Director: Robert Deubel
Notable Cast: Julia Montgomery, James Carroll,
Suzanne Barnes, Rutanya Alda, Hal Holbrook, Lauren-Marie Taylor, David Holbrook,
Laura Summer, Carrick Glenn, John Didrichsen, Lois Robbins
There’s a moment in Girls Nite Out where the film
bounces between a radio DJ giving out clues for the campus scavenger hunt, a
sorority girl putting on lipstick, and the mysterious killer taping together
steak knives and putting them through the mitt of the bear mascot for the
school basketball team. Welcome to 1982 and the slasher boom is already in full
swing and if those three things mentioned being done in sync doesn’t give you
everything you need to know about this forgotten slasher, Girls Nite Out,
then it’s time to go back to Slasher Basics 101.
For their latest unearthed slasher, Arrow Video has dropped
another collector’s item for slash-fans and overall horror nerds to add to
their collection. Girls Nite Out, in true 1982 fashion, runs through the
tropes with relative ease and most slasher fans will find aspects to love about
it. However, it’s rather slow pacing on the front end and run-of-the-mill kills
(run-of-the-kill?) make it far more generic than it could have been with its
clever set up and angle on the killer.
In the opening, it’s a relative shock to see that most of
the main characters of the film, particularly one called Girls Nite Out
about a sorority scavenger hunt being stalked by a slasher killer in a bear
costume, are mostly the boys basketball team. Although, as the film progresses
it does add in a slew of other characters tied into the school to set up its
fodder for the slaughter. Too often it’s a lot of very similar characters
without enough distinguishing factors to make any of them truly stick
out.
The obviously too-old-for-the-roles cast are decent enough
at invoking just enough humanity, but the film takes a very long time in
setting up the ensemble cast, the relationships, and various small-town plots
for what constitutes a handful of thinly veiled college sex jokes and other
caricatures used in slashers of the period. There’s some respect to be had that
Girls Nite Out is taking its time to establish characters and the world
of this school and small town, but it ultimately kills the pacing and the number
of characters spreads the depth thin.
And yet, despite those foundational issues in getting the
humanity and momentum of this film going, Girls Nite Out has just enough
fun ideas up its sleeve to be decently entertaining. The idea of a scavenger
hunt at night across the campus is great in getting characters to split up for
the killer to take them out, it puts random characters into random places for
potential slayings, and it’s all stitched together by a silly radio DJ who gives
the clues to the next object while he plays a handful of classic oldies on the
radio. Just that idea, in general, gives the film a ton of potential.
Layer that on top of an urban legend killer from the town’s
history (trite, sure, but effective) and a killer in the school mascot outfit
with a bear paw filled with steak knives and there’s a recipe for a massively
fun film on hand. The kills themselves tend to be relatively by the numbers as
the killer hisses some anti-women rhetoric and grabs them by the throat to
bloodletting results. The kills may not be as effective as one would hope, but
the reveal in the final moments is worthy of the time spent.
If anything, instead of remaking so many of these other
slashers, Girls Nite Out is one of those prime properties aching for a
new and stylish take on its premise. There are a lot of intriguing moments in
the film, subtext in scenes in how college relationships complicate matters,
and the structure bodes the intention of making the film more than just another
slasher including a third act that goes into police procedural with Hal
Holbrook looking stern at a desk. Yet, the whole is not greater than its parts
as it never finds a way to congeal the pieces together in a way that’s as
provocative or effective as it might look on paper.
For the slasher fans, Girls Nite Out is a decent
addition to the collection - particularly in the new Blu Ray from Arrow Video,
but more casual horror fans will understand why this was a second-tier film in
the genre for its problematic foundations. Still, the great ideas and final
moments of the film do warrant a recommendation for the slasher fans out
there.
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