User reviews

Nobody but Hitchcock fans watch thrillers for the art. Everyone else is looking for actual thrills. The slasher cycle began with Halloween, and John Carpenter provided the blueprint for the imitations that followed - suspense, jump scares, false frights that turn out to be nothing, doom-laden musical notes... The mechanics of the low-budget thriller are familiar and easily achieved.

Final Exam borrows a few tried and true items from Halloween's box of tools. The killer is shot from the waist down or partially screened by trees to appear remote and menacing. Bright light glints off a bloody blade on an otherwise dark night. But the little here fails to actually generate suspense. The viewer is merely reminded that suspense-building is a necessary element of the process. The problem is that the building blocks of a slasher film are too thinly spread and separated by long stretches of time spent among poorly drawn and uninteresting characters. This is a common fault in slasher movies but one which can be at least partially offset by lively pacing and occasional action. Unfortunately, the film's pace is leaden and what little action occurs is so poorly staged that it fails to excite a viewer perpetually starved for distraction.

This is Final Exam's fatal fault. Nobody renting a slasher movie is expecting character interest on the level of The Big Chill or the epic sweep of The Godfather. The viewer's expectations are already modest. But providing more stimulation than what is minimally required to keep the viewer awake should not represent undue hardship for a slasher movie's creator.

No thriller worth the name should be this boring. Cinematic entertainment needs to be entertaining. Writer-director Jimmy Huston clearly slept through the lesson in film school that emphasized keeping things moving along.

Final Exam is like cafeteria food. Nothing special and a little bland, but it gets the job done. If you're needing an 80's slasher fix, Final Exam isn't the cream of the crop, but it's not without its own high points. Some of the characters are decently developed and the filmmakers create a little bit of mood with the abandoned campus location. It's just a shame that the film's killer is such a blank slate.

Is this an exposé on how juvenile mentality, hazing insensitivity and substance abuse plague college campuses around the country? Actually, no it's not. It's just a tame slasher film about bunch of worthless, blabbermouth college kids sitting around and behaving brain dead for an hour before the director shows us some mercy by throwing in a psychotic killer. No one has the patience to endure this notoriously boring exercise of false alarms, college hijinks, endless talk that amounts to nothing and dull murders.

Score: 1 out of 10

Apparently the fools that made this film (film? HAH)had ZERO idea of what makes a slasher film work.NO blood NO nudity(well,very brief nudity)and above all NO PAYOFF!!I spent 90 freakin minutes guessing and second guessing who the killer could be and his/her possible motive(i was shooting for a lame two-killer scream type ending).And what did i get for my troubles? Absolutely Jack Sh!t.Zip ,ziltch,nada,nothin.Just who the hell was that dude and what wild hair got up his butt??Im guessing that the killer must've escaped from a different movie set.The set up was ripe for a vengeful parent and or sibling hacking away for revenge of the girl that fell to her death that was mentioned briefly(ala Prom night,To all a good night etc..).But nooo,there was no rhyme or reason given as to who the hell he was and what provoked his bloodless rampage.I would give this a zero but for the gay guy that tries to act straight.He had me laughing my ass off.Plus he had Toolbox Murders and The Corpse grinders posters on his wall,which was a small bonus.Overall a pathetic,inept,dull and uninspiring DUD.1/10

Certainly one of the most wretched slasher movies ever made.

Timothy Raynor as the killer could not be worse.

The real blame for this turkey must be attributed to Jimmy Huston.

There is no gore, no suspense and no intelligence.

And it is slower than paint drying.

I expected Final Exam to be much better than it was...sadly it turned out to be very boring and not at all gory. People say it's a Halloween rip-off, well some parts of it are but not many. If you want a Halloween rip-off then watch Offerings, a much better slasher film than Final Exam. The only decent part in this film is when the killer stabs the woman and her blood splatters over her artwork. This is also the closest to gory that this film gets. There is no mystery surrounding the killer whatsoever...in fact towards the end they just start showing his face without even trying to create a sense of mystery. It seems Final Exam was made by the type of people who think that having your killer walk around aimlessly will create suspense.

I would not recommend this to slasher fans because it's just too dull. Completists will want to see it, but if you're looking for entertainment then don't bother.

