Student Bodies (1981)
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Billed as “The World’s First Comedy Horror Movie,” today’s selection had a better run on cable television than it did in the theaters. Still, we both found plenty to laugh at in this Naked Gun-style send-up of pre-1982 horror films.
Student Bodies (1981)
Episode 67, 2 Guys and a Chainsaw Horror Movie Review Podcast
Todd: Hello, and welcome to another episode of 2 Guys and a Chainsaw. I’m Todd.
Craig: And I’m Craig.
Todd: Today’s horror film was another request put in by Andrew online. He asked for Student Bodies, the 1981 comedy horror film, actually, actually, that, for a lot of people, really has flown under the radar, but maybe for some people like me, you’ve really had your fill of it. I don’t know about you, Craig, I caught this a lot, on I think it would for a little while anyway. It was a bit of a staple on cable TV. It seemed to come on an awful lot, and I had, been exposed to it there. How about
Craig: you? I don’t remember having ever seen or really heard of this movie. I mean, phrase student Todd, of course, is familiar, but I don’t know that I ever knew about this movie. And I don’t think that I’ve ever seen it. I’m kinda surprised because you and I were kind of into the same stuff, when we were growing up. And I read that this got pretty wide circulation on cable because even though it’s rated r, there’s really not a lot of, gratuitous violence or nudity or even swearing for that matter. So, it was pretty popular for television broadcast, but no, I don’t think I ever saw it.
Todd: You had messaged me after you had gotten the movie saying that, you’d only watched the first few minutes. You thought it looked pretty funny. You were looking forward to, watching the the last the the rest of it. How did you feel, after the end of it?
Craig: Well, I I felt like, you know, from those first few minutes, I got a pretty good idea of what it was gonna be like. I mean, it opens up with, I don’t know, some text on the screen that says, this motion picture is based on an actual incident. Last year, 26 horror films were released, and none of them lost money. And then it goes, directly to these long opening credits with this, very John Carpenter Halloween style music, and it’s focusing on this house. And when the credits are done, underneath we get the text, Halloween. And then it blacks out for a second, comes back, exact same frame, and says, Friday 13th. It backs out, comes right back, and says, Jamie Lee Curtis’ birthday. And then we get this, we get this this point of view shot of this guy who’s heavy breathing going up towards the house. And just these silly ridiculous things start happening. I mean, he’s bumbling and tripping, and we eventually see, that there’s a teenage girl inside. And, it’s obvious from the very beginning that this is just gonna be the the tempt is is going to be at humor. I I didn’t get from I didn’t get the feeling from the beginning that we were in for a serious horror movie at all and we’re not. Having now watched the whole thing, I don’t know. I mean I liked it. I enjoyed watching it. I think it’s gonna be interesting to talk about because usually we do a lot of recap, and it’s I I feel like this is gonna be difficult to recap because really, it’s just kind of an hour and 26 minute gag reel. I mean, it’s just joke after joke after joke, gag after gag after gag. The plot line is is pretty stereotypical for a slasher film, especially from this era, but the real focus is on the gags and the jokes. And they’re funny, you know? I mean, there’s nothing wrong with that. I like a good gag reel. I like to laugh, and I did find myself laughing out loud multiple times throughout this movie. I also at times found myself rolling my eyes. But you know, it was fun. I didn’t love it. I don’t think it’s a great movie, but I felt like it knew what it was, and that’s what it went for, and it succeeded on that level.
Todd: Yeah. I agree with you. You know, some people have called this in retrospect, the I’ve heard some people call it the scream of the past, maybe the the world’s first scream. It’s not really that. It’s more like the the scary movie of the of the past. Scary movie meaning the Weyen Brothers, when they just went all goofball on the Scream franchise. And for people who didn’t live through it, the Scream franchise really kind of awakened a new era of hip scary movies. Before that, horror had, taken a bit of a lull, and Scream kind of brought it back and made it hip and cool, and suddenly you you had what Roger Ebert liked to call the dead teenager movies all over again, but with kind of a new flavor, I suppose. Scary movie Todd, yes, Saturday Night Live, you know, style potshots at those kind of movies. Are there like 15 of those movies now? I I’m surprised
Craig: I idea.
Todd: I’m surprised people still watch them, but from what you can see on the video shelves or, online, it seems like there are at least 8 of those, scary movies. Probably, many of them are not nearly as funny as this movie, I’d imagine, because the whole idea gets kind of worn out after a while. I would liken this movie, actually, to Airplane in many ways. Not exactly because it doesn’t have as many, like, sight gags or total off the wall goofiness that airplane does, but it gets there at times and it’s certainly from that era. We’re talking 1981, and that was the flavor that it kind of left me with. I enjoyed it too. I do feel like some of the humor in here is a bit Todd, and some of the humor in here, like you said, is a bit roll your eyes kind of funny, but I was interested to look it up later that the writer and director of this movie was actually a television comedy writer. And he even, I believe, was a writer for The Tonight Show with Johnny Carson, a number of comedy shows on TV, he was a writer for, and this appears to be his only directorial effort. And I think he probably did a good thing. He really came in at the right time. I don’t think anybody was really lampooning horror films until that point. And then, nobody really did for a little while afterwards anyway, if I’m not mistaken. So it’s No.
