". . . dark and disturbing. . . a film that whips the rug out from under the viewer over and over again." Cinefantastique Magazine "...superior slasher indie... eminently worthy of every fright-starved fans homevideo attention." Videoscope Magazine ". . . a fine debut by a very promising director... Debbie Rochon may be, in fact, the first convincing female psycho." Joe Bob Briggs "Genuine scares . . . top notch performances!" Gauntlet Magazine "Sharp, vicious and psychosexually cunning." Media Plus Magazine "... one of the best American slasher films since Scream." Flipside Movie Emporium "...scares, shocks, and screams galore..." Diabolical Dominion "This cold but crazy nurse will scare the bejesus out of you." Ellis Henican, Newsday "Keeyes concentrates on character development and suspense and succeeds in a big way" Buried.com "[American Nightmare] strengthens my argument that all the good horror is NOT in the theaters." Creature-Corner.com "Debbie (Jane Toppan) Rochon embodies everything dark within the human soul and uses it to scare the hell out of you." B-Independent.com "Full credit to writer-director Keeyes for coming-up with one of the boldest (and professional looking) independent movies in recent memory." Video Graveyard.com "...the best-realized female serial killer in movie history" Cold Fusion Video "...a movie that really takes you by suprise! " Morbid Mortuary "Don't miss American Nightmare" The Video Crypt "...will keep you on the edge of your seats with keen and cunning camera angles, and musical scores...American Nightmare may very well be the new millenniums 'Halloween'" Horrormaniacs.com "[Director] Jon Keeyes is a name that is soon to be known by all horror fans. " Shade.ca   Joe Bob Briggs Report: American Nightmare http://www.vny.com/cf/news/upidetail.cfm?QID=199882 Wednesday, 4 July 2001 21:53 (ET) NEW YORK, July 4 (UPI) -- Okay, Horror Screenwriting 101: When you see wisecracking friends around a campfire in the opening scene, what do you already know about the woods? That's right, there is SOMETHING OUT THERE. And when is the campfire scene over? When the campers are DEAD. Jon Keeyes, the Fort Worth movie buff who made "American Nightmare," does know his horror history and his horror rules, and, of course, he injects all the little "Scream"-type inside references to past horror movies. Somewhere along the way, though, he manages to create an original maniac psycho knife-through-the-gizzards killer. Debbie Rochon may be, in fact, the first CONVINCING female psycho since the girl in "Sleepaway Camp," who actually, now that I think about it, turned out not to be a girl at all (boating accident but let's not go there). Debbie, on the other hand, is very much a female, and her exotic good looks have been seen in such B mini-classics as "Abducted 2: The Reunion," "Tromeo and Juliet," and, of course, the immortal "Broadcast Bombshells." In "American Nightmare" we know from scene Numero Uno that it is her and only her who's doing the killing. This detracts a little from the normal suspense, but fortunately she's able to decimate the cast with a little over-the-top erotic style. Apparently loosely based on the infamous San Antonio serial-killer nurse, she uses a late-night pirate-radio deejay to get her "I'm Killing All Your Friends" message out to the Halloween-night party crowd, and when that doesn't work, she uses her laptop to hot-chat the soon-to-be-dead young people. Add to this that ubiquitous horror device, the cell phone, and she's really the first Multi-media Serial Killer. Don't worry, though, because when it's time to do the nasty knife thing, she slices and dices like the best of her testosteronal counterparts. Jason had a mama. She's got a daddy. I don't want to give it away, but this is one sick party girl. The story runs into a little trouble about two-thirds of the way through, when the lame love-interest couple repeatedly do incredibly stupid things -- like letting the killer walk away, not calling the police, and going wherever she tells them. They could have at least had the obligatory stupid cop who says, "Aw, you kids, it's just a bunch of trick-or-treaters!" Instead they set up one killer-confrontation scene after another, leaving us to savor the style of the psycho while not quite buying the motivations of the people destined to live on as the credits roll. One more minor quibble: It's fine to protect the sequel potential, but in the big climactic scene, Debbie just turns on her heel and walks out of the building. Shouldn't she get horribly scarred by acid? Or SOMETHING? Anyhoo, a fine debut by a VERY promising director out of the state of Texas, with its long and honorable horror traditions. Four breasts. Eight dead bodies. One burial