Review of Student Bodies (1981) by Dylan C — 09 Jun 2010

If anything else, this is a pro-union movie. You see, back when this movie was being filmed, there was a Screen Actor Guild strike, so Paramount Pictures wanted to at least have something in the theaters, so they greenlighted this movie and let it be filmed in Texas, a right to work state, not knowing that the there wasn't an abundance of non-union actors willing to work in a horror comedy parody, which is why this movie misses more than it hits.

It's basically a send-up of the slasher movies from the 1980's and it works in style and look but not in content. The jokes don't work the way the did in the ZAZ movies or in Mel Brooks movies.

Some are clever such as a blind man who has a seeing eye dog drive for him and the death scenes are done in a comical way with people being killed by wooden horse head bookends and paper clips. There's also the character of Malvert, an idiotic janitor played by The Stick, a tall lanky goofy looking man.

But the ending just falls apart and there never feels like there is a story here just a bunch of random gags told by not-so good performers, which is why most of the cast has never acted in any other movies.

These few that have were reduced to bit parts. This movie has the dreaded "Allen Smithee" psuedonym on it, which means it's not as good as it might have been.