Craig: It’s kind of a novelty. Agree. Yeah. It is kind of a novelty, and I would agree that, as far as I’m aware, this I would say is probably the first movie of its type. And you’re absolutely right that it would fit right in with, the scary movie franchise because it it does exactly what that franchise tried to do, which is to not only make fun of tropes in general, but also to try to be referential to other specific horror movies. And, like you said, the the scary movie franchise, you know, I watched the first few. They were kinda funny. I mean, it’s it’s it’s low humor, lots of sex jokes, lots of fart jokes, and that kind of stuff. And, I think actually those run the risk of being more dated than this does because they were so in the moment. I mean, they they would come out each year or every couple years, and they were so referential to the movies that had come out in those years that the further removed we are from that time, I think that people will not get the references as much. There are certainly references to other horror movies in this film too, but most of the poking fun is more at just kind of general horror movie things that we see in a lot of stuff. Now you said that you thought that this movie didn’t really get maybe as silly as those movies. I would tend to disagree. This I mean, it’s pretty darn silly stuff. I mean, like I said, we, you know, we see this teenage girl in her house, and she’s on the phone.
Clip: Hi, Julie. Oh, hi, Toby. Listen. I forgot to give you the answers Todd to that history question on the civil war. Now just remember the north one. Oh heavy. Hey, are you sure you don’t wanna come over? Maybe Charlie could bring a friend or 2. No, and you better be careful sometimes when a person acts wild and crazy well wild and crazy things happen to them They do? Yeah, believe me Anything could happen in this creepy place, but I have a feeling it’s the last time I babysit.
Craig: And like, so, you know, they’re they’re obviously just setting you up for this is what they’re gonna be making fun of. And the silliness, you know, then she hears, a cat meowing, outside. And she goes and she opens her door, and there’s a great big white dog doing this meowing. And then the dog just lifts its leg and farts. And like that’s the end of the gag. That’s just it. And it’s those types, not to say that some of them are more essential to plot, some of them are, but it’s those types of gags. I mean they are silly and they are low brow. That’s not to say they’re not funny. It’s not to say that didn’t get a little chuckle out of me, but it’s not high art. It’s not sophisticated comedy.
Todd: No. It’s definitely not. And, you know, and and there are also some tedious moments here too, I think, like, where the comedy is I don’t know. And again, it is kind of like Airplane in that way, or Kentucky Fried Movie, or those kind of movies where they know they’re making a comedy and they’re just gonna go all out with it in your face. There’s not any subtlety, really, to the humor. Some of these scenes go on just a little too long. It’s like, okay, we got the gag. It would have been funnier if you just kind of stopped there, instead of push it, you know, 5 more degrees. You know, like the like the one of the scenes coming up here is, is we’re we’re still seeing through the cure’s point of view. And I think the girl’s boyfriend has since come over and they run upstairs and he hops in the shower, which actually I thought was an interesting twist, while she waits in the bed. Except, I think that’s a call out specifically to Halloween, isn’t it?
Craig: Yeah, I think so.
Todd: Anyway, and then the killer’s point of view, again, he’s made it inside and he opens up the lid of a desk. And all of these potential murder weapons are just laid out on this desk. There’s like, rat poison, and there’s, like, a rope. It’s like Clue.
Craig: Yeah. Yeah.
Todd: Yeah. And and his hand is wandering over them, do do do do Todd, and I think he’s even saying something like or in his breathing tone. He settles on a paper clip that’s in there and, you know, pries it open and pulls it up to a point which is a this sudden, you know, moment. And and again, that scene would have been maybe a little funnier if that had been about half as long, you know. Yeah.
Craig: Yeah. Airplane, I think is a good comparison. Naked Gun, you know, just that kind of real slapstick comedy. So okay. So it’s the typical thing where these kids are gonna have sex, but the serial killer is is coming to, punish them or whatever. And it’s all the typical stuff we see, you know, the killer’s feet slowly walking up the stairs while the girl’s in the bed and the, and the guy is in the shower. But then the killer steps in some gum, and he’s, like, struggling and pulling his boots off out of the gum. And then there’s gum on the banister, and, he’s grumbling about the gum. And, like, it’s it’s just all just goofy stuff. And when he he finally goes in, though, kill he goes in and he kills this girl, stabs her a bunch of times with a paper clip. And then when the guy comes out, the killer, like, throws a trash bag over over his head, and apparently, that kills him. That’s so weird
Todd: that the trash bag is like the the weapon of choice for the second person who always enters the scene and I don’t really know what that was all about, but it kept going through the whole movie.
Craig: It did. And that’s the thing. You know, when we talked about New Year’s Evil, one of the criticisms that we had about it was boring in its repetition. Like there were these kills, but the and the kills were slightly different each time, but it was the exact same process. You know, it was so formulaic. It followed the same thing. And this does Todd, but it’s like it does it intentionally. Like they’re in on the joke. Like that’s why it’s funny is because, you know, there’s a little bit of difference. So this time, the girl and and every time, it happens exactly the same. This time, the guy came in and he said,
Clip: Not here. Not now. Where? Where? Upstairs. 10 seconds?
Craig: And they run upstairs. And, every time this happens, a guy gets a girl in this position, and then for some reason, the guy has to go away. In this case, it’s because the guy, she didn’t think he was clean enough. She’s like, are you clean? And he said, yeah, I’m clean. Plus, you can’t wipe, you can’t wash off herpes anyway.
