Student Bodies (1981)

There are some films that are bad.  Then there are some that are entertainingly bad.  Then there are some that are embarrassingly bad.  1981's Student Bodies fits into the latter category.  This film is an attempt at a spoof of the early cycle of slasher films, but the result is an appallingly bad hour and twenty-six minutes of arch and unfunny humor.  The sad thing about Student Bodies is that the cast tries hard, and it seems obvious that the filmmakers think that this material is funny.  Nevertheless, in the end, we are left dreadfully unfunny with a painful cinematic experience.

On the night of Jamie Leigh Curtis' birthday, a fiendish killer called the Breather (voiced by Jerry Belson) begins to kill the students of Lamab High School whenever they start to have sex.  He uses only the most exotic and unlikely weapons, and soon the entire school is in panic.  No one knows who the Breather is, and suspicion falls upon Toby Badger (Kristin Riter), a virgin who always seems to be found at the murder sites.

It is a pity that this is such a poor film, because it has what may be one of the funniest satiric lines that this author has ever heard.  At one point in the middle of the film, Principal Peters (Joe Talarowski) mentions that Malvert the janitor (The Stick) was once a teacher.  When someone expresses surprise that Malvert was once a teacher, Principal Peters says that “he does enjoy the raise in pay.”  If the rest of the film’s dialogue could have stayed at that level of sharpness, perhaps the film would not be as dismal as it is.  Instead, most of the dialogue seems aimed at young teenage boys, with unfunny references to farts, horsehead bookends, and lines that try to be funny in a M*A*S*H kind of way (“So you can't say it could be anybody. WE'RE anybody.”, “True, but we're also somebody.”), but are just arch and painfully unfunny.  While a good line sneaks through here and there, mostly it is abysmally juvenile.

 He does enjoy the raise in pay.

Part of the problem with Student Bodies is that it is full of ideas and scenes that probably sounded good when they were first thought of, but when actually put on film they quickly become quite tiresome.  Witness the gimmick the movie has of flashing a body count every time someone is killed.  The first time that is seen, it provokes a mild smile, but after multiple times, it is just a dead horse that the filmmakers keep beating without pity.  The same goes for the killer’s habit of selecting the most unlikely weapons to kill people, such as a paperclip or an eraser.  Again, once is mildly funny, but by the fifth or sixth time, the joke has well worn out its welcome.  Sadly, this film is chock full of this kind of humor; the few good ideas it does have are drowned out by this amateur hour “comedy.”

Writer director Mickey Rose attempts at directing are a bit better than his writing attempt, but they still are nothing outstanding.  He effectively parodies the killer’s eye view POV shots of films like Halloween (although this is also overdone).  Effective also is the climax, which shifts from “comedy” to bizarre; we see Toby running down the halls of the school while characters from the film jump out at her wearing outlandish clothes and making wild faces.  This dream sequence is actually fairly effective at depicting the imagery of a nightmare.  The rest of the direction is relatively pedestrian, with the cameras following the actors as the go about the film.  In all, Mickey Rose offers us efficient and occasionally imaginative direction.

The best aspect of the film is its cast of amateurs.  While they will never be singled out for Oscar consideration, they nevertheless give enthusiastic performances that try to raise the awful script to something worth watching.  Kristen Riter does a good job as Toby.  She adopts a school-marmish tone when talking about sex, and she also convincingly portrays her character’s “goody goody” attitude.  The most memorable performance comes from an actor credited as “The Stick” as Malvert the janitor.  He has very long arms that he swings bizarrely around, and he uses a goofy way of talking to show us that Malvert, while appearing to be an incredibly stupid person, may in fact know more than he lets on.  As a whole, the cast provides the only real energy in this film, and they are about the only thing that makes it watchable.

 Toby hears something....

Student Bodies wants to do for slasher films what Airplane did for disaster movies.  Unfortunately, the film is a disaster itself.  The cast tries its best to make this a watchable film, and the direction is adequate, but the script is so poor that it ruins any chances that this could be an entertaining parody.  The jokes are tiresome and unfunny, and the few good ideas that bubble to the surface are almost immediately drowned out.  Overall, this is a picture which is best avoided.

Eric Miller