Curtains is about people so desperate to "make it" in Hollywood that they are always "in character," their personal identities as contrived as the characters they portray, their selves hidden behind Curtains of their own making. After Jonathan has Samantha audition in a crone mask, he yanks off the mask, forces Samantha to face a mirror, and states, "This is a mask too."

Curtains examines those willing to do anything to "make it." It's the theme of O'Connor's standup act. "Have you ever wanted something so bad you would do anything to get it? Me, I wanted to be an actress. I wanted to be in pictures so bad, I screwed the guy from Fotomat." Hollywood encourages self-deception, and with this attitude the playacting is constant. One is always in character, projecting an image, the Self ever more elusive.

Samantha suffers and sacrifices to maintain her star status, including the sojourn in the asylum. But the stay affects her; the patients both frighten and move her. "So sad. Even when they're laughing they're sad." She advises O'Connor to forego a career in show business, to "get married and grow old together."

O'Connor suspects Samantha of trying to thin the competition, but more likely Samantha is stating what she might do if she could begin again.

Sociology aside, Curtains is an effective slasher film. The wintry location creates a coldly beautiful isolation, reminiscent of The Shining, Ghost Story, and The Brood. The slasher's crone mask, worn to hide her identity, also augurs these pretty young actresses likely fate, when they too will be discarded. Killings are stylized, shot with lyrical slow motion. One actress is chased backstage amid mannequins, discovering a dead actress hanging among them (sagacious commentary on Hollywood's meat market?). The subsequent stabbings (off camera) are punctuated by quick jump cuts amid the mannequins. Unlike many slasher films, Curtains's killer is difficult to identify (there's a reason for that).

Curtains also functions as commentary on Samantha Eggar's own career. Named Best Actress at Cannes for her work in The Collector (1965), by the 1980s she had gone to slumming in Canadian slasher fare (to the genre's benefit). Notably, Eggar's character shares her first name. Curtains has other curious "insider" attributes. Actor John Vernon portrays the fictitious Jonathan Stryker, yet Curtains is credited to director "Jonathan Stryker." (Actually directed by Richard Ciupka).

Curtains opens with Samantha playacting a scene from Audra. She finds closure by performing the scene for real. What has she learned? "That an actress must always be in control," she tells O'Connor. It may be for naught. The final survivor in Curtains, the one who has what it takes to "make it" to the end, ends up in an asylum.

Both as a rumination on the relative values of fame and family, and as a tense and gory slasher film set in beautiful wintry isolation, Curtains delivers.