Todd: So she
Craig: so she makes him go and take a shower, so then he’s away. And then she gets killed, and then he comes back, and then he gets killed. And that’s how it happens every time. There’s, the next kill scene, and I’m skipping around. We can come back to other stuff too if we want Todd. But like the very next kill scene, it’s the exact same scenario. It’s at a parade. This girl, one of the prom queen candidates is up on a float. A guy sees her and gets all hot and bothered, runs up and gets on the float with her and takes her down underneath. And actually, I think this may be the 3rd kill. I don’t know. But anyway, he has to go get a a condom or or something. And while he’s gone, the killer comes in and kills the girl with an eggplant.
Todd: Oh, that was my favorite scene in the whole movie. I mean, it’s it’s hilarious because, of course, this he’s they’re, like, inside the float, and the the humor of this is this is like a major float in the whole parade, and they’re just entering in and out of it. It’s just so obvious. The killer for no apparent reason is also in the float, but Yeah. Makes the float look so huge from the inside that he could just be in there heavy breathing and he’s talking to himself, and the killer is always talking to himself. And he’s like, gotta find a murder weapon. Gotta find a murder weapon. What can I use? What can I use? And then he go goes up to her and he says Hey.
Clip: You like eggplant?
Todd: And she screams. And when he comes in and again, this is my favorite line in the whole movie, is when the guy comes back into the float and discovers her body. Just before he discovers his body, he sees the eggplant on the floor, and he says
Craig: What’s this? I thought you hated eggplant.
Todd: And you don’t even know how he killed her with the eggplant. It’s really not obvious at all. But, again, that’s the joke. Right? And you’re right. This was the 3rd murder. The one before it was, right in the middle of the funeral of the first girl and guy. Yeah. A couple runs away, and into a car, and they’re gonna do it in a car in the middle just just feet away really from this funeral, and he has to run out and get something. Oh, no. He’s gonna run out and get condoms, and he comes back with whole bags full of stuff. In the meantime, she’s in the back of the car and a horse head bookend, comes through the window and just, I guess, beats her to death. Right?
Craig: Yeah. But before the guy had left, he he had said, don’t start without me. And he comes back, and she’s dead. And she’s got, like, she’s, like, cross eyed, and she’s got her legs up in the air. And he’s, like, oh, you started without me. And then he he gets killed in a trash bag Todd as does the guy in the third one. And it and it just keeps happening like that. I mean, and like I said, it’s difficult to talk about plot. It’s more fun to talk about the gags. What’s going on in the background of all of this is that we are in this typical high school community, and at the first funeral, everybody’s there, and I guess the principal, I think it was the principal, is talking at the funeral, and he’s like, This is so sad. It’s especially sad that it happened on such a big day because today is such a big day because of budget cuts. We have to do every school event today. So we have to have the parade today, and we have to have the big game today, and we have to have, the prom Todd, and all these things happen have to happen today. And so so all of these things happen over the course of this one day, but we still get all of the typical things that you see in these types of high school movies. We get the big game. We get the parade. We get the dance. And we follow this girl. I gosh. I didn’t even write her name’s Toby. Toby. I didn’t write down any of the names of the actors or actresses because as far as I know, they were none of them had really done anything or didn’t I I mean, I didn’t recognize any of them. Should I have?
Todd: No. No. None of them none of them did anything after this.
Craig: So you know, I didn’t write any of that Todd, but this girl, Toby, she’s the virginal one and, she’s the one that like she wears a button on her shirt that says no. And then later on when we’re in the locker room, she takes off her shirt and she’s got an even bigger button on her bra that says something like, for the last time I said, no,
Todd: that was great.
Craig: And she’s the virginal one who is continually warning all of her friends that that, sex is is bad and sex kills. And, every time she sees somebody going off, she comments on it and she goes off to follow them. And she’s got this friend named Hardy? Yeah, Hardy, a guy friend. And every time she’s like, where are they going? He’s always like, maybe he has to help her find the bathroom or, like, get always something, like, ridiculous. We know what they’re going off to do. And so she always ends up being around in the aftermath, and so she eventually becomes the suspect. One of the things that, we haven’t mentioned and it starts right from the very beginning is the movie also does this thing where it blatantly points things out to you. Like in the in the beginning, in the very first one with the babysitter, she goes when she goes to open the door to see the meowing dog, she then closes it. And it not only does it zoom up in to show that it’s not locked, but then words and an arrow flash up on the screen unlocked. Like don’t miss this, and they keep doing that like something will pop up, clues or suspect, and it’s so goofy. It’s ridiculously goofy, but it’s funny, and I’ve never really seen anything like it. And so just for kind of the unique nature of it, I thought that that’s a good gag. It’s a funny gag, and it it goes throughout.
Todd: It Todd. And I can say Todd that honestly, again, the movie was pretty ahead of its time. When I first watched this, you know, before we had like, Scary Movie or even before Scream where we were really discussing all of the tropes for movies, this movie was laying it out like nobody else was. And at least for me, this was actually the first place that I was, you know, kinda made aware of that. You know, I I have to say, like, obviously you watch these movies and you realize they’re all kind of the same but this is the first place where as a kid I had it kind of all pointed out to me that, oh yeah, this is this is the formula. This is how these movies always go. And so it really was, pretty clever actually. It Again, it seems even more goofy now and it certainly was intended to be goofy but it probably doesn’t even look as clever now then as it did then. You know what I mean?
