Sartaj Singh
Slaughter High is one of those slasher movies that has always piqued my interest. This is due to the poster for the Arrow Video home media release. It depicts the central killer staring manically (with a bloody bat in tow) whilst one of his victims is hanging from a rope. Along with the title, it’s the sort of fare you’d see in the bargain bin rental section at your local Blockbuster in the mid-nineties. But despite this pedigree that would spark the imagination of anybody who gazed upon this hypothetical VHS copy, the mid-eighties slasher originally had an entirely different title.
Originally made with the title April Fool’s Day, the filmmakers had to change it due to an exactly named slasher film that was going to be released in the same year. Aside from sharing the same title at one point in time, the slasher films share a few other things in common.
For one, they’re both attempting in their unique ways to shake up the formula of a slasher film. Since Halloween (1978) opened the floodgates for the sub-genre to thrive, many franchises and lesser-known movies had saturated it to the point of tedium. In the year of Slaughter High’s release (1986), Jason Voorhees had put the “camp” back into Camp Crystal Lake with a tongue-in-cheek sixth entry, Freddy was about to face off against the Dream Warriors (1987), and Michael Myers was a couple of years from returning in Halloween’s fourth entry (1988) (after the box office performance of Halloween III: Season of the Witch).
While April Fool’s Day contrasted the sub-genre (at large) with a puckish and pranking spirit, evoking Agatha Christie murder mysteries, which has always been an essential part of the DNA of the slasher craze, Slaughter High has other aspirations.
It’s playful and scathing of the troupes that permeate the genre. The best example of this comes from the final girl, Carol (Caroline Munro). Along with a selection of schoolmates, she pranks chemistry geek Marty (Simon Scuddamore) by getting him to strip naked and reveal himself to a lot of the student body.
With this plot point, the allure of sex itself becomes a part of forming the main killer (via Carol sexually teasing Marty into the women’s locker room). Later on, another prank is played on Marty, whereby his chemical experiment is tampered with, resulting in the disfigurement of the young student. It also plays with the general cliché of sex equaling death as Carol’s seduction (which could be punished by the morality of these films).
In fact, in her first few scenes as an adult, Carol’s death is lightly teased via a homage to the shower scene in Psycho. The seemingly tranquil and electronic score, along with the use of point of view & pan shots, lure the audience to think that Carol is the first victim. This playful quality of homaging the legacy of the sub-genre is also present in the music. The composer for the movie is Harry Manfredini, who has been the primary person scoring the Friday the 13th movies. There are instances where his famous “Ch ch ch, ah ah ah” musical motif subtly makes its presence felt in certain scenes.
Carol’s early scenes also paint the picture of someone who is assertive and firm. In a phone call with her agent, she turns down an opportunity to be in a film due to distrusting the man she has to act with. In a sense, she will not degrade herself or her body for career advancement. The small scene illustrates the qualities that make Carol an excellent final girl. She’s someone who does not shrink in the face of opposition or threat, but instead uses it as a means of survival. Often, she’s the one who has to comfort others and remains steely and optimistic when they’re breaking down in tears.
But much like the rest of the movie, Slaughter High indulges in the aspects of the slasher film and also subverts them. This applies to the ultimate fate of Carol. Like many other movies before it, the audience believes that she will survive. However, she dies at the hands of the killer at the tail end of the picture. In spirit, the choice feels like some of the early Friday the 13th films that play with expectations of what’s real and a dream to scare the audience.
Slaughter High‘s other main strength comes from its simplicity. It’s admirable how much it sets up a new killer within its short running time. In fact, the standard aspects of the slasher antagonist are seen in the film’s opening, including the costume and weapon. There’s an emotional weight and irony as Marty uses the Jester outfit that one of the bullies was wearing to get his own back via many horrible means.
However, the movie does not keep him in the costume for the entire last act. When he’s fully unmasked and wearing a school uniform, and bellowing to the camera with a smug sense of accomplishment, it reminds the audience of the pain he went through in the opening.
Sadly, Slaughter High marks Simon Scuddamore’s first and only screen appearance. The young actor committed suicide via drug overdose after the production wrapped. It’s tragic as Scuddamore shows a lot of promise in his debut, switching between the nebbish Marty and the terrifying Jester killer with ease.
What remains is a gem of a slasher film. There’s a fable-like quality in its storytelling, with long shots of school corridors initially having a sense brightness and innocence. These moments later become haunted as time plays its subtle tune of wear upon the abandoned school. Despite the clumsy casting (in using the same cast for the students and adults) and a few too many instances of fake outs via dream sequences, there’s a level of care in the storytelling and filmmaking to create something interesting. For ninety minutes, it stands on the shoulders of its sub-genre forebears and dresses them down with a wry smile (befitting of its central killer).
