"Madman" has some things going for it- Decent gore, a nasty lookin' killer, moments of tension, and some good blue-tinged camera work for the forest (and abandoned house) scenes. Unfortunately, that only accounts for about 1/3 of the movie. The rest is garbage.
The acting and dialog are all over the place, either stiff as a board or ultra-hammy with nothing in between. There is not one ounce of depth or common sense (even by slasher standards) to any character in the film. And how's this for an engaging plot- One dummy heads into the woods by themselves (of course), doesn't come back, so another goes to find them. Repeat over and over and over. The "fridge" scene alone sums up the sheer stupidity of the movie.
On the overall, this movie makes "Friday The 13th" look like "Citizen Kane".