Craig: Because then. Yeah. Yeah. I I agree. And and you’re right. Like with, the Scream franchise, especially the first one, but they carried it through all of them, I think. You know, they had the character of Randy who would explain all of these conventions and explain all of these types of things. And here, they’re pretty much doing the same thing, just not through a character. They’re just doing it through messages on the screen. And I I thought it was, I thought it was really funny.
Todd: Yeah. There there again also you get a lot of the same tropes that you get in a lot of other comedies. So, she for example, I guess what’s really funny about this too is that, and and and we had this actually in a movie that we saw recently and maybe I can remember which one it was, but it’s the goofiness of the fact that even though all these murders are happening, there it there aren’t really police involved in investigating this. It’s like Mhmm. All the principal and his his, associates at the school, and I think they’ve brought in a sheriff, but otherwise, it’s everything focuses around the school. And every time there’s a murder, it’s like the principal meeting with his second in command, I guess, vice principal.
Craig: I don’t yeah, I guess. I don’t know.
Todd: Who’s an older woman and and the sheriff or whatever, and they’re all in there in, his principal’s room, and they have all the evidence sort of laid out in front of them. I think they even have the body in the nurses station at one point after one of the murders. Then there’s a shrink. There’s the school psychiatrist who the principal feels like he needs to send Toby to, after the murders, and the psychiatrist himself is completely unhinged. And there’s what I thought was a pretty funny scene where she’s meeting with him and she’s being very earnest and trying to explain her feelings. And as she is, and he she’s talking to him, he is, standing up and like moving things in his office, like taking the the picture on the wall that was straight and making it crooked, and scattering some things on the table, and the words that are coming out of his mouth are are more and more bizarre, and you realize, of course, oh yeah, this is the whole psychiatrist himself is actually also crazy kind of thing. And so there are a lot of these almost SNL type characters in here where you have the crazy psychologist, you have the clueless principal who’s really, loves to hear the sound of his own voice and and just, is totally into himself. You have, of course, the clueless teenagers who are only interested in sex. And, then you have this really weird character, which is the standout of the movie to me because it’s so strange. And he’s a really really tall guy and he’s the janitor. And suspicion is thrown on him from the first moment because we see that the killer is wearing, the the gloves that he’s wearing aren’t like classy cool leather gloves or whatnot. They’re like the kind of gloves you put on in the kitchen to wash dishes. And I believe in the first funeral scene, this, janitor is there and he points forward just at this really odd moment in the funeral and says, Sex kills. Sex kills. Sex kills. And he’s got one of those gloves on his hand. But this guy is one of the weirdest looking guys you’ve ever seen. He’s super tall, he’s extremely thin, he has really long arms, really long hands, and he talks like Tarzan. But my gosh, this guy. Right? I mean Yeah. His arms when he walks and his arms swing, it seems like his elbows are swinging both directions. You you walk you see him in this movie and you think this guy must have had a career as a character actor or something, but really this has been like the only thing that he was in. And even at the end, he’s credited not even with his name but as and featuring as Malvert the stick man. When I was a kid, I just watched this and I was like, who is this guy? This is so weird. Actually, I thought that was this the the time I thought that was the scariest part of this whole movie was the mystery behind who is the stick, you know.
Craig: Yeah. Well, they explained it at one point. They said that he used to be a teacher, but he was got he got in a car accident, and so he’s been weird ever since, and they’ve kept him around because they felt guilty or whatever. But yeah, his performance is really interesting, and he is. He’s unusually tall. He has an and and thin, and he has unusually long arms and and legs. And there are he just moves in a really interesting way. I mean, it’s almost it’s almost graceful. It’s almost dance like the the way that he moves. And he can do things like at one point, he’s he helps Toby steal the, principal’s keys, and she asks for them. And he hands them to her between from behind between his legs. And his his legs are and arms are so long that he doesn’t even have to bend over. Like Yeah. He’s like, I I I don’t know. And that’s the thing. I tried to look up stuff about him Todd, and you just can’t find anything about him. Yeah. I mean, there are people actively online, like, trying to find this guy and find out where he is and what happened to him. Today, I don’t know if his performance would fly so well, you know, in our PC culture, because I I think that, you know, they’re not only is he just a dumb guy, but I think that he’s kinda being presented as challenged and we’re a little bit more sensitive about that then. But I don’t know. In this type of slapstick comedy, sometimes we can still get away with those things, but it’s it’s it’s it’s fascinating to watch.
Todd: It really is. But yeah, you’re right. His performance as you said, and then that’s one of the Craig things I think I found about this movie. And again, maybe it’s just looking at it through modern eyes, but I like seeing him on screen. I Todd whenever he opened his mouth because I thought it was so dumb, you know? Yeah. The the manner of talking.
Craig: Get out of their mouth.
Clip: Robert’s gonna have punch. Malware, help my punch. What are you talking about? Malware t. Rich.
Todd: Not that things like that are out of place in a dumb movie like this, but it’s it’s even almost too dumb for this movie, you know.
Craig: Yeah. And I mean, I don’t know. I feel like that was the tone they were going for. I mean, they’re stupid, stupid jokes. Yeah. And and, like, he goes to the prom, and he goes to the football game with a blow up sex doll. And, you know
Todd: He’s dancing with it. Yeah.
