Totally Killer review.
Totally Killer is a great time travel movie…but a decent at best slasher movie. When so much of it works…we can forgive the latter.
New movie reviews will not contain spoilers.
Totally Killer
Directed by Nahnatchka Khan
Screenplay by David Matalon, Sasha Perl-Raver and Jen D’Angelo
Starring Kiernan Shipka, Julie Bowen, Olivia Holt, Randall Park, Lochlyn Munro, Charlie Gillespi and Liana Liberato
Totally Killer Review
Have you ever seen Back to the Future? It’s a question that Jamie (Kiernan Shipka) asks during her time in 1987. The easiest way she can try to describe her time travel situation. It’s a great question to start off a review of the movie too. If you’ve seen Back to the Future…Totally Killer is the slasher movie version. The movie obviously knows it. Hence the question. It’s smart to not hide from the movie’s obvious inspiration. Especially when Totally Killer delivers such a fun time travel story of its own.
Jamie’s mother Pam (Julie Bowen) is a real-life final girl. Three of her friends were murdered by a masked killer in 1987. When the masked man returns and finishes the job in 2023. After Jamie accidentally travels back to the day of the first murder…she attempts to expose the killer and save her mother. That includes teaming up with the teenage Pam (Olivia Holt) and dealing with younger versions of many familiar faces.
As this is a horror movie website…let’s start with the slasher aspects of Totally Killer. They’re fine. The movie pours on the gore when it needs to. The killer’s costume is kind of silly…but it’s fine. This is more of a whodunnit than a scary movie. In fact, it’s not scary at all. What it is, however, is a lot of fun. The horror aspects may only amount to a narrative part of a bigger package…but it has good reveals and some clever ideas.
Now…for the good stuff. Totally Killer is a very good time travel movie. It takes great care in crafting its version of 1987. Prior to Jamie’s journey back in time…the story sets up so many things to pay off in the past that it is genuinely impressive. Things that felt like throwaway lines in 2023 become fun moments in 1987. Everything pays off one way or another. Usually in a very fun way.
The McGuffin of the time machine is silly in a good way. Time travel is treated as a inevitability…and a high school student’s science project. That student happens to be Jamie’s best friend Amelia (Kelcey Mawema). She’s trying to finish her mother’s work. Obviously, that’s going to come back in 1987. Set in a small town, Totally Killer gets a lot of mileage out of the convenience of having everyone know each other. Amelia’s mother is, of course, a student in 1987. Someone who can understand what Jamie is talking about and help her try to return to her own time.
Another thing that Totally Killer gets a lot of mileage out of is the cultural differences between the eras. Jamie is constantly stunned by the carefree way people in 1987 live their lives. Dialog showcases the differences between what is deemed acceptable now compared to then. At one point Jamie manages to collect a blood sample from the masked Sweet 16 Killer…only for the police to laugh at the concept of DNA and toss it away like garbage.
Culture isn’t the only shock Jamie is in for. The young version of her mother is nothing like the over-protective, kind woman she recently lost. She’s the leader of the school’s mean girls and doesn’t hesitate to tell Jamie what she thinks of newcomers. Their relationship grows in a natural way…as chaos and murder bring them closer together.
Totally Killer’s approach to time travel is very strong. It posits that time is a river that is always flowing in one direction…and time is always moving forward. That means we get to pop into 2023 and see what’s happening while Jamie is messing around in 1987. People in 2023 have memories of how things were before Jamie went back in time…but can see that reality suggest their memories are incorrect. Details of the original murders change as Jamie tries to prevent them. Where someone died…the order they died in. Jamie struggles to fix things as time begins to run out on any chance to return home. She changes things to the point where she can no longer count on what she knew about the murders. It’s a great way to utilize time travel in a slasher story.
The cast of Totally Killer is all in on its premise. The 80s are a lot of fun to visit. Even with a masked killer on the loose. Seeing the past versions of the people the movie established in the present is as fun for the viewer as it is weird for Jamie. Shipka is great, as always, and grounds the movie despite its out there premise. Her reactions to the world of 1987 are almost as good as the presentation of it.
There’s even a better than average payoff to the whodunnit aspect of the story. Some of it involves more clever usage of the time travel scenario…but it works purely from a mystery standpoint as well. A simple way to describe Totally Killer would be this: A great time travel story. A very good comedy. A good whodunnit. A pretty good slasher movie. In combination, Totally Killer is a great time and a fun watch. Especially if you like Back to the Future.
Scare Value
Totally Killer puts a ton of care into its time travel elements. It sets up so many little details to pay off later and adds a running commentary on the generational differences between the eras. More fun than funny…but very fun. It doesn’t skimp on the gore when it comes time for carnage…but the slasher element is more of a narrative device than a purpose. As a time travel movie…it’s a winner.
4/5
Totally Killer Link
Streaming on Amazon Prime Video
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