Une nuit infernale

Linda Blair, everybody's favorite head-tolling girl, stars as an extremely cute college girl named Marti. Together with 3 other students, she's locked overnight in a haunted mansion as some sort of fraternity initiation rite. The house used to be inhabited by a family of weirdoes (figures…) and the deformed son is believed to still dwell around in the tunnels underneath the mansion's basement. While the other fraternity members are playing pranks to increase the eeriness, the real killer comes to interfere…

Of course, you can't really refer to this 'Hell Night' as being a good film. It's an 80's slasher, produced in-between two 'Halloween'-films. The only reason of this film's existence is to raise more money, so you can't be too demanding for plots, logic or credibility. In it's own specific category, this is a more than decent film. I can name you over a thousand similar films that are worse but only a few that are better. It's amazing what a competent director (Tom DeSimone – specialized in 'Women Behind Bars'-flicks) and a devoted cast (Linda Blair!!) can achieve. There are quite a few suspenseful sequences in Hell Night and the gore is not exploited for once. The settings are decent but sometimes underexposed, which is a bit of a shame. Overall, this a lot more tolerable than the average flick in which teens are slaughtered by the dozen.

Four college kids are sent to an abandoned mansion to fend for themselves during a hazing ritual gone wrong in "Hell Night." During their stay at Garth Manor, the group deal with pesky pranks from their peers and face off against a "gork" dubbed Andrew. We never find out what a gork is exactly, but it sounds relatively un-PC. At any rate, Andrew "Gork" Garth is a deformed child who has been left alone to his own devices. Now that he's all grown up, he's hellbent on murdering anyone who steps foot onto his property. That's unfortunate for Linda Blair and company, who lack the benefit of something like TripAdvisor. One thing's for sure, though; if they live through the night, this place is getting a dismal one-star review.

"Hell Night" came out in 1981, just as the slasher genre was gaining traction. It is at times derivative, and at others, it surprisingly deviates from the beaten path. The initial set up of four characters who alternate between horny, funny, smart and sympathetic is one we've seen countless times in the genre, but "Hell Night" puts a refreshing spin on things. For starters, its cast has a chemistry and a shared likability rarely seen in the slasher subset. An all-grown-up Linda Blair leads the cast with her charming girl-next-door presence, while pretty-boy Peter Barton ("Friday the 13th: The Final Chapter") plays her good-guy boyfriend. In the next room are the Spicoli-esque surfer dude and his hilariously charming and sexy girlfriend, played by Vincent Van Patten (son of Dick) and Suki Goodwin respectively. Goodwin in particular is a real firecracker, an endless ball of charm. It's a shame she quit acting shortly after this film came out. Her comedic chemistry with Van Patten jumps off the screen and nearly steals the show. That being said, all four actors are quite solid and work together to keep the film going, even through it's duller moments.

Speaking of dull moments, there's more than a few of those here. Since the film is about 15-20 minutes longer than the average slasher, it's only natural this would happen. The atmosphere is pretty well established early on, and while the characters are never a chore to visit, the often-protracted stalking sequences can sometimes feel endless or even pointless. Having said that, when the jump scares hit, they hit hard. The film is a bit of a workhorse in that regard, as by the end, we are treated to a big jump seemingly every other minute. Tim DeSimone, who had previously worked in the adult film industry under the impossibly awesome psuedonym of Lancer Brooks, apes the likes of "Friday the 13th" and "Halloween" quite competently here. There are moments midway through the film that feel like someone traced over John Carpenter's work, right down to the sparse, synth-led score. Yet, for all that it borrows, it never feels entirely redundant. One digression in particular, where a lead character escapes the mansion and goes off to find help, is a welcome curveball. It's little moments like this that give the film its own unique flavor.