FINAL EXAM could have been much worst. I've seen much worse than this. But what's really odd about this HALLOWEEN copy is the fact that the producers copied almost everything about the John Carpenter film except for one major detail: the killer or the killer's reason for killing. Ooopps! Something tells me that after watching the film, the producers couldn't figure out exactly what they left out from HALLOWEEN. It's quite obvious from a horror fan's Point-of-View though. FINAL EXAM has some good moments, and even though it takes forever to get going, when the killer strikes, the film sorta becomes suspenseful. The problem is, we never know anything about why the murderer is going on this rampage, at this specific time, etc. They hint at a back-story (a girl committed suicide after she was refused by a sorority and we can assume that whoever's doing the killings must be a relative) but that's just not enough.

The thing that makes the original HALLOWEEN so great (forget the sequels) is that it builds a mystery around Michael Myers without telling us too much about him (which is the problem of the sequels). In FINAL EXAM, we know NOTHING about the killer. He looks like a prop guy who stood in for the killer. Had the producers actually written a reason for the killer's motivations, I think this would have a been a passable flick. As it is right now, it's just pointless.

The only really original aspect about FINAL EXAM is Radish, who's so annoying that he actually becomes fun to watch. What a uber geek! Without Radish, FINAL EXAM would have been completely forgettable or as anonymous as those no-name products you find in a supermarket.

Final Exam is your average 80's slasher. It has some cool college pranks and all that tomfoolery that takes place at college campuses around the world(except Union). But this movie drowns in its own character development. It takes WAY too much time with its characters and totally forgets its a slasher flick. And the slashings aren't very good. I want gore with my slash! 6/10.

B-Movies are watchable...they might have part of the package, such as perhaps ONE person who can pretend to act in a remotely entertaining way. I am a fan of terrible films but this one was absolute, utter agony to sit through, my friend was asleep within 5 minutes and I sat wondering why I subject myself to sitting through such crap, my finger getting ready to hit the ffwd button. Nothing happens in this film for the first hour or so...you watch it, you wait, nothing really happens...drive-in filler/fodder, avoid...better off re-watching horribly boring films you've seen with a few memorable blips of greatness...like Unhinged.

Final Exam has all the ingredients of a typical 80's slasher - deserted location, silent killer, spooky synth score, lots of coeds for the picking - but its attention to character and college hijinx help it to stand out from the glut of similar films out there at the same time.

Final Exam's plot is about as simple as it gets. Coeds are sliced and diced during finals week at their college. That's it. Thankfully, the makers of Final Exam have peppered the film with a group of interesting and goofy characters who keep morale up until the slashing begins.

To many, this is a HUGE hindrance. Besides a bloodless prologue, the killing doesn't start until nearly an hour into the 90 minute film. If that's a deal breaker, then take your negativity elsewhere. This is one of those movies where I'd have been perfectly content to watch this cast of characters go about their day to day lives, laugh, fall in love, have their hearts broken, play pranks on each other, etc. In many ways, it's a great college comedy...that just happens to be crashed by a psycho killer.

The killer in Final Exam is of the strong, silent hulking variety. We learn nothing about this guy and can barely make out his features. For Michael Myers, this is unnerving because of his clean, white mask, but it's strangely frustrating here. Sure, random violence is always usually scarier than a big, dramatic unmasking scene where the killer goes on for 10 minutes about their abusive childhood and how they were never asked to dance at prom, but I feel like they could have given us something. There's a throwaway line about a girl who was accidentally killed during a sorority initiation a little while back, so maybe this is her father or brother getting revenge? Who knows.

Final Exam is a very underrated piece of 80's drive-in cinema. You can do much worse. Hell, you probably already have.

