Personally, I use
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A slasher film is a subgenre of thriller and horror film, typically involving a psychopathic killer stalking and murdering a sequence of victims in a graphically violent manner, often with a bladed tool such as a knife, machete, axe, scythe, or chainsaw. Although the term "slasher" may be used as a generic term for any horror movie involving graphic acts of murder
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as a rough guide to define a slasher film. There is no set time period for me (there are slashers being made today for instance), and whilst I may consider films from outside of North America as slashers, I do not class gialli as such, as they have their own specific niche 'rules' of their particular sub-genre. I also do not class things like Alien as slashers, as creature features tend to come down to 'animal instinct' or the battle for survival rather than pre-meditated murder. Slashers also (generally) have an air of 'whodunit' to them whilst creature features usually don't.
I guess it it all comes down to personal interpretation though.