Terror At Tenkiller Movie Review

Trailer here.

 

Terror at Tenkiller is a 1986 horror movie directed by Ken Meyer and starring Stacey Logan, Michelle Merchant and Michael Shamus Wiles.

The film opens with a woman being killed and dumped in a lake. Cut to two young women called Janna(Merchant) and Leslie(Logan). They are college students who are on their summer holidays.

Leslie has a boyfriend called Josh(Kevin Meyer)and they are arguing. Leslie wants a break from him so she and Janna go to Janna's family house at Lake Tenkiller. Young women have been found dead in the area. Janna is going to work as a waitress for the summer and she tells Leslie she can get her a job there too. They talk about a local legend where a Native American woman who killed ten men in revenge for her sister's death. She drowned them in lake and she drowned herself. Janna's dad says that her spirit still lives in the bottom of the lake. 

A man called Tor(Wiles) is killing the young women in the area. Janna gets a call from Josh and he wants to talk to Leslie. Janna tells him to get lost. A local man called Preacher comes around to the girls. He is a pervert. He spies on them. He is Tor's boss but Tor doesn't like him spying on the girls so he kills him and dismembers him. The girls get a threatening message on the machine. Tor calls over to see them. He is fixing Janna's boat. She tells him all about Leslie and Josh. Leslie is scared by the nasty voice message. She has a nightmare about Josh. The girls start work at the local diner. Tor comes in and he chats to Leslie. Janna finishes her shift and she is home alone. Tor visits her and he kills her. Leslie is still at work in the diner and she doesn't know what has happened to her friend.

She arrives home to find Janna's dead body. She  meets Tor and she thinks that Josh has done it. Tor takes her into the house. Josh is on his way there as he is worried about Leslie. Leslie realises that Tor is the one who has killed her pal. She hits him and runs away. Josh arrives at the house and gets killed by Tor. Tor manages to catch Leslie and he puts her in his boat and goes out into the middle of the lake to drown her. She tries to escape and she does manage it. Tor gets dragged down into the lake. Is it the Native American spirit? Leslie is safe until Tor pops up out of the lake with a knife.

This film isn't great. There is some bad acting and some silliness. I liked parts of it, but it isn't one of the better slasher movies from the 1980's. The ending was trying to be shocking, I suppose, but it didn't make much sense. The guy who played Tor was not a good actor. He was pretty wooden. If you like 80's slashers, then give this a try. If you are looking for something with substance, then this isn't it. I will give it a 4/10.