I realize I am biased on this one, but I own a copy of this '80s hack-'em-up and watch it regularly. Is it a great movie, on par with the original Halloween or Nightmare on Elm Street? Hell no. But I love it. Why? I must confess, I love it for the simple fact that the movie was filmed on the campus of the college I attended and graduated from. Yep, Limestone College in Gaffney, South Carolina can boast the honor of being the setting of this film. All the exteriors and most of the interiors(except for a couple shot on a sound stage somewhere in NC and the gym scenes shot at Garner Web College nearby)were shot at my college. As a huge horror fan, it gives me an extra little thrill to watch that film and recognize all the buildings and rooms that I walked daily for four years. And I do think the movie has some good points. It does admirably attempt to develop the characters(even though most of them are so uninteresting I could care less, unfortunately), and I waffle between my feelings on the movie not revealing the killer's motives. Part of me agrees with Billy in Scream(it is scarier when there's no motive, so random), but another part of me longs for the closure of knowing why... In any case, I don't think it's as dreadful a film as others(such as Dorm that Dripped Blood), and the fact that my alma mater hosted the film thrills me. Unfortunately, the school doesn't really advertise the fact. lol I think it should have plaques that announce that this building is where the killer killed the school tramp, and this building housed the final showdown between the killer and the school virgin. I keep hoping they'll come back and film a sequel. Keep your fingers crossed...

The film is basically boring. Half of the film is non-action filler that does nothing for the film. The kill scenes are not gory, nor are they original or interesting.

Killer has no persona or screen presence: just a guy in an army jacket with a knife. Guess he is supposed to be like a Mike Myers, but w/o the mask or the scariness. Also there is no story or motivation behind the killings: he is just your generic killer.

The only good thing about the film is that the annoying students you have to put up with for half of the stupid film finally get offed.

Ending is not interesting and is abrupt. It is like a film student project almost. Don't waste your time.

Final Exam was an attempt made by Jimmy Huston, the film's director, for creating a Slasher title that tried ignoring the obvious boundaries that haunt the genre. This was the same man that would later go on to create a more popular product in 1987's My Best Friend is a Vampire. Teamed up with Huston is Gary S. Scott who arranged some of the music featured on Fox's Funhouse (hosted by J.D. Roth) in 1988, and in that same year allowed his musical hand to complete 31 episodes of Freddy's Nightmares (1988-1990).

The film takes place at Lanier College and opens up with a murder at another campus. The killer is an unknown assailant who holds no ties to the cast in question; just a lunatic out for blood. The viewing audience is strung along on a 50-minute "heartfelt" exhibition of a "rigorous" college life. A second murder occurs in close proximity and poses a threat to the well-being of the young crowd as the remaining minutes display the disposal of the characters in a quick, albeit cheap, fashion.

My description of Final Exam is brief because there's not too much to say, honestly. Mockingly I mentioned the heartfelt moments contained within – so many, in fact, it'll cause you to feel as if you're watching an after-school special or an episode of Full House rather than a movie filled with dread. The director wanted to avoid the usual Slasher routine so instead he opted to focus more on character development. I wonder who told him that this was a good idea – sure, not enough character involvement is unwise and too much of it in a Slasher film is boring…why can't there be a balance of both? Is that such a cross to bear? "Ugh, toiling endlessly on creating a decent film for audiences to appreciate…such a burden," Huston says to himself in the waking hours of daybreak. I'm curious as to why the horror genre attracts so many foolish wannabes who have the urge to pick up a camera and start filming absolutely nothing; almost like a curse, a hex if you will, which I suppose would be rather fitting. Seriously, film-makers should create a movie about a director who thrives on creating sloppy films that contain no substance or value – oh wait, they already did, and they based it on Ed Wood.

Everything about this movie is dumb – which shouldn't be viewed as a wild accusation since the majority of films in the Slasher sub-genre are not only inadequate but also incompetent. The dialog alone should be a subject of ridicule with Oscar-rated material such as this to cleanse your palette:

"I leave in the morning for the big city. You're gonna be left with nothing' but that saggin' old wife of yours. *Laughs arrogantly* She must almost be 30 by now?"

Out of all the Slasher titles that involve students at a University or high school, I'd suggest watching those instead, more precisely, ANYTHING over Final Exam. Watching paint dry will become a favorite past time after experiencing the dregs of boredom that this movie invokes within its viewers. Final Exam executes the movement of a snail too perfectly and allows 1984's Girls Nite Out to look like a Masterpiece Theatre rendition of Julius Caesar.

The opening of final exam seems pretty promising, a couple making out in a car are stabbed to death by a killer, Now the rest is a bore. The killer shows up at a college campus stalking students. Why? Who is this man? these are never quite explained. This is slow paced, even for a horror movie. Check out happy birthday to me. Or madman. they are much better.

