Film

Mother's Day

Name: Mother's Day
Genre: Action, Horror, Comedy
Released: 1980
Cast: Nancy Hendrickson, Deborah Luce, Tiana Pierce, Michael McCleery, Beatrice Pons

Serial killer
Horror
Thriller
Very dark
Strange

A deeply unsettling 1980 exploitation film that treats sexual violence and torture as horror-comedy spectacle. It's a nasty piece of work—the kind of thing that existed in video-store back rooms, made by people with technical skill but no moral restraint. Strictly for those who hunt through disreputable corners of cinema history.

TMDb rating

2.8

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The Last House on the Left1972

Wes Craven's proto-slasher that brought real violence and moral chaos into horror cinema. It's technically crude but emotionally harrowing, a landmark for understanding how transgressive 70s horror worked.

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The Texas Chain Saw Massacre1974

A masterpiece of suggestion and dread that proves you don't need gore to create genuine horror. The craft here is exceptional—editing, sound, performance working in perfect sync to destroy the viewer.

But It's still transgressive and upsetting even if the actual bloodshed is minimal. Some find it pointlessly cruel in its treatment of victims.

Not sure tonight? Get a pick in a minute, starting from Mother's Day

The wildcard

Something you would not have found on your own.

Phantom of the Paradise1974

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Brian De Palma's operatic horror-thriller-comedy hybrid about obsession, artistry, and corruption. It's as much musical as slasher, and it has wit, style, and genuine pathos alongside its violence. Pure cinema.

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Eaten Alive1976

Tobe Hooper's deranged, hallucinatory descent into madness and murder. Visually inventive and genuinely disorienting, it captures the fever-dream logic of a predator's mind in ways that feel dangerous.

But The plot is thin and the film prioritizes atmosphere and dread over narrative clarity. It's hard to follow and harder to watch.

The Crazies1973

George A. Romero's underrated nightmare about a biological weapon that turns a small town into paranoid killers. It's tighter and more socially engaged than most exploitation horror of the era.

But The violence is sudden and brutal, and there's no real catharsis. The film asks uncomfortable questions about power and helplessness without offering answers.

Deep Red1975

Dario Argento's baroque giallo masterpiece—stylish murder mystery with stunning cinematography and a killer soundtrack. It's exploitation with genuine artistic ambition and craft.

But The misogyny is baked into the genre itself; women are often victims first and characters second. The plot becomes convoluted in its final act.

The Witch Who Came from the Sea1976

An uncommonly weird and poetic entry in exploitation cinema, exploring trauma and fragmented memory through a protagonist whose grip on reality is dissolving. Genuinely strange.

But It's oblique and dreamlike rather than straightforward; some find it pretentious or simply incomprehensible. Violence erupts without clear motivation.

Cruising1980

William Friedkin's controversial cop thriller set in the underground gay scene. Technically accomplished and morally provocative, it asks real questions about identity, surveillance, and desire.

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Don't Answer the Phone!1980

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Three of a Kind1981

Both use ensemble casts and comedy-horror tones, but Three of a Kind proves the same period could produce transgressive comedy that's actually funny and clever rather than just transgressive.

A sketch-comedy show that aired after Mother's Day was made, featuring inventive absurdist humor, parody, and fearless performances. It shows what the same era produced when energy went toward humor rather than horror.

But As a sketch show, it's wildly uneven—some bits land perfectly, others fall completely flat. The comedy is sometimes too arch or self-aware for its own good.

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Where Mother's Day exploits female bodies as objects for male violence, Jeanne Dielman reclaims the female body and female space as something so ordinary and so complete that the very act of showing it becomes an act of dignity and refusal.

Chantal Akerman's three-hour meditation on routine, labor, and female autonomy. It's hypnotic and radical—a complete rejection of spectacle and male violence as narrative drivers. Watch a woman's actual life become revolutionary.

But It's deliberately, almost punitively slow. Three hours of mundane domesticity will bore most viewers to genuine frustration. Nothing happens the way cinema trained you to expect.