THE 31 DAYS OF HORROR-WEEN: PRIME EVIL: DON’T MESS WITH MY SISTER! (1985) * ½

Usually when I do The 31 Days of Horror-Ween, I pick the movies out ahead of time.  Sometimes, in an effort to cover all genres, I accidentally wind up with a movie that Isn’t Really a Horror Movie.  It looks like a horror movie.  Sounds like a horror movie.  It even comes from people with a pedigree for making horror movies.  However, for whatever reason, it’s anything but.  That’s pretty much the case with the awesomely titled, awfully made Don’t Mess with My Sister!

Steven (Joe Perce) is stuck in a dead-end job working as an accountant in his brothers in-law’s junkyard.  Steven’s wife, Clara (Jeannine Lemay) hires belly dancer Annika (Laura Lanfranchi) for his birthday party.  When she leaves her costume at his house, Steven agrees to return it to her.  He then gives her a ride to her next client, who tries to force himself on Annika.  Steven intervenes on her behalf, accidentally killing the guy in the process.  In the throes of passion, they wind up hooking up, and when Clara learns of Steven’s infidelity, she sends her burly brothers out to teach him a lesson. 

Don’t Mess with My Sister! gives director Meir Zarchi another opportunity to explore his penchant for giving men with oddly shaped faces long, disgusting close-ups.  Unlike his classic I Spit on Your Grave, there’s no real payoff to justify the slow-burn opening.  It gets bogged down right from the get-go with lots of annoying family drama and it never really recovers.  To make matters worse, much of it is just plain boring.  

Badly acted, and crudely put together, it lacks the punch to the gut feeling of I Spit on your Grave.  I don’t know if Zarchi set out to recapture lightning in a bottle, but there’s absolutely no lightning to be found here.  Heck, you’d be hard-pressed to find a bottle.  

I will give him this, he always fills his movies with weird touches that make them memorable.  I mean most filmmakers would’ve just made the Annika character a stripper and called it a day.  Zarchi instead turns her into a belly dancer and gives her lots of long scenes of her fluttering her belly around to Moroccan music.  He also has an undeniable knack for coming up with a great title.

Sadly, to my chagrin, this isn’t really a horror movie.  It’s more of a tale of white trash relationship woes.  At times, it almost feels like a scuzzy version of a Lifetime movie.  There was a kernel of an interesting premise here.  Unfortunately, it just devolves into a lot of scenes of family members shouting, pushing, hitting, and discharging firearms.  You know, typical domestic disturbance stuff.  Hardly the sort of thing you’d expect from the guy who made I Spit on Your Grave. 

AKA:  Family and Honor.  AKA:  American Junkyard.  AKA:  N.Y. Fire Street.