alive. Corpse-beating. Grave-stabbing. Slicing. Dicing. Filleting. Multiple stab wounds. Outdoor rave bikini-dancing. Drug-induced wife-stabbing. Gratuitous shower scene. Gratuitous Brinke Stevens. Voodoo Fu. S&M Fu. Drive-In Academy Award nominations for Brandy Little as the babysitter haunted by her sister's disappearance at the gruesome campfire massacre the year before; Chris Ryan, a real-life morning deejay at KEGL in Dallas, as the kinky macabre pirate-radio call-in host who says "That's the spirit of Halloween! Kids in the hospital! Hope there's enough room!"; Johnny Sneed, as the shy sensitive computer-nerd boyfriend hero, who says "I just know Halloween is a bad time for her"; and, of course, Debbie Rochon, as the pill-popping defrocked nurse with a knife and a thing for pain. Three stars. Joe Bob says check it out. To check out Joe Bob's voluminous guide to all the B movies ever made, go to joebob-briggs.com or email him at JoeBob@upi.com. Snail-mail: P.O. Box 2002, Dallas, TX 75221. Copyright 2001 by United Press International. All rights reserved. CREATURE CORNER.COM http://www.creature-corner.com/reviews/americannightmare.php3 American Nightmare: So let's take a formula. One that you're all familiar with, I'm sure. One that should make you cringe and roll your eyes when you hear it, but one which is a fact of life. Beautiful people get stalked by a killer one-year after said killer evades the police after their first killing spree, which took one of the beautiful people's relative. Wait, stay with me here. 'American Nightmare' has this formula. 'American Nightmare' uses it better then any of the schlocks in Hollywood ever have. It's Halloween, and a local pirate radio station called 'American Nightmare' is taking calls from its listeners, who describe their worst fears to him. A group of friends hang out at a local coffee shop to listen and prepare for tonight's parties. They call in and describe their fears, while a killer sits mere tables away from them listening intently. Surprise! Soon they start dying one at a time, killed by their worst fear. Still not interested? Let me tell you why 'American Nightmare' was more interesting then any of the 'I Know' movies. First off, you know who the killer is. There are no constant red herrings being shoved in your face, making you second-guess yourself throughout. Nope, you are introduced to the killer in the first 5 minutes of the movie, and she wears no mask or scary costume. She's just a nice, if not somewhat freaky, girl that likes to kill people for reasons never quite explained. And believe it or not, when you know who the killer is for the entire movie, you actually have to have a somewhat interesting story that the viewers can be into, since the constant guessing factor is done away with. I wish more writers/directors would realize this. Ah well. Secondly, the characters are likeable. Each of them is introduced slowly, no quick pointless back-stories that're brought out of nowhere explaining why they're all friends. They just are, and throughout the film you can believe that these are real people. There's no cringe-inducing pop culture references or witty banter, just some friends hanging out like real people do. That's why when they start to die off, you actually feel sorry for them, instead of rooting the killer on like happens when you hate the characters anyway. All of the credit for this goes to the actors, who do their jobs beautifully. Put this film up against something like 'Valentine', and you wonder why these thespians don't have more work. Finally, you have the director. John Keeyes seems to have the knack for keeping the camera on his characters just long enough for you to almost forget that it's a movie you're watching at times. Perhaps it's just because I'm so used to 15-second long shots trying to set up a plot in 20 minutes, but Keeyes' direction moves along nicely without trying to badger the viewer with too much information to keep hold of. He seems a student of Carpenter with his long shots and camera angles, but if you're going to follow someone's style, might as well be a master, right? While at times the movies seems to drag a bit (there are some scenes that could've been trimmed by a couple of minutes and still retained their quality), and the plot leaves you scratching your head a bit towards the end (and leaves itself WIDE open for the sequel treatment), 'American Nightmare' was a very impressive effort from first time writer/director John Keeyes, and just strengthens my argument that all the good horror is NOT in the theaters. It's struggling, and the studios aren't picking it up because they would rather have shit like 'Valentine' and 'I Know Who You Killed Last Summer' than movies that feature real scares and an honest passion for the genre. 