Craig: Yeah. Which is a pretty funny sight to see, actually. So it is. I mean, it’s it’s lowbrow comedy. It’s juvenile comedy, but you know, there there’s a place for that. Yeah. As you listeners probably know, Todd and I started out this project. We would get together and watch the movies together and have a couple of beers, and then we would talk about it. I missed that with this movie because I think that sitting on a couch with you, having a couple beers, it would have been a much more enjoyable experience than just sitting on my couch and watching it by myself. You know, this this would be a fun movie to to to goof on, with your friends either before or after a few drinks or or whatever. It’s that kind of experience. It’s not so much a sit down and and, you know, watch it from start to finish for the artistic quality. It’s it’s more of a, I don’t know, just a buddy kinda kinda deal, I guess.
Todd: Oh, yeah. And you could really sit down and watch with anybody, like, even my wife sat down and watch it with me. She’s like, is this gonna be I said, you know, as I remember this, there’s not a bit of blood in it. It’s it’s pretty tame and and and I was right. In fact, like you had pointed out earlier, the only reason it’s rated R is another goofball thing that comes in. Again, there
Craig: I love this. Yeah. Don’t forget. I
Todd: love it. The fur just did this and it is a totally random point in the movie. It just cuts to a scene of a guy sitting at a desk.
Clip: Ladies and gentlemen, in order to achieve an r rating today, a motion picture must contain full frontal nudity, graphic violence, or an explicit reference to the sex act. Since this film has none of those and since research has proven that r rated films are by far the most popular with the movie going public, the producers of this motion picture have asked me to take this opportunity to say, fuck you.
Craig: And then it and then it pops up with the r rating on the screen. I thought that was hilarious and I thought it was so clever. What was funny to me is I don’t know, maybe the MPAA standards were different back then, but I know that today, for a PG 13 movie, you’re allowed one F bomb, just the one,
Todd: but you
Craig: are allowed. But really, you’re right. That’s the only thing that I can imagine would make this r Todd. Beyond that, it’s really more just like kind of a teen comedy, and a tame one at that. Yeah. And I think There’s no nudity. I mean, there’s a there’s a scene in the locker room, but there’s no I mean, they they remain in their bras and panties. There’s suggestions of sex, but it never actually gets to that point. Like, they start kinda fooling around. Nobody takes any clothes off or anything. There’s there’s virtually no violence unless you consider putting a plastic bag over somebody, like a giant hefty bag over somebody’s whole body. I mean, if you consider that violence. Beyond that, there’s there’s really nothing.
Todd: Yeah. It always cuts away, you know, and and that again is part of the comedy like the guy approaches the girl with an eggplant. It cuts away. You’re just sort of left to wonder how in the world did he murder with an eggplant Because then when you when it cuts back to the body, there’s nothing bloody. There’s nothing anything really. It’s just there. Maybe there’s a little bit of implied blood on the horse head bookend. Right?
Craig: Yeah. Yeah. But then even that’s just aftermath, like we don’t see anything happen. We just see what what kind of sort of looks like some smeared blood on it later, but, it’s certainly not gory. I mean, it doesn’t even really look like blood. I mean, just kinda looks like red food coloring or something.
Todd: And I think that’s part of why this movie got so much, airtime on TV is because it’s totally TV friendly and and probably just needed that f bomb cut out of it. And then on cable, you don’t even really need to do that. So, Yeah. So that might more so than it being a great movie or super popular movie. It maybe along with It’s a Wonderful Life. It was just a convenient movie at the time to be able to put in Right. On that people would enjoy it, you know that time of night when they’re in the mood for this kind of movie.
Craig: Right. Right.
Todd: Right. But you’re right, There’s total goofball stuff in here when the killer is on the phone talking to people who the voice changer he’s using, he’s talking through a rubber chicken.
Craig: Oh, I love that. And the first time he does it, you know, he’s talking like this whole faculty. I don’t even know who they are, the the faculty, but they’re convinced that Toby is the killer and and the shop teacher who’s super weird. Somebody says, let’s give her the Craig, and he says, I could cut her. I I could saw her head off. But then they get and and they send her away to go be evaluated. Then they get this phone call where he’s talking through this rubber chicken, and he says, the next time I kill is going to be at the football game. Click. And the lady on the other line said, did you hang up on me? And he says, no. I said, click. And the next the next time he calls, the the lady, the same lady who’s talking to him, she pulls the same thing on him.
Clip: I will kill next at the prom.
Todd: Oh, yeah? Click.
Clip: Did you hang up?
Todd: No. We just said click.
Craig: These goofball jokes. And a lot sometimes when in comedy, you know, they say there’s, like, the rule of 3 or whatever. I don’t know. You know, you repeat something enough times, it gets funnier. Sometimes I think that that really falls flat. Here, because it’s so stupid, it’s hilarious. Like, it’s so stupid that every time it comes up like in the first scene, the babysitter scene, after they’re dead, the parents come home, and the mom walks in the house and she screams like this terrible scream. And the husband comes running in, What is it? And she’s like, She left the TV on.
Clip: Todd does she think she gets to do for 75¢ an hour?
Craig: And then she walks into the next room and screams again, and he runs out. And she’s like, There’s chicken on
Clip: the floor. I’m paying her 75¢ an hour.