While one could probably spend the bulk of its running length nit-picking it to death, there's just something undeniably charming about the way "Hell Night" plays out. It feels familiar, but at the same time, keeps us on our toes. With characters that you actually want to see survive and a killer who is not wearing a mask or wielding a chainsaw, "Hell Night" at least offers something you won't always find in '80s slashers. It's not a classic by any stretch of the imagination, but necessary viewing for any fan of the genre. "Hell Night" is, like the ritual itself: a rite of passage everyone should go through at least once.

Overlooked this one when it was released but after seeing the DVD on sale and reading some positive comments on this site decided to part with my cash. Was I disappointed? No. Once you get past the cheesy opening with its gloriously B-movie style credits it turns into one of the more interesting stalk and slash films of the 80's. The set up is simple - 4 frat pledges have to spend the night in a mansion with a sinister past and a killer on the loose... who will survive? Do we care? Well yes, these kids are surprisingly likeable and, by cleverly putting them in pre-20th Century fancy dress in a candle lit house, removes them from the contemporary teen horror genre. The killings are pretty conventional – decapitation etc.– but the film then builds up to a tense and exciting final 30 minutes with a few surprises and a brilliantly staged ending. I'm probably over-praising this film somewhat but my expectations were low and my rewards were a decent 6.5/10!

This film is everything most slashers are - i.e. redundant, pointless, silly and all the rest of it. However, unlike the majority of the sub-genre; this one isn't all that bad. The plot is hardly original in it's fusion of the haunted house tradition and eighties slasher trash, but at least it gives the film a slight edge over it's less imaginative counterparts. The plot sees a group of four high school 'kids' having to spend a night in a creepy old house as an initiation ceremony for the fraternity they want to join. However, this isn't just a creepy old house and by way of a super-camp story telling sequence, we learn that the master of the house killed himself, his wife and three of his four horribly deformed children. This, of course, means that one survived; and that one, is course, rumoured to still be hanging around the creepy old house. That is, of course, a rumour that turns out be true! What then follows is the usual slasher sort of stuff, with the kids inside getting sliced and diced along with the ones outside, who were just trying to make their new frat-mate's stay a little scarier.

Linda Blair, now all grown up since her role in The Exorcist, takes the lead role and does pretty much what you would expect the heroine to do. There's some nice murder sequences in this film, but the gore is never over the top. I actually like over the top gore, but despite not having much of it, it never really harms this film. The murders are stylishly shot, and the way it portrays them allows it to be shocking without the need for a lot of bloodshed. In a sub-genre that is primarily concerned with bloodletting; this is actually quite admirable. The sets are one of the best things about this film. The Gothic mansion gives it that great atmosphere that is usually reserved for haunted house movies. The movie doesn't always make best use of it's settings, however, with too many scenes being restricted to close-up's when a shot that takes in more of the surrounding area would have been better. The fact that the killer is deformed gives it a bit of an edge over the likes of Halloween because aside from there being a killer, you also want to see him to find out how badly deformed he is. It is a disappointment when he's finally revealed...but the wait holds some suspense. On the whole, this isn't all that good; but it's not bad either. Slasher fans will find something to like.

What impressed me the most about this "slasher" movie is I honestly cared about the characters and felt bad when they died! That never happens with me & horror movies-- usually the characters are annoyingly lamebrained oversexed fools and I can't wait for them to get axed. HELL NIGHT has much going for it, including an amiable atmosphere, enthusiastic & easy-going performances (especially by the Boom Mic, who I thought deserved an Academy Award for his brief but frequent appearances), decent sets (including the outdoor ones, a bit reminiscent of The Shining), and villains who I swear looked straight out of SCOOBY DOO. (Not that that's a BAD thing, but it's just not too scary.) I honestly thought the script was well-constructed and funny and character exposition was given in an unobtrusive but helpful way (i.e. Linda Blair working as a mechanic.) There is absolutely nothing new or groundbreaking in HELL NIGHT, but it's a sterling example of how to polish up an old apple and make it look appealing and new-- and taste good. (Sorry for that awful metaphor...) Contrary to what others might tell you, Vincent Van Patten really grew on me, and I loved that surfing scene. He's my boy! Rating: 7/10.