After School Massacre

I've been watching slasher movies since the mid '90s, and I have 'never' been this irritated with what I was seeing. The best way to describe my feelings toward this movie is simple: I felt like I got trolled by somebody who hates slasher fans. There is no way this is a legitimate effort.

Normally I only like discussing acting in slasher movies when it's somewhat impressive, because let's face it, with these commonly low budgets it's going to be close to impossible to buy skilled actors. With "After School Massacre," the bizarre nature of 'this' level of acting is where the 'only' horror lies. This is the worst acting I have ever seen. Not only that, the acting leads us nowhere! There's no payoff for suffering through this bizarre acting and limp script. The only explanation for somebody signing off on work like this is that it was an all-out assault on all the things I hold dear when it comes to movies.

The kills, the story, the killer, the comedy, the sex, the nudity, the music, they were 'all' equally as terrible as this bizarre acting. That has to be some kind of record.

I've been hustled a few times in my life, but buying into this premise is by far the most painful duping I have ever received.

"After School Massacre" is a modern throwback to the classic slasher film.The story is a simple slice 'n' dice, hot young girls meet the psycho killer that focus more on tits and ass soaked in blood than actual story. In the film, a teacher who walks the line between perv prone to inappropriate behavior and educator becomes obsessed with a student, flips out and goes on a killing spree after being suspended/fired (it depends what part of the story mentions that point), and one by one slaughters the group of teen girls.

"After School Massacre" doesn't hold up to the classic 80's slashers that it desperately tries to imitate. Jared Masters creates - a decent enough concept, young girls at a slumber party face the masked killer- yet in executing this vision focuses more on Spice channel shenanigans that substance. The characters are so far removed from any authenticity that fantasy characters seem realistic in comparison.

"After School Massacre" is a low budget slasher so production value is on the cheap-which doesn't necessarily mean a bad thing-a lot of cheap films have had quality product emerge as a result. However with this film there was too much attention spent in asinine character relationship dynamics and not enough time spent on building a strong story, or recognizable characters. The acting is amateurish and two dimensional. It sucks because a few moments in the film show real promise of what this film could have been with more care taken to bring this story to life.

The special effects and soundtrack are the saving grace and only proof that is had a horror ancestor attached at some point. Again it is a low budget film so we aren't talking award winning stuff here, but Masters and the FX department use classic stylizing, and practical measures to give us gore and blood that isn't CGI and actually work. In those moments "After School Massacre" rises up to more than mimic the classic slasher. The soundtrack is hip, relevant, with creepy VHS era sound effects balancing out the atmosphere and at times elevating the scene to real horror status. So kudos on that front!

Overall "After School Massacre" disappointed me. It felt more like a project contrived to get young girls to take their clothes off on camera without being softcore porn. The story is weak, looses continuity throughout, and filled with fluff but no reward. This film works more toward the fetish crowd than the true slasher fan base with ridiculous dialog that goes no where, adds no value, and only serves to prove that most guys are pervs hoping to see girl-on- girl action. Still the deaths scenes are worth a scan through- although the word "blood spatter" should have been thrown out there in kill scene discussions for the actual scenes that needed it. And there are a few in here that needed it. The film ends on a weird note that doesn't really finish the film but doesn't actually herald in a reason for a sequel either. Check "After School Massacre" out if you really want to but don't expect much.

If you've seen some promo shots or the trailer I reckon, you may feel that this may have some highlights. Particularly when it comes to very good looking female characters ... although characters may be giving the paper thin excuses of characters too much credit. But the thing is not that the movie is only teasing you, but refusing to give you any pleasure ... you're better off watching twitter or instagram accounts or whatever else floats your boat! That is not the main reason I rated this so low.

It is because it actually lacks in the one thing that would make this bearable. Shocking horror scenes and death scenes that might give you something. Always remembering that this is a movie obviously. The really annoying people in it - you don't really care for them, so if they would die ... well you at least would want that to be something exciting. But due to the low (or is it no?) budget of the movie, you are practically seeing ... nothing! You could turn that into positive and praise the filmmakers for inventing so many methods of cutting away or framing it in a way that you are not able to see impacts or penetrations (of killings, just in case you again got your ... hopes up).

The music video at the end is also bad ... but almost feels like something great ... maybe just watch that! You get to see all the cuties from the movie ... you can mute if you feel like your ears are being violated of course.

The sets are lacking, the acting chops are SORELY lacking and originality is not to be found anywhere. There are some cute women in the cast, but libidinous male viewers shouldn't get their hopes up; the "skin factor" is limited and nowhere near sufficient to make it worthwhile watching this debacle. The kills are so unconvincing as to be comical, the role of law enforcement depicted with a childlike simplicity, meaning gore and suspense fans will also find the film quite disappointing. I am the most patient of movie viewers, but I ended up skimming through most of the film on 4x fast forward after watching the first 25-30 minutes. Too lousy a film to even come close to the "so bad it's good" classification. AVOID!

What can I say...both the dialogue and the acting come straight out of an Adult film. Even the teachers are the Adult Movie, looks too young, too dumb, and too buff to be a teacher kind of teacher.

And the setting, again like an Adult Movie, is of the "there clearly wasn't even an attempt to make it look like X" kind of set. I mean, a potted plant, a desk, and a roll away chalk board with one or two school desks looks NOTHING like a classroom. Unless, of course, very vulgar things happened in front of a camera in that classroom.

Usually I give movies like this 10 stars because...mission accomplished, they aren't really pretending to be anything else.

But this one seems like they were going for Triple X fair...and backed off at the last minute.