"Prom Night"(1980)d/Paul Lynch

When Jamie Lee Curtis,daughter of "Psycho"(1960) star Janet Leigh and actor Tony Curtis, was crowned the apex 80's scream queen after the success of "Halloween"(1978) and "The Fog"(1980),it seemed like she could do no wrong.But then "Terror Train"(1980) and this little Canadian disco slasher brought us all back to earth.Is it any wonder her bleached out,drugged up appearance and five lines of dialogue in the emptiest hospital in history in "Halloween 2"(1981) marked her final horror appearance for over a decade?I think not.Of course she's had a long,fruitful Hollywood career since then,amidst rumors of batwanger-dom(probably started by me,and due to that mannish square chin of hers)which I'll dismiss once and for all with the following publicity still:

Yeah,Jamie was rocking a serious pair of dirty pillows.
Hermaphroditic rumors put to final rest,let's get on with the review,shall we?

Callous kids send she-stutterer to early grave.
There's no doubt about it,kids can be venemous,hurtful little bastards.All Robin wanted to do was to fit in with the local scruffy young tearaways as they played "The killers are coming"(popular children's game?) in an abandoned warehouse somewhere in Canada.Stuttering,a sure s-s-s-sign of weakness marks the little girl for ridicule followed by abrupt gruesome death as she plummets out a window to the pavement below.Adding insult to injury,the remaining shards of broken windowpane follow,cutting the corpse's throat and removing all doubt.Gross.The four kids,fearful of retribution, form a pact to keep the events of that day a secret between them.Six years later the murderers are all high school kids in their twenties, preparing for the annual prom,only a vengeful killer(in a disco glitter ski mask...no,that's not a typo.) has different bloody plans for them as well.
Kim(Jamie Lee Curtis) and Alex are Robin's siblings(Leslie Nielsen is their father...remember when this guy took serious acting roles?),putting the tragedy behind them through exhilarating disco moves on the dancefloor.Each of the guilty teen/twenty-somethings,Nick(Kim's prom date),Kelly,Wendy and Jude is plagued by crank calls,reminding them of their terrible secret and taking the joy out of prepping the gymnasium for the prom's "Disco Madness" theme(no,that's not a typo either).Somewhere in there is an overweight afro-coiffed Jewish pot smoking nerd with a makeout van with plush carpeting in the back,and a moronic Sicilian-type bully who doesn't seem to realize Welcome Back,Kotter had already died a syndicated death,aping an aggresive,more stupid(is this possible?) Barbarino at every turn.One by one the childhood killers get their comeuppance at the aforementioned dance,but not before Kim does an onscreen ten minute boogie,and later evades the glittery axe-wielding killer with blouse open,exposing her ample sweater mates for a solid five minutes.In the end,people die violently,Kim survives the onslaught,and her brother Alex is unmasked as the murderer and lone witness to their misdeed six years earlier after Nick heroically beats him upside the domepiece with his own axe,effectively killing him.It's safe to disco once again.

Ba-ba-ba-ba-ba beheaded.
Certainly not a top slasher entry by anybody's standards,this one does boast of some decent gore and atmosphere at times,though weighed down by a drawn out script full of loose ends,and badly dated,thanks to the prom full of boogiers.Nielsen is used too sparsely here,and the cast of co-starring caucasian afro-coiffed canucks(they all seem to enjoy the hairdo,strangely) doesn't add much beyond a chuckle.Jamie's lungs don't get much of a workout in the scream department,though the sight of her hustling underneath the mirrored ball just may give you many sleepless nights anyway.

One out four B.W.'s