Craig: And, like, she keeps doing all this 75¢ an hour stuff, and then she actually goes up and finds the body and doesn’t react at all and just says something like, Well, I’ll be.
Todd: Doctor. And then he comes in and screams.
Craig: Doctor. Yeah. It’s goofy stuff like that, but for whatever reason, it works. I think if I had been in a different mood, if I hadn’t been in a good mood, I would have not enjoyed it. But I was in for it. I was on board. I was ready to go with this goofy humor and I enjoyed it. I don’t know that it’s necessarily something that I would need to ever go back Todd, and it’s certainly, I don’t think, something that I would wanna see over and over again because I think eventually it would get old. But it’s funny. It’s it’s it’s goofy funny stuff.
Todd: It is. And I’ll and I’ll say I’ll I’ll just come out and say that I think after a while, it does get a little Todd. And because, again, the humor is not super sophisticated. And while that works for a while, you really have to you really have to pace it out, I think, at a certain to a certain degree. You either have to keep the gags coming so fast and furious, that they’re just overwhelming your senses and you’re you’re always laughing, or or you have to be a little more sophisticated about your humor. And I sort of feel like this movie, unfortunately for me anyway, falls just a little on the side of the fence that the gags are not coming fast enough to keep me a 100% in it. You know what I mean? So so then when the gags do come, you’re kind of reminded, oh, yeah. That’s right. You know, it’s another stupid gag. And so I would have to say that by the time I reached the end of the movie, I was kind of ready for it to be over. It did feel like it got like, as we got toward the end of movie that it was getting a little tedious. I don’t know. Did you feel similar similarly?
Craig: I I did. I did. I was watching it, and, my partner walked through, and he kinda asked me how it was or whatever. I said, well, it’s stupid. I said, but it’s it’s it’s funny, but I I I did say too. I said, it’s too long, and it’s not. You know, it’s a short movie. It’s only an hour and 26 minutes long, but I think that it could have been about half an hour.
Todd: Yeah.
Craig: And, and that maybe would have been a little bit more effective. But I don’t know. I I wouldn’t necessarily say that I got bored. There were, like you said, you kind of wish that more of the gags, that they came more quickly or that more of them hit home. Because every once in a while, you know, there may have been a lull, but then there would be a gag that would really make me laugh out loud and you know, put put a big smile on my face. So it’s not that I was by the end, I was bored. It’s just it Todd did feel a little bit long.
Todd: Yeah. And and sometimes it’s clear they’re trying really too hard. There’s one gag in particular I’m thinking of where for no reason at all, at least that I could discern, suddenly in the corner of the film come those hands, like the killer’s hands. But they’re doing sign language. And I I’m sure it’s not even sign language because after a while, it it’s clear that it that they’re just not doing sign language. And then finally, it just it just kind of throws its hand its own hands up in the air and it disappears. And and you’re kind of like, why? What? It’s not it I don’t think it was at all connected to the action. No. It just felt like they felt like too much time had gone through and they had to squeeze a gag in somewhere and so they put it in. But that’s one example where it kinda falls flat. What is this? Yeah.
Craig: I agree. And, like, it left me just like you. I was like, why? I don’t get it. You know, why this scene? Yeah. It didn’t seem it didn’t seem to have any I mean, a couple of characters were just talking. I mean, they weren’t even talking about anything interesting, really. And it just popped up and then it just went away and that was it. And and they did that with a couple of things. One of the ones that I actually kind of liked was at one point, the screen just goes to that fuzzy VHS, type screen. You youngins out there won’t know what that looks like, but we eighties kids, know, when the tape is is is kinda messed up, and it’s just all scrambled and funny. And and the killer just talks us through.
Clip: We have temporarily lost our picture. Please stand by. Just kidding. Hello? It’s me, the breather. You’re probably wondering who I am. Who could I be? Could I be the innocent looking Toby? Would you trust the girl who looks like Prince Valiant in a plum sweater? Maybe I’m doctor Sigmund, a man who was once arrested for corrupting the morals of a hooker.
Craig: The and he just goes through this whole list of people who we already know are the suspects because every time they do something suspicious, it tells us. It flashes up on the screen. Suspect. Suspect. But I mean it it was goofy and unnecessary, but at least it was kind of clever and kind of broke the monotony of some of the other stuff. And then, you know, I’m sure we’ve skipped over. There are other deaths, but they all follow that same pattern. Then it gets to the end. What, what’s been going on is because Toby is is the one who is under the most suspicion, she and her friend, Hardy, they are trying to investigate to find out who this is to kinda clear Toby’s name, And they end up at the prom. She’s in costume. She’s in disguise. She’s dressed up as Sandy from Grease at the end when Sandy’s all sexy and stuff. And this whole last deal, another girl gets killed in almost the exact I mean, it’s the same formula. She goes off to have sex. The boy has to go find a condom. She gets killed. This one, she gets killed with the prom queen crown. She wanted to be prom queen, but wasn’t. He comes back, and this was a really kind of a joke and bad taste. Like, he comes back and finds her dead, but he’s gonna have sex with her anyway. Like, that was kinda close.
Todd: That was a little yeah.
