Private School

While a lot of the reviewers for this movie don't seem to like it, I seem to be in the minority. This movie for me has always ranked up there with other great '80s teen flicks like "Making the Grade", "Fast Times at Ridgemont High", "Sixteen Candles" and so on. The storyline is light, and there is a lot of bawdy humour, but the cast is what makes this movie. Everything from Betsy Russell riding horseback topless, to the 'mooning' at the end give this movie it's charm. I was surprised to see it still on video, and it's a treasured addition to my movie collection.

Although "Private School" may be a little slim on story, that won't matter to fans of the genre. Typically, we don't watch this sort of thing for the story. But the main plot points involve Christine (an adorable Phoebe Cates), a nice gal at a girls' school, who is in love with nice guy Jim (Matthew Modine), who goes to a boys' boarding school nearby. She's just about ready to go all the way with Jim, but competing with her for his affections is Jordan (the delectable Betsy Russell), her stuck-up antagonist. Set pieces are derived from the attempts by Jim's sex-crazed friends to ogle as many of the fine female students as possible.

Director Noel Black and his writers (Dan Greenburg, who'd previously written "Private Lessons", and Suzanne O'Malley), truly let out all the stops, in this scenario in which even distinguished veteran actors have sex on the brain. In fact, the movie has such a high energy level that it's almost TOO much at times. It just moves right along, generating some chuckles and plenty of titillation. Viewers will be very pleased to note that the attractive female cast is disrobed at any and every opportunity. And yet, there *is* an appealing romance between Christine and Jim to give the shenanigans some real heart. The gags come fast and furious, with Jim and his incredibly horny buddy Bubba (Michael Zorek) and pal Roy (Jonathan Prince) dressing in drag (that classic comedy trope) in order to infiltrate the girls' school.

The cast is enthusiastic and full of familiar faces: Kathleen Wilhoite (as Christine's best friend Betsy), Fran Ryan (as the headmistress), Ray Walston (as a goofy chauffeur), Frances Bay (as a high society woman), sensual cult icon Sylvia Kristel (as the sex education teacher), Richard Stahl (as a drunken, lecherous father), etc. Martin Mull has a hilarious, unbilled cameo as a drugstore clerk; Paula Abdul did the choreography and has a bit as a cheerleader. Russell is irresistible as the "bad girl" (people will love her topless ride on a horse), while Cates displays a winning personality (and sings some of the songs on the soundtrack). Zorek plays such a sleazy sex fiend that he pretty much devours every scene in which he appears.

Good fun, for any fan of this genre, guaranteed to make the audience feel happy and horny.

Seven out of 10.

And I mean butts. Three of the best rears to grace the movies are shown in this one. Betsy Russell, Brinke Stevens, and Phoebe Cates (hers may have been a body double--but it looked like I had always imagined Phoebe's would look like) show us the goods, and they are good!

There are also some funny gags that not only the boys play on the girls, but also the girls play on each other and on the school faculty.

All the "established" actors are doing their best to drag this movie out of the muck and they just barely do it. (If you want to see how bad teen sex movies can get, just watch "ScrewBalls" and you will see that this movie is really a cut above)

Overall a pretty good "Animal House" rip-off that works much better.

This is one of those horny teenager films that came out in the 1980's and it's easily just as dumb as most of them but looking at the young cast today this could be interpreted as a curio for this genre. Story is about horny teenagers from two prep schools where the boys and girls engage in raucous behavior from peering into windows to sneaking into showers. The girls side is Cherryvale and the boys Freemount and we see Jim Green (Matthew Modine) who dates Christine Ramsey (Phoebe Cates) and she has decided to give her virginity up and books a room in a cheap Mexican hotel.

*****SPOILER ALERT*****

Jim's friend Bubba (Michael Zorek) takes bets on the event but he also wants to try and score with the sexy Jordan (Betsy Russell) who is jealous of the fact that Christine and Jim have a solid relationship going on although he and Bubba dress up as woman and sneak into Cherryvale. The Dean is Miss Dutchbok (Fran Ryan) who tries to keep the shenanigans down to a limit but she gets caught in the back of a limo with a chauffeur (Ray Walston) with their lovemaking broadcast over an intercom system!

This film is directed by Noel Black who in 1968 made the terrific "Pretty Poison" but since then he has worked primarily in television and his feature film efforts were regulated to low budget sex romps like this. It would be easy to just unload one bad remark after another for a film like this but that would be too easy and instead I look back at this as something that was a trend and if you compare them with the few horny teen films that are made today you'll see how different they are. The abundance of nudity was actually the norm during this period and actress Betsy Russell has three nude scenes in the first 30 minutes and the scene of her riding the horse topless has gone on to be infamous. The familiar cast is also another reason to check this out and along with Modine, Cates, and Russell is Kathleen Wilhoite, Sylvia Kristel and Brinke Stevens in the shower scene. For trivia there are two things to point out like the fact that Cates sings two songs on the soundtrack and is actually pretty good and the other is that Paula Abdul was the choreographer for the outdoor calisthenics/dance sequence. I'm not really recommending this to anyone because this is one of those films that audiences can make up their minds about on their own but maybe my comments point out a few things to help others decide if they want to venture out and view this.

Christine (the gorgeous Phoebe Cates) attends Cherryvale, a school for girls. She's dating Jim (Matthew Modine) from the local boy's school. Jim and his pals are always up to no good with many hare-brain schemes in their sexually deprived minds to infiltrate the school and see a bit of flesh. When Christine and Jim decide to go away for the weekend the real fun begins.

'Private School' is my favorite of all the teen comedies of the 80's. It's not rocket science but it's a lot of fun and worth a laugh or two. Acting: * * * (Very Good) Writing / Direction: * * (OK) Technical Design: * * (OK) Music: * * * * (Excellent)

If you liked 'Fast Times at Ridgemont High' and 'Porky's' you may enjoy this one too.