Two students making out in their car on campus get killed. The scene is very dark, and they are killed in a medium-long shot so, really nothing is seen - which is what most of the relatively few deaths in this movie are like.

At a different campus, a sinister black van shows up. Relatively few students are left, since most students' final exams are over. During one of the exams, masked gunmen get out of a brown van and start firing. They pick up the two people they shot and speed away. This is just a fraternity prank which also makes the sheriff (who doesn't punish anyone!) less likely to show up later when he is needed.

Some more students get killed by the mystery killer, who is never given any character. A fraternity pledgee gets grabbed by "Wildman", who holds him close and seems to sniff his neck and nibble his ear: yuck. The scene turns even more perverse when they strip the pledge down to his underwear, tie him to a tree, spray him with whipped cream and fire extinguishers, pour ice on him, and fill his underwear with ice too. The campus security guard who shows up later pours some liquor from his flash into the pledge's underwear "on the rocks." Did Victor Salva direct this scene?

Some of the death scenes towards the end show a little blood, but really no creativity - something the whole film is lacking.

Based on the comments I looked at for FINAL EXAM, it appears that this once forgotten film may be getting a rebirth after nearly 18 years, thanks to SCREAM, BUFFY, and the return of the slasher-horror genre. FINAL EXAM does have some suspenseful chilling moments, including the finale where the girl meets the psycho atop the campus tower, plus a couple of gruesome mutilations. The best thought I had in viewing this one was that it's a simple basic average movie, as there was nothing new or groundbreaking. But with slasher's comeback, it may be worth checking out. Another movie I'd recommend is MADMAN, which is far more original and horrifying than FINAL EXAM, and because it has a special purpose in mind.

It's the final exams at Lanier College and a young couple has been reported murdered at a neighboring college. Gun wielding masked men arrive at the school and start shooting. They drive away in their van with the bodies. It turns out to be frat prank but a real serial killer has arrived in his van.

After Halloween and Friday the 13th, there came a deluge of other slasher horrors that centered on a certain date or event following their predecessors' footsteps. This one is one of those except there is a little bit of difference. There is some blood but the gore special effects is not that big. It's a lot of stabbing motions. It opens with a young couple getting murdered and the first noticeable thing is the non-descript killer. He looks like a big henchman but lacks the iconic style of its compatriots. The man has no charisma and he has no iconic look. That may be the movie's fatal flaw. At least, he could have stayed faceless for as long as possible. The acting overall is amateurish but that is par for the course. The movie tries to set up these characters but the inferior acting skills limit the effectiveness. This is better than most of those small budget indies desperate to cash in but it fails to be one of those to spawn the needed franchise.

Final Exam gets a bad rep. It's not gory, it's not terribly scary, and it takes about an hour to get to the slashing, but it's obvious that it was tying to do something a little different. Judging by most people's reactions, they didn't succeed, but I beg to differ.

Not once was I bored and that's more than I can say for a lot of other movies. The characters and performances were amusing and watchable, which kept me going until the bodies began to hit the floor. The killer could stand to be a bit more imposing and I do think, in this case, he should have worn some kind of a mask, but that's a small quibble.

I admire Final Exam for trying something new. On the surface, it seems like your run of the mill slasher film (which it turns into in its last half hour), but there's a uniquely humanist angle here that I like.

I really enjoyed this unoriginal and very predictable slasher flick. The movie revolves around a couple of students who still haven't finished their final exams that soon come to realize that a mad serial killer is on the loose. This is, as you can tell, not original at all. In fact, this might be one of the least original slasher films ever but it sure is an entertaining one. The movie is very fast-paced and even though very few of the characters are likable, you don't want them to die since every character adds something

I didn't have expectations while watching this movie after watching the dull and disappointing "Graduation Day", but I was pleasantly pleased with this movie definitely one of the better 80's college slashers. Cecile Bagdadi (Courteny) played the female lead really well, Joel S Rice played Radish with real depth as did the other cast Wildman, Janet, Lisa, Mark and Gary they all played they're parts really well.

All in all Surprisingly entertaining slasher flick which isn't nearly as bad as many people make it out to be. It's relatively fast-paced and makes one and a half hour pass by pretty quickly. It won't win any prizes for being original but it's still a decent movie so I'm going to go ahead and recommend this one, but only for slasher fans.