Sisters of Death

"Sisters of Death" has a fairly simple plot. Five women and two men are stuck on the property of a crazed father intent on revenge for his daughters death seven years earlier by a sorority initiation gone wrong. It's not a bad movie but it's a bit too plain and simple. There is no imagination used in the way the houseguests are killed. For those looking for blood and guts, there is none. There are hints of possible nude scenes but that never develops. Just teasers for those looking for nudity. Pretty tame stuff. I don't see any problem with kids watching this. There is no gore or nudity in this film. It is a bit sad to see the young female stereotype. The girls play the old helpless and stupid role a bit too much for me. Although they know they are in danger they go around doing the dumbest things. It's as though they want to get killed. Gee, what can I do next to put me in danger? "Sisters of Death" is an OK low budget drama with a touch of mystery and a little twist for the end. Something to watch when there isn't anything better to do. It's nothing special or anything to go out of your way to view but not a total waste either.

Five women, who were once members of a secret sorority, are invited to a lavish ranch in a remote area north of Los Angeles. It seems like a celebratory reunion until things turn deadly. What's going on and who's responsible?

"Sisters of Death" was shot in 1972, but not released until 1976-77. It starts off as an occult-oriented flick involving beautiful women, but morphs into a sorta Ten Little Indians situation with elements that would influence the forthcoming slasher craze, just don't expect a lot of gore.

The highlight is the five women, played by Claudia Jennings (Judy), Sherry Boucher (Diana), Roxanne Albee (Penny), Sherry Alberoni (Francie) and Cheri Howell (Sylvia). You would think that Claudia Jennings would win out on the beauty front, but actually Sherry Boucher and Roxanne Albee surpass her (Boucher is, interestingly, a Jennings lookalike). Elizabeth Bergen is also on hand as Elizabeth in a small role.

While there's no Starsky and Hutch, as amusingly suggested, the two guys sure are reminiscent of them (that particular TV series wouldn't debut until a few years after this flick was shot). It's somewhat similar to "The Beast Must Die" (1974), just without the werewolf angle. Like that movie, not enough focus is put on fleshing out the characters, which makes them uninteresting and this isn't helped by the one-dimensional location.

The entire mid-section of the flick is relatively dull, but things perk up in the end with a twist or two.

The movie runs 1 hour, 27 minutes, and was shot in Paso Robles, California, which is about 200 miles north of Los Angeles.

GRADE: C.

In the same vein as Ten Little Indians, Sister's of Death does the 'invitation' thing some years before Paul Lynch's Prom Night and even before Class Reunion Massacre from 1976.

Sorority girls are holding their initiation for two inductees that involves a pistol/murder in which one of the 'Sisters' would load the gun, place it to the inductee's head and pull the trigger. Of course, the blank bullet is just supposed to make a loud noise and that's it. But, in this case, it splatters the girls brains and the rest is history.

Anyway, it's a few years down the road and the ex-sorority girls receive and invitation and five hundred bucks to attends a 'Sister's' reunion. They are supposed to meet in a designated spot where two guys with a beat-up station wagon (with sheets over the windows) are to pick them up and take the them to their destination, where they themselves are to make a couple hundred bucks.

After all the girls finally make it, the two guys drive the girls to their location. one of the guys talks his friend into staying and partying with the girls and soon learn they're stranded on the property. An electric fence keeps them on the premises while an unknown specter roams throughout the mansion spying and doing away with the girls one by one.

Sister's of Death is a film that does a lot of cliché' things before it was cool to do so. The acting is surprisingly good for a drive-in caliber flick. There's copious amounts of cheese that accompanies the actions and dialog of our characters, and a twist ending that I never saw coming. Just who is it that is taking the girls out one by one? Just whose revenge mode is set on high and what lengths will they go through to extend their murderous rage? Watch and see.

This PG-rated see-how-they-die thriller reunites five sorority sisters seven years after the death of a fellow pledge during a hazing ritual gone terribly wrong. Responding to anonymous invitations to gather at an isolated desert villa, the girls soon learn the day of judgement is at hand - and begin to die one by one.

Made in 1972, but not released until 1978, SISTERS OF DEATH is a passable time killer, but lacks interesting characterizations, thrilling setpieces or the trademark extremes that made drive-in going such a singular thrill. With a film like Bava's BAY OF BLOOD pulling out all the stops, SISTERS OF DEATH is just too tame. Still, the cast is game; check out Claudia Jennings (former Playboy Playmate of the Year), Arthur Franz (MONSTER ON CAMPUS) and Joe Tata (the wistful frycook on TV's "Beverly Hills 90210).

An initiation task for a pair of pledges as part of a ceremony inducting them into a college sorority goes horribly wrong when a live round finds itself into a gun in a game of Russian Roulette, resulting in the death of a pledge. Years later, the surviving sisters are adults & lead various lives. They are contacted out of the blue for a reunion party in Mexico. But upon arriving at the secluded mansion for the party, they find the place belongs to the dead pledge's father, who is determined to find the person responsible for his daughter's death despite the police ruling it an accident. The sisters & a pair of male gatecrashers find themselves trapped inside the property by electric fence, slowly picked off one by one by the secret killer in their midst.

God bless the dirt-cheap budget DVD labels – how else can you find minor gems like Sisters of Death a good 39 years after its release? I initially thought that the film was going to be a borefest or a cheap telepic drama but once the film started, I saw that Sisters of Death was capable of much more than that.

Sisters of Death is a thriller that may have been made years before the slasher film became a fixture of the genre, but it does have certain elements that would make it a slasher film prototype (HALLOWEEN came out two years later). The plot reads like a slasher film in some regards, although the killer doesn't use knives but various methods to kill their victims & the killer's identity doesn't become clear until the very end, which when seen is an effective surprise. The actors do a good job of carrying the film along, which was a hallmark of the genre at the time – 1970s genre films were a bit talky but made a considerable effort to compose solid stories into their being. The setup is solid & the story is interesting, although it does veer into daytime telepic territory at times. Not a classic by any margin but it does have an interesting story & the twists are pretty novel.