Customer Reviews

Hillside Strangler (R-Rated Edition)

5 star:		(4)
4 star:		(0)
3 star:		(1)
2 star:		(2)
1 star:		(2)

 

 

I WAS going to give this FOUR stars, but I will now give it FIVE stars to offset these idiots. All I can say is I'm shocked at these reviews. Let me quote, someone says it had too much "Gratuitous sex and violence" another reviewer says "really horrific and in bad taste" yet admits to liking serial killer movies. I want to smack the dumb out of all of you. This is what serial killers are people! They hurt people, they torture people, they bring their victims into the darkest corner of their minds. If you did not like this movie, than you just do not like serial killer movies, because contrary to what the other reviewers say, THIS MOVIE IS ABOUT 85% ACCURATE to what really happened, as appose to all the other serial killer movies that reviewer "rhmoviemogal "russ" mentioned. For example, the Dahmer movie that he mentions being the best was the most inaccurate of them all. The movie told about how much Jeffrey loved one guy, and the whole movie was a love story. Jeff was nothing like that. He picked up new men every week and slaughtered them, he was not attached to them, he just wanted them for lust, not love. The movie also didn't capture dahmers violence, which was some of the worst in history. (not that the movie board would let that movie be released)
ANYWAY, back to this movie: I thought this movie was a 4 star movie, because it could have had more action, with that aside, the movie pays close attention to details that actually happened. Feel free to research these: For example, they really did receive a list with escort's names on it from a girl. That girl's list DID cause them to get a shake down, which led them to killing her. He DID give his wife/girlfriend a ring of one of the victims he killed. They DID pull over people with sirens and badges. Every victim in this movie was portrayed as the real victims they represented. The girl the gets nabbed and tries to run because she knows they are fake cops was real, in reality an elder neighbor witnesses this and was too scared to call the cops. They DID leave bodies out in the open and liked the media publicity. I could go on and on, just compare some of the most minor scenes in this movie to reality and you will see. Look up the case. Which leads me to the 15% that is inaccurate. These guys dressed up in full uniform when they where impersonating officers, in the movie, they were in street cloths. AND ARE YOU READY FOR THIS ALL YOU "TOO MUCH VIOLENCE" CRY BABIES? Most of the horrifying violence was left out!!!! (just like most of these movies) These guys burned the women with cigarettes, and did horrible things to them that I cannot even put in this review. Plus, the movie does not mention that MOST of their victims where underage and not all of them were street trash. One victim was a high school honor roll student. Most of their victims ranged from 12-18. The movie also doesn't not touch base on the court trial where one of the killers tries to convince the judge he has a split personality.
MY point is, stop looking for drama in a serial killer movies. As the name "serial killer" applies. They are killers. There is nothing glamorous about them. So go home to your moms and cry! You big baby! Stop trying to candy coat killers

I am so sick of the negative reviews about this film witch in my mind should be a cult classic. I love this movie for the fact that I felt so creeped out by these scum bags, my god the two main characters were born to play there rolls. I am with the other reviewer who thought this was a 4 star movie but bumped it up to 5 to help stave off the cry babies. I am so impressed with C Thomas Howell with his role that I would want to see his next film and he is usually the kiss of death.
Look I have seen 100's of horror and thrillers in my day and I swear this film feels real and gritty to me.
By this bad boy used for a stinking $1.50 and you will not be sorry.

I'm siding with the 5-star folks on this one. The acting was great. Both Howell and Turturro turn in superior performances. The supporting cast, especially the victums and the killer's family, are also great. The only thing keeping C. Thomas Howell from being an A lister is that he isn't ethnic enough for general audiences; his acting skills are fantastic!

very realistic and raw,the fact that their are people out in the world just like these guys makes it even creepier,i agree with the other reviews the goofballs that gave it one star should stick to disney films,if you watch a movie based on true serial killings expect violence. the entire cast is believable and i agree some parts could have moved faster, but overall an intense flick.

Bad Acting, If You Want To See This Movie Try To Get A VHS Copy With DENNIS FARINA. Don't Waste Your Money On This. Dennis Farina was in The Made For TV movie, The Hillside Strangler And It Was FANTASTICK.

I can't find out how to delete my previous review, but it wasn't the sellers fault that made me say what I did.
Charles Conklin

This a a true crime film that shows the killing spree engaged in by two sociopathic cousins, Kenneth Bianchi (C. Thomas Howell) and Angelo Buono (Nick Turturro), who indulged in a killing spree of young women in Los Angeles during the nineteen seventies. All I can say is that both of these actors must have been hard up for money for them to have acted in this tawdry film.