Craig: But anyway, so then he gets killed Todd, and then the shop teacher gets killed, so we know it’s not him. And eventually, Toby makes her way into the principal’s office, and she, looks through his stuff, and she finds this folder with all of the girls who have been killed with, like, on each one, it’s a different over her face. It says, like, slut or whore or tramp or bad girl or something like that. And the principal walks in behind her, and is acting weird and eventually starts like taking off his clothes and stuff. So we presume it’s him. And there’s, another gag where, like, she turns around and and she turns back, and he’s got all of his clothes off except these enormous boxers that come all the way almost up to his chest. And then on his chest is painted the Iheart n y symbol.
Todd: Like, what was that all about?
Clip: So random.
Todd: Yeah.
Craig: And and and he like he says, I’m going to go get the school trophy. And she’s like, we have a school trophy. And he’s like, yes. 1 year, one time. The typing team won a trophy. Like, it’s just so goofy. And he goes off and gets it, and he comes back in. And it’s like, he’s gonna kill her with it. But then he slips on a 1,000,000 marbles that just happened to be on the floor. Like, did we see that there were marbles on the floor before?
Todd: We actually she some at some point in here, a bowl of marbles did get knocked over, and they did go across the floor.
Craig: I I had missed that entirely. So I was like, Okay, I guess there’s marbles on the floor. So he falls and then falls and impales himself on this statue. And what I was thinking at this point was that she was going to be suspected of killing him too. Yeah. And and then, of course, if he really was the killer, then nobody would know or believe her, and then she would be in trouble. But what happens is she ends up going into another room where her friend, Hardy, is supposed to be waiting for her, but he’s dead too. And from behind her, she hears somebody say he’s dead too just like all the other ones. And it turns out that this it’s this old lady, vice principal lady, who’s been with the principal all the time. And she explains that
Clip: I only kill the boys. He killed the girls. It breaks up the numbers. But why? Why not? I never told him. He had no idea. I did it to protect him in case there are any witnesses. I I don’t understand. Because he was my son. You’re his mother? No. His father. Oh my god. Father hyphen mother. But why did you do it? Because I loved you.
Craig: Goofy. I don’t even remember exactly what happens now, except that it it I think she gets away and starts running. And things just got completely surreal, and I had no idea what was going on. Yeah. She’s, like, running through the school. And all of a sudden, all of these people who have been killed throughout the movie are like there and Yes. They’re dressed in weird costumes. What was going on?
Todd: It was like it suddenly became an avant garde art piece, the whole film. Yeah. She’s running through and people are coming out and they’re dressed differently and people who are dead are are there again. And it’s just you’re right. There’s nothing to describe. It’s just so weird. Like, what’s going on? And then she wakes up. Right? Right. She wakes up and it’s like The Wizard of Oz. It it feels like that was supposed to indicate that that she was truly having this bizarre dream and that’s how dreams sometimes go. They seem like they’re going realistic and everything, and then they take a a strange turn. I I felt like maybe that was what the movie was doing. More than anything, I think the movie didn’t really know how it wanted to wrap itself up, or it wanted to get in a few extra gags at the end, probably just to make fun of how horror movies end. You know, you get the twist and then sometimes you get the double twist, and in this case, the movie is going for, like, this triple twist back flip, you know, kind of thing.
Craig: Yeah. Yeah.
Todd: She wakes up but it’s like the Wizard of Oz. Like, she’s in a bed and she’s surrounded by people, but they’re not the same people that they were. The shopkeeper’s there, but he’s actually the psychiatrist and the janitor, the tall lanky janitor guy is there, but he’s actually, one of the one of the teachers, like an English teacher or something, and is suddenly talking very properly, almost like a proper British accent.
Craig: And the principal is the janitor now. It’s like it is. It’s very Wizard of Oz. Like, and you were there and you were there and you were there, but none of you were who you really were. And I kinda I don’t know. In most movies where, it was all a dream, I don’t like that. I feel like it was a cop out, but this movie was so goofy. I had no idea where it was going anyway. I I thought that this was appropriate. You know, it was an appropriate end to this movie.
Todd: Yeah. And then she goes out with her boyfriend afterwards and she’s just talk it was such a weird dream and they’re walking through the woods. And she just decides, we should do it now. And so, oh no, you know, she’s making that choice. And so they they kind of lay down in the woods and he walks, he goes away and when he comes back, he’s got the gloves on.
Clip: Hardy, why are you breathing so heavy?
Todd: I’m the killer.
Clip: Hardy, you’re you’re not the killer. You’re my friend. Remember? That was a dream. This is reality. Why are you doing this?
Craig: I don’t know. I guess I’m just that kind of guy. And they’re at her funeral.
Todd: Oh, it’s 10 minutes later. It says on the screen.
Craig: 10 minutes later.
Todd: And they’re having this it’s like this makeshift funeral. It’s not even like a proper, like a proper tombstone. It’s just like a wooden cross with her name carved in it.
Craig: That’s really funny. And everybody’s putting, flowers on her like the mound of dirt that she’s under. And, the the boyfriend goes and, like, puts 2 flowers down. He’s like, I’m sorry. I guess I just lost respect for you because she decided to have sex, I guess. And he’s like, But I’ll always love you. And then I saw this coming a 100 miles away. Of course, she jumps out of the Craig, a la the end of Carrie. And that’s the end in the credits roll. I don’t know. You know, I’m really glad. You had mentioned this before, this movie, but if I remember correctly, it wasn’t on our list. So I appreciate that a listener recommended it because, I’m glad to have seen It was it was funny, and it was fun, and it was kind of a nice departure from, some of the stuff that we do. I mean, we’ve done, goofy horror comedies before, but it’s nice every once in a while to just have something really light, something that you don’t have to think about at all, that you just roll with it and, you’re in it for the laughs. And I had a good time.
