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Guest
Review by Troy
Howarth |
A
maniac disguised in bear mascot outfit (no, seriously)
slices through the student body of an Ohio university...
The slasher boom of the 1970s and '80s yielded a lot
of trash. While there were some effective shockers amid all
the rubble, Girls Nite Out most
certainly isn't one of them. It plays very much like a parody
of the genre and its conventions, yet there's no real indication
that it's meant to be anything other than deadly serious. What
little humor there is, provided by the usual string of inane
youngsters, falls completely flat. The image of the psychopath
stalking the supporting cast while wearing a bear outfit is
almost too outré to miss, yet miss it does.
There's
basically little positive to be said about the film. Diehard
fans of the subgenre may find some entertainment value that
was lost on me, but beyond that it's difficult to summon any
enthusiasm for the picture whatsoever. The opening and closing
credits do not provide a directorial credit (hey, I wouldn't
be anxious to put my name to this, either) but it would seem
that Robert Deubel is the guilty party. Deubel's approach to
the material is flat and functional. Dialogue scenes drag on
and on in an interminable fashion and Deubel fails to really
capitalize on even the stalk and slash set-pieces. Suspense
is nil, as is audience interest. What's worse, Deubel seems
to be going for a 'less is more' approach which, in the hands
of the right director (think of John Carpenter and Halloween)
can be tremendously effective, but here robs the proceedings
of even the most basic entertainment value. What little sex
there is happens off camera, there's absolutely no nudity to
speak of, and the little gore that there is looks like red paint.
Talk about bland!
The cast is
comprised mostly of unremarkable young actors who don't appear
to have mastered the craft of acting. While leading lady Julie
Montgomery is cute and perky, she's no Katherine Hepburn. Most
of the other young actors range from insipid to 'I wanna reach
into the TV and strangle this person' level of annoyance. A
slumming Hal Holbrook makes one of his few horror film appearances
(one of the others being the vastly superior George A. Romero
picture Creepshow, shot not long
after this one) in a role that gives him the priceless screen
credit "And Hal Holbrook as Mac, the Security Guard"
and very little else. Seen mostly looking glum and/or making
phone calls, his entire role was likely filmed in one or two
days. Doubtless because the character is, well, played by Hal
Holbrook, the characters seem to give an awful lot of weight
and authority to a character that's essentially a night watchman.
A disinterested Holbrook, however, is vastly preferable to the
rest of the cast which also includes the veteran actor's son,
David, playing a major red herring role. (It's likely that he
was cast first and that the producers sought to capitalize on
having the younger actor by enticing his father to make an appearance;
if so, nice gesture, Dad!)
Alternately
dull, obnoxious and unintentionally funny, Girls
Nite Out is recommended to only the staunchest of slasher
completists.
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| Guilty
Pleasures' (a subdivision of Media Blasters, much like Shriek
Show) release of Girls Nite Out is
unremarkable, but arguably better than the film deserves. The
1.85/16x9 image looks as good as the drab cinematography will
allow. An unrelentingly cheap-looking affair, the film likely
looks as good as it ever has. Colors are accurately rendered and
print damage is confined to some vertical lines that crop up every
now and again. The mono English soundtrack sounds flat and muffled,
making it hard to make out some of the dialogue. Extras include
a campy theatrical trailer (narrated onscreen by an attractive
half-naked actress who, dammit, doesn't appear in the actual film),
trailers for other Media Blasters releases, an alternate titles
sequence under the title The Scaremaker (!), and a brief
on-camera interview with star Julie Montgomery. Montgomery gamely
tries to keep a straight face while discussing the finer points
of the film, but one can't help but get the impression that whatever
enthusiasm she expresses for it represents advancement in her
acting chops since the film was shot.
10/29/05 |
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