. Isn’t that something? It’s always amazing and a joy for me to find cheap horror movies that I don’t have to turn the TV’s brightness all the way up or squint through to try to figure out what’s going on. Ah… such bliss.


Oh…my… GOD. You’re telling me someone on staff knew how to light a dark basement!?! Hallelujah!

But other than the technical competency and that one character’s self-awareness, this is still your typical cheesy horror film. In fact, there are quite a few instances where it feels VERY cheesy, before it tones itself down again with something like the slasher parts and acts a bit more serious. It’s honestly a little weird, now that I think about it. Like it can’t tell if it wants to go full comedy or not. Because the slasher parts can be pretty brutal (or in some cases they’re implied to be brutal), and there are even a couple of dialogue exchanges that you can tell were meant to carry more weight, but then they’re interspersed with odd moments or strange dialogue exchanges. A scrawny friend says something snarky to the jock of the group, then asks him if he’s going to hit him now that he’s insulted his masculinity. To which the jock replies, ‘nah friend, I know you’re frustrated, I just want you to try to chill’, before going back to fix their flat tire (which he took his shirt off to replace, the act of which I still cannot find a logical explanation for.)


So is taking off your shirt supposed to make the bolts fasten better?

Said friend then goes and pees on a sunbathing couple, because he didn’t bother to look before pulling his lily-white willy out. When they get to the house, no one seems at all concerned that they can’t find their host. They just assume he’s left, even though his car is still there. Nor do they seem at all concerned about the creepy whispers coming from the closet, or the fact that the delivery boy who delivered their food has also mysteriously disappeared around the same time as their friend. More importantly though, they don’t seem to be concerned that the raw “meat”  for their dinner appears to have been left out on the counter for who-the-fuck-knows how long before they got there. I don’t know what kind of doctors all these yay-hoos are supposed to be, but clearly gastroenterologist isn’t amongst them. If the killer hadn’t gotten to them, I’m sure a vicious bout of food poisoning would have surely taken them out eventually instead.


And who TF prepares cow’s heart for your friends when you’re moving? You’re supposed to carb-load them up on pizza like a normal person, idiot.

Then there’s a dancing montage where they shimmy and shake, and act like house cleaning is one of the most exciting things in the world to do. They’re just all ridiculous smiles and laughter, and then you get to watch half the cast members shake their butt for the camera while they all listen to some Cyndi Lauper rip-off and pretend to dust.



Two of the characters go upstairs and start to begin the sexy times, until they’re interrupted by a rogue hand lovingly fondling the dude’s ass. Don’t worry though, it’s not the killer yet. It’s just their weird friend who poked a ginormous hole in the bed (with a machete!?!) so he could stick his hand through it and freak them out. And he didn’t mean to grab the guy’s butt, he totally thought it was the girl’s, hahaha…ha…. And thus continues the film’s not-so-subtle homoerotic subtext.

Gee, Betty, you’ve got a really firm ass. You been working out?

All of which is followed by an argument over dinner (of liver and cows hearts? Again, WTF? Blech!) regarding nepotism and white privilege (oddly progressive conversation for an 80s film…) and you begin to wonder why any of these people are friends. A question you continue to ponder once the history of the house is revealed and Barney – Fangoria-loving, self-aware Barney – suddenly sees the writing on the wall and wants to vamoose. And despite the fact that everyone now knows that they weren’t told about the house specifically because Jerry knew that if they knew then they wouldn’t want to come, everyone turns on Barney and acts like his wanting to leave is such a betrayal to his friend. Seriously, they act as if he just killed their dog, ran over it for good measure, and spit on its corpse. “How could you?!” “Think about Jerry!” Yet a few minutes later when he does manage to find someone to give him a ride into town, suddenly they’re patting his shoulder in sympathy, as if to say ‘I get it. Good luck, man’. Like, holy shit! Will you idiots make up your minds? This is some serious bipolar levels of friendship on display. But I guess that’s to be expected, since at some point the jock tries to persuade another friend to make a pass at Jerry’s fiance. So clearly this is a movie that can’t tell if its characters are supposed to be sympathetic or not.



But all of the weirdness isn’t bad. Some of it is actually kind of impressive. Towards the end when Conney realizes everyone is dead and that she is, indeed, the Final Girl, she runs back to her room, grabs her pink backpack and then pulls out… a gun. A fucking GUN! AND BULLETS! AND SHE KNEW HOW TO LOAD THEM! I don’t think I’ve ever seen that in one of these movies before! And you’re telling me she had that with her the whole time? And we never even had a hint that it was there? Meaning this chick just casually brought a weapon with her for a weekend involving friends, food, liquor and light house cleaning? Who does that? I don’t know, but it may be one of the most ‘American’ things in a slasher I’ve ever seen.


She must be from the South.…

So, ultimately, Evil Laugh is…kinda odd…. Okay, in some places it’s VERY odd. But, I can’t say that it didn’t keep me highly entertained throughout with all its strangeness, so I can’t complain too much. And it’s actually a fairly competently made production, all things considered. Hence the reason why I kind of liked it. Yeah, the acting was hit-or-miss (they’re either pretty good, or pretty bad), some of the characters were too weird or trope-y, that “evil” laugh sounds anything but, the slasher parts could have been more detailed or unique (the microwave one was good though) and they gave away the ending a little bit with too many references. But it’s still pretty decent for a mid-range slasher. At least I thought it was certainly one of the more entertaining ones. Cause really, I think what they were aiming for was to make a simple, goofy little film, and I hope everyone who made it had fun with it, because that’s pretty much what it is. So… mission accomplished, I guess. Hardcore slasher fans would probably prefer a lot more in the way of blood and gore and general slasher goodness from it. But they may also like it for the early example of self-awareness, nudity, overall weirdness, and the couple of good kills it does have (and every one of them should hear that ridiculous laugh at least once). But as for the more casual horror fans, they likely won’t care about this one too much.

Evil Laugh is available on a variety of streaming services.

Evil Laugh is also available on DVD and Bluray.

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