Return to Horror High (1987)

 I was just sort of traversing the horror selection on Tubi and found that they had Return to Horror High (1987), a meta-slasher film poking fun at the subgenre. I went over to the IMDb to see how my peers reacted to this slasher film and they just obliterated it. Lots and lots of 1/10s or up to 4/10. Just an outright condemnation of it. Maybe I was just in the right mood or frame of mind for this flick, but it wasn't anywhere near as bad to me as it was to them. Is it anything to write home about? Well, maybe it could have been gorier, or funnier, or smarter, I guess. But did I just sit there taking scrutinizing notes while shaking my head in disapproval? Not at all. 

To sort of give you a rather simplistic synopsis: a film crew decides to develop the screenplay of writer, Arthur (Richard Brestoff), at his high school, answering to police at the scene of what appears to be a slaughter, with Chief Deyner (Pepper Martin), and his police (one of the officers is played by Marcia Brady herself, Maureen McCormick, really articulating her attraction to Martin, as well as, her wink-wink, nudge-nudge performance telling us this whole film is a farce). Arthur tries to give Deyner the rundown as to what happened during the long shoot at the school, that a police officer-turned actor, Steven (Brendan Hughes) and the actress in three roles on the film, Callie (Lori Lethin of "Bloody Birthday") were trying to determine if there was a real killer somewhere on set. While Callie and Steven investigate and appear on the shoot, there is indeed a killer supposedly murdering cast and crew.

Alex Rocco is a blast as the sleazy film producer who tries to get out of paying crew members, encourage his writer and director to get as much nudity, blood and guts, and exploitation in the slasher as possible. Scott Jacoby (I know him as Jodie Foster's love interest in the criminally underseen "Little Girl Who Lives Down the Lane") is the pretentious, idealistic director who considers the project as some sort of approach to high art, not wanting to fill the screen with as much blood and tits as possible. Andy Romano is the principal of the high school who acts more than a bit suspicious while the film shoot is ongoing, sort of on set as a "story advisor". Each and every role in the film is purposely a stereotype and the subgenre of slasher is intentionally poked fun at.

A lot of those who write about the film bring up George Clooney in a very brief appearance as a supporting actor who gets a television series, dumps the film project, happens to follow a sound down the high school hall, is pulled into a room, with his head pressed against the tiny window of a room as blood pools under the door, spreading across the floor. It's right at the beginning, with just enough screen time for a movie trivia night.

Rocco's producer spends a lot of time trying to jazz up the film with lurid content so he can make the most profits, while Jacoby demands those on his set to stay in character, follow his orders, get the most on camera without a mistake or attempt to go off the script. The two are butting heads a lot. Lethin is the lead actress just fed up with the producer wanting her naked, debating with him about how it is always the women taking off their clothes, wanting to know why the men didn't do so. She had a point.

This really isn't a gory film. There are body parts, but most of the time, you can tell they come from the prop department with film blood spattered on them. There is an obvious reason for that. We follow Lethin as characters existing in a film then as her actress outside that production working in concert with Steven to locate a killer. There is a back story involving a high school love affair with a missing student Steven was once involved that ties to a trip in the basement containing a room with skeletons in wedding dresses.

But when the ending has bloody sheets moved off supposed corpses while the police are in the basement to survey a possible crime scene, letting us know that most of the film told to Chief Deyner by Arthur is a total sham, I could see why the audience might have turned on Return to Horror High. Maybe the entire journey to that twist felt like a cheat. I found it amusing, if a bit too silly. It didn't bother me all that much because the entire film was telling you that nothing is as it seems. You couldn't get too involved in any scene where Lethin is wearing a wig because they are a give away that it will inevitably have Jacoby yelling CUT while Rocco is not altogether satisfied with it because there wasn't more gore or naked flesh.

Lethin, I must say, in short blond hair and grown up a bit since "Bloody Birthday", was quite sexy to me. Much to the actress character, she's never shown naked at all in the film. She's pressed into a car seat by a guy wanting to fuck her, ripping open her shirt, but that is as close as it gets. I was surprised at how much nudity is in the film, with a character following Lethin into a women's locker and shower room with a desire to go out on a date. There is a "blink and you'll miss her" cameo from Darcy DeMoss as a cheerleader whose shirt is pulled up by a jock in love with a character Lethin plays...DeMoss is the victim with the face planted in a wall by Jason Voorhees in "Friday the 13th: Jason Lives".

I will say that the comedy can be hit and miss. I noticed a lot of peers with user comments on the IMDb just didn't take to any of it. McCormick was a surprise appearance. I remember being startled by seeing her back during the USA Up All Night era, obviously with the film cut. I can't remember when I watched this the second time, but I believe this third viewing on Tubi was the first seeing the film uncut. I might have seen it on VHS at some point in the 90s or early 2000s...I'm not quite sure exactly when, though. Again, Tubi had it available, and with some night left before Sunday, I thought Return to Horror High could be a late Saturday fit. For slasher aficionados, this high school set meta-slasher might be essential viewing. If nothing else, to just check off the slasher bucket list. But it does seem so many felt shafted by the film overall. 3/5

Don't want to forget to mention Vince Edwards as a rather dismissive and mean-spirited science teacher who takes particular aim at a nerd in his class, especially during a frog dissection.  Not to mention, he stares at Lethin's breasts as she portrays a new student in his class! And Marvin J McIntyre, a very recognizable face in the 80s, is a props specialist counted on to provide the necessary gore for Rocco. Al Fann, as the janitor, is always mopping up blood, it seems.