The Slumber Party Massacre (1982) ***

The Slumber Party Massacre (1982) simultaneously serves as a parody of slasher/horror tropes and as an effective slasher in its own right. Director Amy Holden Jones—who, amusingly, would go on to write films as divergent as Mystic Pizza (1988), Beethoven (1992), and Indecent Proposal (1993)—intentionally ogles her cast of females, giving the audience laughable extended gazes of their naked flesh. There's also heavy-handed symbolism when it comes to our maniac and his phallic weapon of choice, an absurdly long and thick drill bit. 

The killer is seen in full very early on, so his identity is never a mystery, which adds an unusual flavor to a genre that typically relies on revealing its crazies in the final act. The male leads that crash the titular (natch) gathering, hoping to score, turn out to be perfectly inept and taken out fairly easily. 

There are a few choice gore gags and a synthesized score that is very much a Halloween (1978) (review) rip-off (really the whole film is, minus the comedy angle, but I believe that was intentional), though still very good. The feminist leanings never truly seem to add up to anything as the female victims still pile up and the film plays it mostly by the numbers. The acting is pretty poor and the movie is pretty corny. Regardless, it's a fun film and one that holds up well on repeat viewings.