Tuno negro

This is an interesting movie. On one hand it is kind of slick Hollywood-style slasher movie involving an ultra-modern killer who stalks his prey in internet chat rooms and posts his murders on the internet. On the other hand it is enjoyably atmospheric and highly stylized, resembling the much more interesting (to my mind) early 80's slasher movies or the Italian gialli(many of which, people tend to forget, were Spanish co-productions). It has a great setting--the University of Salamanca, one of the oldest and most storied universities in the world. The high-tech slasher operates against this almost medieval background. He calls himself the "Dark Minstrel", connecting himself to a legendary (albeit fictional) group of poor student minstrels who took it upon themselves in earlier times to weed out the most undeserving upper-class underachievers. Like his brethren, the dark minstrel targets students who cheat or have bad grades--his motto: "la ignorancia mata" (ignorance kills).

The plot of this movie is actually pretty good, and those who claim it doesn't hold together really need to watch it again. The revelation of the killer is pretty surprising and is NOT a cheat if you are paying close attention. It's definitely as violent as your average giallo or slasher movie. The victims look pretty long-in-the-tooth to be college students, especially the most recognizable actress, Maribel Verdu (of "Y tu Mama Tambien" fame), but they are no less likable or any more stereotypical than your average slasher movie cast. The lead is a smoking hot German actress, who goes only by the name of "Silke". She's pretty decent and has a nice nude scene, something that is usually missing in most modern-day Hollywood movies (that may sound like a sexist thing for me to say, but the day they start casting remotely average-looking women in these things, based on their acting talent rather than their physical attributes, I'll stop complaining when they don't take their clothes off).

This is pretty decent movie overall, and I'd recommend it to anybody, but especially giallo and slasher movie fans.

Well, supposedly spanish filmmakers are trying to avoid the "american" way of making films, well I guess they missed the point here. Because this film follows exactly all the elements that make american horror films what they are, one minute thrills with some exceptions. The film is rather predictable, the dialogue is awfully ridiculous,but the sex scene was somewhat interesting. The acting on the other hand was not that bad, Fele Martinez once again shows that he is one of the best young actors working in Spain these days, and even though he looks too old for being in college Jorge Sanz does a good job also. The soundtrack of the film is one of the few good elements the film has, and well...the last 15 minutes of the film are flooded by certain touch of dark humor that brings up all that was lost by the first one hour and a half. At the end, what I have to say about Tuno Negro is that, is totally forgettable, but you might as well have a not so bad time if you go see it. It´s up to you.

Very good Spanish slasher movie, with an interesting and darkly humorous idea (a slashing minstrel going from one university to another each year, killing the worst students, cutting the bad seeds of society).

Only slightly different from his american models (the plethora of college slashing films), Tuno negro is a very good addiction to the genre, with several good death scenes, many talented actors and actresses (the lead cutie is a sort of Spanish clone of Katie Beckinsale), good musical score. All in all, a good way to spend 100 minutes, far better than many of his similar from the States.

Like `El arte de Morir', this is a Spanish example of the teen slasher pic, that has some original ideas, but isn't as good as the efforts of other Spanish directors in horror film making, like Amenabar's `Tesis', de la Iglesia's `Dia de la bestia' or del Toro's marvelous `Devil's Backbone'. Still it is a lot better than the boring and predictable `I know what you did last summer', which had nothing, absolutely nothing new or inventive to it. The story tells of a secret society of serenade singers, and, guess what, lots of students are being killed. One of the highlights of `Tuno Negro' is the impressive setting at the university of Salamanca, a location that gives the film a slightly Gothic touch. Then there's the female lead: an interesting divergence from the usually dull well-behaved heroines in Slasher flicks; I liked Silke's acting a lot, although the version I've seen has been dubbed into German; can't say nothing about her original way of speaking that got criticized below. This is certainly not a masterpiece, but it's quite entertaining; I've seen much worse than that.

Alex is a new student to the University of Salamanca, but upon her arrival she and her friends get caught up in a web of mystery surrounding some deaths on campus and that of the legend of the Black Minstrel. They learn that the Black Minstrel is knocking off slack students who aren't taking their learning very seriously. When the Black Minstrel contacts Alex through an internet chat site, she and her friends realise that it's up to them to figure out who's behind the costume and discover the secret of the Black Minstrel.

Again another carbon copy of a teen slasher film that was started by the craze they call "Scream". "Black Serenade" is a Spanish slasher going for that winning mainstream formula of American slashers and you can easily see the influences. The opening death scene has some very recognizable touches of "Scream" about it and the story is similar to "Urban Legend". The killer and their motive might be different, but simply we've been down this path oh so many times before. Hold on, you might think from what I've mentioned so far that I'm going to tear it apart, well actually that's not the case. I thought it was average. Not below. Not above. Just average. I don't know why, but I was slightly amused by it. Maybe it caught me in the right frame of mind. It has its bad moments, but occasionally it offers a surprise or two and the odd inventive kill. The production was more than decent, but sadly it's predictable story telling. The urban legend of the Black Minstrel going around universities and knocking off the bad seeds isn't a bad device. There's even a nice edge of black humour about it. The back-story in the plot is far more engrossing than that of the horny and drug addicted guys and gals dialogues and sleazy interplay. Well, it did deliver on some tawdry action and there's some decent blood letting. One death scene is an almighty mind trip.

The paper thin characters are rather lacklustre ( I thought bad students would be at least interesting) and some look way too old for their parts, but since the material was rather underdeveloped. The performances from the cast were satisfactory I guess. While, the ignorant students are the usual stereotypes, you also got thrown into the mix a pair of hard boiled cops and a priest with a secret. The red herrings amongst these characters are lousily staged, because it's not hard to pick up on who's behind the mask and when it's revealed it's just too contrived. Now the killer's costume looked decent enough and their choose of weapon was one fancy looking knife, in which they loved to film their killings. The director at times slackens off with the pacing and gives us cheap false scares and bluffs, but within these moments he also manages to orchestrate some genuinely, tense set pieces. Such as the chase scene in the town square and the thrilling climax (before that trite ending), but I didn't get the point of the montage, accompanied by a rock song in the mid section. Huh??? It was just laughable!

What else was funny, was the very mediocre computer effects (that goes for the flames and explosions!). The superbly, laced Gothic cathedral and campus setting was well used and the cinematography did a swift enough job. Soundtrack goes for an fair rock/metal approach and the robust score drums in the usual chants to fit into the mood and surroundings. It might be far from inspiring for its field, but we learn that being a bad student doesn't pay off in the long run. But I don't think this (if you can call it a) social commentary and moral will hit it off and change someone's perception on the privilege of education and knowledge.

It might blatantly rip-off other slashers and have many implausible scenarios, but I still found it mildly diverting.