This film sheds little light on what motivated these two cousins, Kenneth and Angelo, to behave as they did, though it does provide some tantalizing glimpses. Kenneth was adopted and certainly seemed to have had an odd, clinging relationship with his adopted mother. Angelo had a totally dysfunctional relationship with his mother, Kenneth's adopted mother's younger sister, whom Angelo may have even tried to kill at one time. Both these sisters seemed to have had behavioral issues.

Interestingly enough, Kenneth was a police wanna be who, thankfully, kept having his law enforcement job applications rejected by various agencies for one reason or another. He sometimes worked as a security guard. When his rejection by a law enforcement agency for a job proved to be too much for him, his mother sent him packing from Rochester, New York, to live with his cousin, Angelo, an auto mechanic in Los Angeles.

Kenneth would thankfully also be rejected by law enforcement agencies in Los Angeles and surrounding counties. While in Los Angeles, he masqueraded as a Columbia University trained psychotherapist. Yes, our sicko killer would actively counsel others, which would provide a surprise twist in the end. He would also manage to form a relationship with a nice woman who found his disgusting cousin, Angelo, repellent, as he made her feel uncomfortable as he made me feel.

Together, Angelo and Kenneth would form go on to establish a house of prostitution, getting prospective clients from a list of names that Kenneth bought from a prostitute. When that unsavory business venture is shut down by competing pimps who object to what they see as a poaching of their clients, Angelo decides to exact revenge by killing the prostitute who sold them the list of clients. This would the first of their many kills, and the beginning of the cousins' end.

Spouting scatological references at every turn, referring to women in pejorative terms and treating them with overt contempt, physically and verbally, at every opportunity, Angelo is totally primal, without redeeming value as a human being. Killing women as a past time was not a great leap for Angelo. For Kenneth, it would provide the opportunity to impersonate a police officer for the purpose of lulling his victims into a false sense of security, before going in for the kill.

Under Angelo's tutelage, the weak and whiny Kenneth would blossom into a lustful, eager killer. Angelo, who was already a full blown sociopath, needed no prompting. The police would go on to dub the handiwork of these two fiends as being that of "The Hillside Strangler", as the police did not realize that two individuals were involved, until after Kenneth, the weaker of the two, was apprehended.

I confess that I have seldom have seen a more repellent character in a film than that of Angelo. He is so disgusting that I was embarrassed for Nick Turturro and surprised that an actor of his reputation would undertake a role that had such little redeeming value. C. Thomas Howell, looking unusually cadaverous, fares a little better, as his character, while unsavory and pathetic, is not quite as disgusting of that of Turturro's.

This film pulls out all the stops in reaching for the lowest common denominator. With profanity, vulgarity, and nude, large breasted women getting killed at every turn, this unrated film does its best to totally disgust the viewer. In this it succeeds, verging on the pornographic, at times. The problem is that it does little else. The film provides too little insight or background to show how such horrible human beings came to be. In the end, the film results in being merely repellent, making the viewer feel unclean for having seen it.

Dull,
Stupid,
Boring,
But the casting was really bad. Direct to vid star C. Thomas Howell still can't act his way out of a paperbag. Nicolas Turturro (NYPD Blue) is equally unapealling as Angelo. Both are losers who take out their aggression on females. Not much character development. But not much fear or menace either. I know less about the infamous case than I did when I saw this movie. I enjoyed the bio-pics "Gacy," "ED Gein," and "Ted Bundy." This is not in that league. Skip this one folks and buy the three mentioned above, or the director's earlier work "Dahmer." Those movies capture the real menace and horror of their crimes. This movie is just criminal.

I'm usually not bothered by violence in movies. Even if it is based on a true story. Movies about serial killers don't bother me either. I have even liked one or two that came out. But this movie's depictions of the violence that befell these women is really horrific and in bad taste. There are times in films when you just have to be suggestive towards what happens. You just have to do that so the person watching it doesn't turn it off in disgust. There were a couple of times in this movie that I was tempted to turn it off for the sake of my girlfriend watching it. I'm no sissy, I don't have christian values, I'm not a parent, but I can tell when a film is depicting violence tastefully and artistically (yes artistically), with good nature or just for theatrics, and when a film is just trying to make you sick. The fact that this is a true story has no barring on me. If it was completely fictional, I'd still feel the same way. This movie just made me sick to my stomach. It didn't make me sympathetic, I didn't feel sad, I was just wondering to myself "why am I still watching this?" Just because what happened is true doesn't make it all right to graphically display it in a move and make me watch it.
Other than that, the acting wasn't really that great. The dialogue at times was cheap, the ending was anti-climactic and the director obviously has no sense of morality what so ever. I wouldn't let my mom view this garbage.
Two stars for the women who had to die so they could have an excuse to make a movie like this.