NORTHVILLE CEMETERY MASSACRE (1976) **

Watching Northville Cemetery Massacre, it’s apparent directors William Dear and Thomas L. Dyke walked out of Easy Rider and said to each other, “Hey!  That movie’s a success and they only killed two bikers in slow motion at the very end.  Let’s make a flick in which fifteen times that many bikers get shot up in slow motion throughout the entire film!  It’s bound to do fifteen times the amount of business!”  

That of course, was not the case.  As far as the biker genre goes, you can do a lot worse, that’s for sure.  However, Northville Cemetery Massacre is far from a good movie.  If it’s one thing this flick does well, it’s shoot up bikers in slow motion, so it does have that going for it.  Imagine if Sam Peckinpah had directed Hell’s Angels on Wheels and that might clue you in on what to expect.

A hippie hitches a ride with a biker gang and attends a wild biker wedding.  While the gang are hooting and hollering, he sneaks off to bang his girlfriend in a barn.  That’s when the cops show up and chase away the bikers.  The asshole cop in charge then takes it upon himself to rape the hippie’s girlfriend.  The cops blames the crime on the bikers and teams up with the girl’s grieving father to shoot a bunch of bikers in slow motion, mostly to cover his ass, but also because shooting bikers in slow motion takes up about a third of the running time.

Northville Cemetery Massacre is mostly notable for being the first collaboration between Dear and The Monkees’ Michael Nesmith.  The two later worked together on Elephant Parts, and another motorcycle-themed movie, Time Rider.  Even though Nesmith is my second favorite Monkee, the music in this isn’t particularly great and sounds about what you’d expect from your average biker flick.

Dear and Dyke don’t do much to keep the story progressing.  It pretty much plays its cards too soon and quickly gets repetitive from there.  By the time the big Massacre does happen, we’ve already grown numb to the sight of seeing bikers gushing blood and guts in slow-mo.  The open-ended ending is a bit of a cop out too, which is kind of a letdown considering all the carnage that came before.

Oh, and if the leading man’s voice sounds familiar, it’s because he was dubbed by none other than Nick Nolte!  

AKA:  Harley’s Angels.  AKA:  Freedom:  R.I.P.