APRIL FOOL'S DAY

April 1, 2007. On the occasion of the debutante Torrance Caldwell's entry into high society, her friend Desiree Cartier organizes an elegant party at her villa. But Desiree has also planned a cruel prank at the expense of Milan, a girl her brother seems particularly interested in. The prank turns into a tragedy, Milan dies, and those responsible for the incident are acquitted by the judge. One year later, on the same day that cost Milan her life, the young people responsible for the accident receive a letter asking them to turn themselves in, otherwise they will die one by one. The author of the threat seems to be the same deceased girl, who indeed begins to eliminate her tormentors. Sony recently distributed "The Beginning of the End," a remake of the 1980s slasher "Non entrate in quella casa," but just before that, they had played the card of another remake of a slasher from the same period, "April Fool's Day." The original "April Fool's Day" dates back to 1986 and bears the signature of Fred Walton, who a few years earlier directed "When a Stranger Calls" (itself remade in 2005 with "The Call"). Today, the story of the massacre on April Fool's Day is retold by the art brothers Butcher Brothers (real names Michael Altieri and Phil Flores), already authors of the appreciated essay on the disintegration of the American family "The Hamiltons," but the result seems to be the remake of "Non entrate in quella casa" much more than "The Beginning of the End" actually is. The choice that screenwriter Mikey Wigart has opted for is therefore a (very) free reworking of the situation that was the basis of Walton's film, but the result is really very poor. The 1986 film was a barely mediocre fake horror, therefore easily improvable, and yet this remake manages to be even worse, fully respecting the principle of uselessness that many have always attributed to the current trend of looped remakes. Add to this that the new "April Fool's Day" (called bastardly "Deadly Joke" in Italy), unlike the majority of horror remakes, was produced directly for the home video market, declaring from the outset a lower-than-average production value. The film starts on the wrong foot. The prologue is a sort of paratelevision mix between "Beautiful," "The O.C.," and "Cruel Intentions," since we are immediately presented with a bunch of fashionable young rich people who exchange challenging glances and perform repulsive dialogues made of weak "r" sounds and high-society meanness, all presented as a bothersome product with a glossy image. A prologue of over 20 minutes for a film that lasts only 80: a definitely wrong choice since it delays the actual "focus" on the story to an unbelievable extent, then forcing to narrow the times when the narration becomes more interesting. An interest that is never really achieved, since "Deadly Joke" then seems to follow the script of "Non entrate in quella casa" (but also "Jolly Killer," "I Know What You Did," "Valentine," and many others) with all the defects that follow: more than unlikable characters, zero gore, off-screen murders, and a lot of boredom on the side. What might appear minimally interesting in "Deadly Joke" is the manifest critique of the upper classes of American society, highlighting the rot, cruelty, and hypocrisy that hide behind the facade of respectability that hovers over the high class. But the theme is inserted into a boring and often predictable context, with all the consequences that follow. In the cast, the usual television faces ranging from Taylor Cole ("C.S.I.," "Numbers," "Supernatural") in the role of the protagonist Desiree, to Josh Henderson ("Desperate Housewife," "Step Up") in the guise of her brother. The only face known to the horror public is Scout Taylor-Compton, protagonist of "Halloween - The Beginning" and "Zombies - The Revenge of the Innocent." A lackluster direction by those who seemed to be two authors to keep an eye on completes the picture.