The long-awaited summer holidays have arrived, and the students of a New England college are preparing to return to their respective homes. However, Katherine, Vicky, and their friends intend to organize a big party right inside the college. Mrs. Slater, the elderly and sour owner of the building, forbids the girls from having the party; the classic straw that breaks the camel's back after a year of antipathy, an event that pushes the girls to take revenge with a prank on the woman. However, the prank takes an unexpected turn, and Mrs. Slater accidentally dies. The girls decide to have the party anyway, but during the party, a mysterious killer begins to murder one by one the girls responsible for the murder.
The juiciest and most succulent fruits of the American slasher genre undoubtedly appeared in the early 1980s, a period that popularized Michael Myers as an icon of the genre and gave birth to Jason Voorhees. The production of slashers during that period was prolific and naturally had its highs and lows, although even today it is the films produced during that period that generate the most memories and are often subject to remakes.
Among the lesser-known slashers (at least in Italy) is "Non entrate in quel collegio" (Don't Go in the House), 1983, a good film that combines the classic bodycount with college settings for women that represented a real mini-trend of the period. Indeed, from the late 1970s to most of the 1980s, a myriad of low-budget films sprouted up that had as their common matrix the location within high schools or women's colleges; they were called "sorority movies" and were mostly horror, thrillers, or comedies, and the common intent was to target a male/late adolescent audience by showing beautiful girls, preferably in compromising situations (the strictly forbidden visit of a boy within the college walls was one of the most frequent topoi) and in skimpy outfits (the scenes of the girls gathered to talk in baby dolls before going to sleep and those of the shower are other indispensable examples). Pure exploitation of the more innocuous kind, in short.
"Non entrate in quel collegio" joins this trend but represents an anomalous element, very different from the masses. Firstly, it follows the paths of the slasher (which will be taken as examples) and exponentially reduces the characteristic prurient component, almost exclusively entrusted to the first few minutes, to make room for the construction of rather effective tension scenes. Having set the necessary distinguishing stakes, "Non entrate in quel collegio" begins to plunder its closest relatives, showing evident influences from "Black Christmas" by Bob Clark and "Prom Night - Don't Go in the House" by Paul Lynch. From the former, it takes the setting and the group of female protagonists; from the latter, the narrative opening and the device of the party as an occasion for massacre. Therefore, if you are looking for an original film, do not look for it in "Non entrate in quel collegio"!
However, it must be said that Mark Rosman's debut film, who will later become a director of teen comedies like the "Lizzie McGuire" series and "A Cinderella Story," does its job well: it knows how to entertain and scare, as well as appearing optimally packaged despite the low budget.
The construction of the tension scenes is really good, with a great atmosphere accompanying each murder, even though the murders themselves do not entirely follow the bloody and hyperviolent trend of "Friday the 13th," which was in vogue at the time, but are rather chaste, privileging suspense over blood. An added value is given by the suggestive photography of Tim Suhrstedt, who manages to enhance the numerous dark scenes that appear in the film.
Even the screenplay, written by Rosman himself, is not as banal as often happens in these films, and to the stereotyping of the characters - there is the old hateful landlady, the most reckless girl and author of the prank, the one who is more honest and responsible destined to move forward in the film, the nerd, the most cowardly one, and so on - is added a construction of the mystery not as obvious as it might seem, reserving even some good twists.
In conclusion, "Non entrate in quel collegio" can be considered a good film, a worthy exponent of the slasher genre worthy of being remembered.
There is the inevitable remake from 2009, "Sorority Row - The Pledge."
Comments
Comments (0)
Comments