Todd: Doctor. Oh yeah. And if you do decide to watch it, I think you’re gonna be craving Doctor. Pepper by the end. I can almost guarantee it. Doctor.
Craig: Oh my god. That’s product placement. Doctor. Pepper was everywhere. Then there was everywhere. I mean, dozens of people are wearing I’m a Pepper shirts. I mean, Doctor Pepper is all over the place. And then there was also Coors and KFC and Dunkin Donuts and Nike. Now, I don’t know how this stuff works. Don’t they have to get permission to use this stuff? How in the world did these filmmakers get to use all of this product? And it seems so intentional, like they were trying to highlight it all the time.
Todd: Well, now technically, you don’t have Todd get permission to use it. However, most filmmakers won’t use it without permission because they are trying to get some kind of promotional consideration. They’re actually trying to get money for putting their product in the movie. And so it only makes sense that Doctor Pepper has paid some money. Like, anytime you see Burger King or, like, we saw, you know, the Monster Squad last week. Burger King was in there heavily or whatever. They paid. There was an agreement, and the filmmakers got some money for advertising Burger King so much. And if if you Todd through to the credits, you’ll see that it wasn’t just Doctor Pepper. There is a list of it says promotional consideration given by and there are like 3 pages. Oh, my gosh. Like product placement here. And I don’t know if this is because the screenwriter, you know, wasn’t is in television and so, you know, he had all these connections and and this is how they help pay for this movie because the movie does seem pretty low budget.
Craig: Yeah. I looked it
Todd: up and and I think they filmed the whole thing in like one high school like on location at a high school in Houston and even hastily changed the name of the high school at the end when they were like, maybe we don’t wanna draw too much attention to it Todd make it from Right. Lamar to Lamab High School. Mhmm. Just just like like taking that r and hastily making it into a b. Right. So so yeah, that’s the only thing I can think of, but Doctor Pepper stands out way above and beyond everything else in this. I swear, you could play a drinking game and get totally trashed by the end of it. Oh, yeah. With one rule. Yes. And that’s it.
Craig: Yeah. Without question. You know, the only interesting bit of trivia, I kind of assume this is, you know, it was one of those things, of course, it didn’t do very well in the theaters, but it because it aired so much on TV, it kinda has a cult following. And a lot of times when that’s the case, you can find interesting bits of trivia. I didn’t really find much on this one except for that it was, made during the writers strike of, 1980 and 1981. And I guess that it was filmed in Texas because Texas was a right to work, state, and they didn’t have to worry so much about the unions. But the the director who’s listed is Mickey Rose, and I assume that’s who you were referring to at the beginning. But what I’ve read is that really most of the direction was done by Michael Ritchie who was uncredited and who was the director of the Bad News Bears. So I I, you know, I guess, you know, that guy, Bad News Bears, he had some experience with comedy, so maybe that kinda helped the quality a little bit. I also noticed right from the beginning, that it said, in the credits, the executive producer was Alan Smithee.
Todd: Yeah.
Craig: And just because I’m a a movie, you know, whore, basically, I know that that’s that’s the name that, people slap on something when they don’t want to or can’t put their real name on it. So I knew there must have been some kind of weird stuff going on behind the scenes. And and I read maybe that the the studio was trying to get as many make, movies made as they could, so that they didn’t have to pay, the unions and whatnot, and this was one of those. It’s and and the quality shows. It does look like it was put together quickly. The actors are kinda no name actors, and the acting is not great. I mean, it’s all over the top. You you kinda forgive it because you’re not expecting an Oscar worthy performance here. But, I I would, you know, I would recommend this movie. I would rec you know, if if somebody were having a bunch friends over, whether it be guys or girls or whoever, and you just wanted to sit down and and have some popcorn and and have some good laughs. Even if you’re not a horror fan, you know, even if you’re just a comedy fan, I think that this movie that people could enjoy it. And it could be something that you could have a conversation with your friend for 5 minutes, come back to it. You haven’t really missed anything. You know?
Todd: Yes. Yes.
Craig: It’s it’s fine.
Todd: Yeah. That’s the kind of scenario where it doesn’t really matter that it gets a little tedious by the end because you’re with your friends and you’re you’re injecting your own fun into the movie anyway.
Craig: Yes. Right.
Todd: I totally agree. If you’re in the mood for naked gun type movie, an airplane type movie, a scary movie type movie, this is the one for you. And if you’re a horror fan, you you could point this out. This is this is the original. Right? This is the original horror comedy. Yep. Well, thank you again for listening to another episode. If you enjoyed this podcast, please share it with a friend. You can find us on iTunes and on Stitcher and also on Google Play. You can also find us on our social media pages, particularly on Facebook, where if you have a recommendation like Andrew did thank you again, Andrew, for this recommendation. Please, post it there. Please let us know, and we would be happy to review your film. Until then, I’m Todd. And I’m Craig with 2 Guys and a Chainsaw.