Directed By: Jamie Blanks
Starring: Denise Richards, David Boreanaz, Marley Shelton, Jessica Capshaw, Daniel Cosgrove, Jessica Cauffiel, Katherine Heigl, Fulvio Cecere Rated: R (Scary Stuff) Running Time: 96 Min.

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Well, it's Valentine's Day again, time for love, roses, candy, and revenge. Valentine takes all of these things to heart, as a crazed killer has decided the time is right to take out his former grade school sweeties, permanently.

Following in the footsteps of pretty much any horror movie you've seen since Scream, this mildly shocking fright-fest offers a few original ideas and some funny diologue. None of it is even the least bit believable, but much of it is a great deal of fun. To tie in the holiday, the psycho's victims each receive a morbid Valentine's Day card, and the killer wears a creepy cupid mask. One of the neat things about this movie is that the characters are all fairly certain who the killer is, but haven't seen the person in years, so they have no idea what the killer looks like. This beckons the question, "Then why does the killer have to wear a mask?", to which the answer is, "Because they all do!"

Jamie Blanks does a decent job of directing, and the quality of acting is what you would expect from the slasher film genre. There are a few leaps in logic, like how in the world Denise Richards could possibly have trouble finding a date, but none of them destroy the fun of the movie. I expect a 'Director's Cut' of Valentine will be available when it's released on home video, since there are a couple scenes that also seem to be missing from this film. (Wait a minute, how did that guy die?)

So, ignoring the fact that horror movie killers appear to be running out of holidays to ruin, Valentine actually isn't too bad. See the matinee showing!

Allen J. Vestal

A.J.'s Place: Movies & More