Deadly Lessons

This kind of a holy grail among both slasher films and TV movies because it is BOTH a slasher film and a TV movie, which means that as a slasher film it is much harder to find than the cinematic ones which are all getting the deluxe DVD treatment these days no matter how godawful they are, and as a TV movie it is one the few that is NOT totally worthless. Needless to say there is very little blood and no nudity here, but its gratifying to read that Donna Reed still considered it "sleazy" (that's as good as "thumbs up" from Ebert and Roeper for me).

The very familiar plot involves mysterious murders at a prestigious girl's school run by Donna Reed. The most familiar actor is probably Bill Paxton, who also appeared in the cinematic slasher "Mortuary" before making it big with "Weird Science" and "Aliens". The lead is the chronically cute Dianne Franklin, who is not great here but sure is easy to look at and highly stalk-able. She was not in nearly enough movies. The same can not be said, unfortunately, for her main co-star Ally Sheedy, but you'll be glad to know she ends up bound and gagged at one point here (two more thumbs up!). Then, even more obscure than Franklin, there's Krista Erickson who played the original "mean girl" in the summer camp classic "Little Darlings" and also enjoyed a brief career as a really nice piece of acting talent in the kind of movies that play late at night on cable television.

Unfortunately, the only way to see this movie right now is to also catch it late at night on one of the Turner Stations (which is how I saw, but unfortunately didn't record, it). But, hey, if anyone reading this is a mover and shaker at Turner, this would be a great choice for a DVD release.

Starkwater Hall , an exclusive school for girls, is in its summer session when the unimaginable happens - a pupil is found murdered. The headmistress, Miss Wade, is determined to hide the fact and preserve the school's reputation but, when a second killing occurs, the secret is out. Terrified, the remaining girls decide to protect each other from the unseen horror.

This made for TV film has some elements of a slasher or killer on the loose genre, but where it differs is in its lack of gratuitous violence, gore and nudity. Consequently, Deadly Lessons isn't so tacky or cheap and is essentially a whodunnit- Hardy Drew style. The focus is on the detecting than on murders. There's no heavy menace, but it's got a light touch while maintaining a serious tone. Donna Reed adds a touch of class. Larry Wilcox' detective character looks out of his depth and is an annoying character. It might lack some punch, but overall it's an entertaining mystery. Plus the ending is quite suspenseful with that twist. Diane Franklin is cute.

Pretty boring TV movie that plays around with some slasher tropes, but feels more like a padded episode of Murder, She Wrote. There's never a great sense of danger, but I do like the cast a lot with familiar faces like Diane Franklin, Ally Sheedy, Donna Reed, and Bill Paxton showing up and adding some class to everything. I only wish it were a more exciting movie.

I thought this movie was pretty good. It's like a 'Scream' movie without the gore and a large variety of suspects. Donna Reed adds a classy touch to the proceedings and Ally Sheedy is shown just before she hit stardom with 'WarGames'. Hopefully this film will be shown on TV soon.

It's great to see at least a few posts on this good little t.v. slasher. I still pull out my old VHS of the NBC premiere just to see what television was like especially considering the current, sad state of the tube now where commercial blurbs are at the bottom, top and sides of squashed, mashed and castrated film & program credits and huge bylines slapped across the screen to remind you of what you are watching! Well, I can't really add to what's been said about this film except that it got some great play time on TBS in the late '80s and in an interview shortly before she died, Donna Reed lambasted the film as 'very cheap and on the sleazy side'! Nothing of the sort, I actually double featured this with Wes Craven's Scream for a couple of friends of mine and they really got into it. When will tele-flicks like this get their due?