Movie Review: 'Dude Bro Party Massacre 3'

Dude Bro Party Massacre 3 (2015)

Directed by John Salmon, Michael Rousselet, Tomm Jacobsen, Joey Scoma

Written by Alec Owen

Starring Alec Owen, Greg Sestero, Patton Oswalt, Nina Hartley

Release Date July 7th, 2015 Re-Release Date September 1st, 2023

Published August 31st, 2023

Dude Bro Party Massacre 3 is a glorious piece of horror satire. Released in 2015, this comic send up of 80s horror tropes and Dude Bro caricatures is now getting a special re-release for on-demand rental on Friday, September 1st. The creation of 5 Second Films, Dude Bro Party Massacre 3 comically satirizes 80s horror movies by picking an in progress franchise with a deathless villain named Motherface and a group of Dude Bro frat guys who make terrific bloody fodder for inventive and imaginative horror movie death scenes.

Dude Bro Party Massacre tells the story of a twin frat brothers, one of whom has survived two previous Dude Bro Party Massacres at the hands of the vengeful Motherface. The twins are played by Screenwriter Alec Owen and part three picks up with the brother who'd starred in the previous massacres being murdered. This leaves his more shy and reserved twin brother to go to his old college campus to investigate his brother's death. To do this, he will have to join his late brother's frat, Delta Bi, a group of hard partying survivors known for their epic parties and epic pranks.

In classic frat movie fashion, those darn Delta Bi's are major pranksters and troublemakers. The only difference is that there pranks tend to have a body count. The frat was responsible for more than 4000 deaths but hey, it's just a prank bro. They also toppled a South American dictator? Maybe? These scenes are hilariously presented as boys will boys stuff punished with a week long suspension, during Greek Week, so you know they are in real trouble.

The suspension is a ruse to get the Dude Bros of Delta Bi off the campus and onto a lake side where they are set up to be killed by Mother Face. As happens in long in the tooth 80s franchise horror, new supernatural elements tend to get added to the plot. Here, the local sheriff, played in a brilliant cameo by Patton Oswalt in a glorious mustache, needs the Dude Bros to be killed and a virgin sacrifice in order to protect the town from some vaguely specified demonic presence. The sheriff has conspired with the College Dean, played by adult film star Nina Hartley, to set up the Dude Bros while he sets up a former Dude Bro turned cop to be the virgin sacrifice.

And that is all you need to know about Dude Bro Party Massacre 3 in terms of story. The rest is just a wildly inventive and very funny send-up of the classic conventions of movies like Slumber Party Massacre, and any 80s horror movie that was centered on a sorority or a college campus. Heavy drinking, homo-eroticism, and boobs are all well represented and satirized in Dude Bro Party Massacre 3. It's a loving homage to be sure as it is clear the guys behind 5 Second Films love 80s college horror movies.

The homage and satire extends to the look of the movie. In a stroke of genius, the movie looks as if it was shot on 80s film stock and transferred to VHS and then recorded off of a TV on another VHS. The lines and the grainy flawed, aged look of the movie is spectacular and greatly enhances the satire. The movie also includes brief, and quite funny 80s style commercials that you might've seen on late night TV during the 1980s. It's a brilliant touch and really rounds out the the comedic aesthetic of Dude Bro Party Massacre 3.

Dude Bro Party Massacre 3 was released initially in 2015 and I totally missed it at the time. That's a shame because this is truly my kind of horror comedy. It's both gloriously gory and wildly funny. The death scenes are shocking and vile but staged in hilariously broad fashion. The recreation of the 1980s horror aesthetic seems effortless and yet, it's clear that the team at Five Second Films took a great deal of care in crafting in meticulous detail, scenes that feel as if they could have been in a 1980s horror movie.

I absolutely love Dude Bro Massacre 3. I was worried that it might come off as too snarky or superior to the movies it is satirizing but those fears were unwarranted. These are true horror fans and smart comic minds who have made a movie that pays homage to classic horror tropes while bringing out huge laughs at the expense of those well worn cliches. I almost forgot, big shout out to the wonderful Greg Sestero. The Room star plays one of the Dude Bros of Delta Bi and it's so great to see him in anything. Sestero is the Otter from Animal House archetype transported perfectly into the milieu of a college horror movie.

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