'American Nightmare' is not going to change lives or peoples perception of right and wrong. It does, however, take a formula that is tired and over-used and breathes a little bit of new life into it. And these days, that's a very refreshing thing. B-INDEPENDENT.COM My list of favorite things from Texas is a pretty short one: Joe Lansdale short stories, Dallas Cowboy Cheerleaders, and maybe the sunsets over the desert out near El Paso. You can add Jon Keeyes' AMERICAN NIGHTMARE to that list. It's 90 minutes of horrific delight finely smartly wrapped in a tight, energetic package. Anyone who has had read my reviews knows of my unbridled lust for Debbie "uber-cutie" Rochon. She's all dark hair, long legs, and ear-to-ear-grinning sweetness with a heaping spoonful of naughtiness thrown in for good measure. However, my views on her acting have not always been so complimentary. Abducted 2 comes instantly to mind. I think I said she was miscast and lacked range. What was I thinking, as if her co-stars, Grizzly Adams and Airwolf, were any better. Rage. Psychosis. Fear. Hatred. Debbie embodies everything dark within the human soul and uses it to scare the hell out of you. Her introduction is as intense and chilling as anything I've ever seen. Like my hero Roger Ebert says, "a thriller is only as good as the bad guy." As Jane Toppin, Debbie Rochon is sexy, unrepentant evil. Director Jon Keeyes doesn't take the conventional approach to the serial killer film. He owes more to Hitchcock than John Carpenter or Sean Cunningham. Suspense takes precedence to fright. It's not so much "when" or "where" will Toppin strike, but "how" and "to whom." The set up is pure self-reflexive Scream-territory. While listening to a deejay on a pirate radio station go on about fears, a group of friends spend Halloween eve quoting their favorite horror films. Toppin too is listening, and has a vendetta against the group. In true horror film style, everyone starts dropping like flies as they prepare for a night partying down. While not explicitly graphic in the gore department, some of the violence is still brutal and horrific. There's a chilling scene where Toppin buries one of the group alive. As Toppin dances in rage on the grave, all we hear on the soundtrack are the buried woman's screams of terror and fading heartbeat. The scene goes on much longer than it should and grows more and more nerve-racking by the moment. That image has haunted me more than anything else I've seen in recent memory. Moments like that are what gives the film its power. It transcends the other films hogging rental space at Blockbuster to achieve something more, a sense of purpose. With up and comers like Jon Keeyes making horror films this well, it's just a matter of time before a changing of the guard takes place and masters like Romero, Hooper, and Carpenter are relieved from their spots at the head of the table. BURIED.COM AMERICAN NIGHTMARE, the directorial debut of Jon Keeyes, is the quaint story of a psychopathic nurse who starts killing a lot of the twenty-somemthing characters in her small town. The 16mm photography is excellent, as is the casting--Debbie Rochon gives one of her best performances to date as the serial killing nurse. Rather than relying on gratuitous violence or nudity, Keeyes concentrates on character development and suspense and succeeds in a big way. Highly recommended. VIDEO GRAVEYARD Full credit to writer-director Keeyes for coming-up with one of the boldest (and professional looking) independent movies in recent memory. Starting off with what feels like a typical slasher movie opening (but isn't) this cuts to a year later on Halloween and has a bunch of twenty-something friends sharing their fears over the radio to a pirate show's host. Well also listening in is quite nutty ex-nurse Debbie Rochon (a B-movie favourite of mine and showing-off her acting chops here) who starts to slaughter them all using their fears as a basis to the murders. Confidently made by Keeyes this does sport some good mild moments of suspense and has a well-rounded young cast; but this is all Rochon's show, baby! Rochon puts her all into the role and is intimidating, completely screwed and oddly sexy (her first appearance in the movie strikes a chord with you). There are a couple of things that didn't sit right with me here: the whole internet angle didn't gell too good and the ending is too open-ended (I'd of liked more motivation for Rochon's deeds) but for an effort by a young filmmaker this is a great start. Like a lot of modern horror movies this knowingly "winks" at other films in the genre, but it's not gratingly done and it's always nice to see Brinke Stevens in a movie (even if she's given almost no screen time).