8/10
The 1980 film "Prom Night" had been a big success in the box office, and it set a tone for the slasher genre. It soared Jamie Lee Curtis even farther into stardom, and was personally one if my favorites starring her. This 1987 sequel took the series into a different direction, the paranormal... It honestly has next to nothing with the original, yet it has still become a hit.
The movie starts by introducing us to a character named Mary Lou Maloney. The year is 1957, and this teenage girl confesses her grave sins to a priest. As the penance is about to begin, she says she loved every minute of the wrongdoings, and leaves. The film then goes to Mary's prom, where she is hails prom queen. Her angry and jealous boyfriend Billy is angered by the fact that she is going to be heading home with another man that she likes more. Out of revenge, he decides to throw a stink bomb down on the stage by Mary. An accident occurs, and the bomb sets fire of the poor girl. I found this beginning quite interesting, and while I think that the nature of Malone's death was a little absurd, it was still a good foreshadowing for the future plot of the movie.
A jump forward to present time takes place, and we meet Vicki Carpenter. Vicki is a high school student, and she has just been asked to prom by her boyfriend. We also see that the principal of this high school is Billy. I like this a lot, because it gives the allowance of seeing him be haunted by the death of Mary.
One of the problems with the film is that after the intro, there is about twenty minutes of absolute trash. The scenes are melodramatic, and they completely turned me off for some time. I thought that this movie was going to be terrible overall because of this, and I really wish that they would've been a little more careful.
Things start to get weird as small occurrences happen around the school. Items fly around, and Vicki gets the feeling that something is wrong. This is proven when her good friend Jess is hung by something that can't be seen. While everyone called the death a suicide, Vicki knows this isn't true. She doesn't know exactly what is happening, but begins to get a feeling that Mary Lou has something to do with it.
A point I'd like to emphasize is that no matter how enjoyable this movie is, it should have never been called "Prom Night 2." Originally, it was called "The Haunting of Hamilton High," but Alliance Films chose to rename it so they could feed off the success of the original. This scam was a really dumb idea, because this movie has ABSOLUTELY nothing to do with the 1980 film. I think that in naming the film as they did, it mislead people, which led to disappointment. While I still like the movie, I was quite ticked off about this.
One of the things that I really liked about this movie was the supernatural/ paranormal scenes. Everything was done very practically, and they were a lot of fun. One of my personal favorite parts was when Vicki got pulled into the chalkboard. It really showcased good special effects, and while it wasn't scary, it was still intense. I also love the way that Mary Lou really took over Vicki. A girl that was once innocent became a promiscuous and evil girl, and she became vulgar and disgusting. I think this was a clever plot twist, because it made the movie extremely bizarre and memorable.
Another thing that I noticed in the movie is that it made many references to horror movies like "Carrie" and "The Exorcist." I found this cool, because it gave a nostalgic feeling while I watched the movie, and it showed that the filmmakers had a real love for the genre. Some examples I saw this in were the emphasis of the locker room(Carrie), the use of telekinetic powers to harm people(Carrie), the increase in meanness(the Exorcist), the increase of erotic needs(Exorcist), the head spin(Exorcist), etc.
I thought that the cast in the movie was fair enough. Wendy Lyon was an obvious favorite in the role of Vicki, because she really showed a lot of depth in her skills. She started off as a modest and shy girl, but turned into a complete train wreck because of her possession, and every moment was completely convincing. Michael Ironside was pretty cool as Billy, because he showed a lot of emotional distress as a result of Mary Lou. Richard Monette gave one heck of a performance as Father Cooper. The moment that I really saw his greatness was right after he heard possessed Vicki tell her sins. You could sense his anguish because of the deathly look on his face, and he didn't have to say anything at all. The rest of the supporting cast was mediocre to good, because they did nothing super impressing, but they kept the film alive with their likable nature, or sometimes jerky personalities.
The scenes at prom were actually a little bit of an improvement from the first movie, because they are much less dated. There is a more hip feel to the dance, and the music is still somewhat relatable. I also feel that the style of the dance is more like now, because it was like a party rather than just dancing the whole time.
The ending of the movie was absolutely phenomenal. I almost saw it as a little reference to "A Nightmare On Elm Street," because it was thought that everything was fine, but then something completely spontaneous happens and leaves you completely puzzled. This was the perfect ending, and I think it was even better than the closing to the original movie.
Overall, I really enjoyed this film a lot. While it was flawed at parts, it was an adrenaline driving piece of chaos that really served the decade well. I almost feel that while "Prom Night" was superior in its filmmaking, this one was equally(if not more) enjoyable. I highly recommend this movie to all fans of horror, because it is a obscure treat that is not to be missed.
No comments:
Post a Comment