Yes - and I would consider the likes of Saving Private Ryan, Braveheart and Titanic "junk food" in comparison to, say, Friday the 13th or The Burning.

Supposedly factual accounts of war and disaster which are in fact blatant rewrites of history leaving only a shred of truth are potentially dangerous films consumed by the general public for a quick fix of rollercoaster emotions.

Slasher films have no such agendas and do not need to take creative liberties in desperate attempts to keep the average moviegoer happy... although of course that is changing in these bland, "knowing", post-modern times of horror cinema.

are you kidding me ?

dont need to take creative liberties ?
A guy who doesnt die ? thats a pretty big creative liberty !

I hear what you're saying re. 'non fictional films'
I always take them with a grain of salt ..
There has not been a single historical/biographical film that hasnt been padded with 70% bullshit to make it more interesting for the average movie goer.

But before i even get into production values or acting talent ... I wasnt comparing films outside the genre ...

I'm comparing horror to horror ..

Ther are a lot of scare films (esp. from the late 70's early 80's) that were given a lot more care and talent than the slasher fims - that were basically exploitation films .. T & A, really poor acting (mostly soap opera stars) and absolutely no story or plot .. just kill kill kill. (in a different discussion these would be my reasons why these films are good ! :)

I concur, this is a subject for a different thread.

I shall say
 

TCM gets my vote. Sadistic, unrelenting and butchery. Halloween would come in second. The first one is well done and menacing. The others are Halloween +lack of direction and dilution.

didn't enjoy madman much......the burning however...great fun.

The New York Ripper

Deep Red

Maniac

Deep Red ...
I never thought of that as a 'slasher film'

at least not in the 'friday the halloween' sense ...

It's cliche because it's true. Halloween all the way.

On the subject of "junk food" films; given the entire premise of a typical slasher film is fantasy, you cannot claim creative liberties in the same sense as you can with the creators of Saving Private Ryan, Braveheart and Titanic.

Unlike these movies, the typical slasher film does not pretend to be an account of actual events (except for the odd one that does, of course) and the slasher viewer is not fed anything like the agendas, propaganda and lies so blatantly contained in the supposedly more "respectable" and "serious" films I mentioned.

It's interesting that those great movies (my emphasis on general opinion) turn out to be the junk, and the more honest rubbish slasher movies turn out to be the nice big steak.

dont get me started on Titanic !
I avoid these films like the plague ... but again .. let me stress - i was really comparing films WITHIN the genre ..

There are a lot of really good horror films that are somewhat more origional and involved ...

Slasher films are something people make with a low budget with unknown actors to make a buck on the rental shelves ..

and again, i like them .. but they cant really compare to smarter horror films ...