Synopsis
A psycho is stalking the students at an exclusive girls' school.
1983 Directed by William Wiard
A psycho is stalking the students at an exclusive girls' school.
Highschool Killer, Meurtres au collège, Lições Mortais
I found Deadly Lessons while looking through Bill Paxton’s films, and it hooked me immediately. Diane Franklin, who I just saw and loved in The Last American Virgin, the legendary Donna Reed as a headmistress, Ally Sheedy, Nancy Cartwright, and Paxton as Franklin’s love interest all in a PG made-for-TV slasher. Is it good? No, not particularly, but, hey, it’s awesome seeing them all together and it’s bizarre seeing a slasher this tame.
I've been on a mini-binge of old made-for-TV thrillers and this is the silliest one I've watched. It's the most like a TV show and feels like a multi-episode arc of an 80s show strung together and presented as a movie. But it also has a great cast (particularly Ally Sheedy and Bill Paxton) and a decent body count for a TV movie. It's a family friendly slasher with off screen kills, red herrings, teens playing Nancy Drew and a ludicrous climax. It's not the movie you'd expect from the poster art but it's a fun watch.
The last movie in my Diane Franklin marathon is a TV-movie (rated TV-PG) horror thriller. Stefanie (Franklin) is off to an all-girls boarding school to learn some deadly lessons from a killer. This boarding school has horses, so I assume she'll also learn some horsey lessons before she learns the deadly ones. Believe it or not, she also gets a lesson in board games.
There's not much going on here, unfortunately, but Diane Franklin is stunning as always.
Best scene goes to a horse gone wild as Stefanie rides it with the best reaction shots. A dude in a blue polo, collar half-popped, watches from afar.
#4 of Slasher September 2019: Games, Rituals, and Sundowns
A Bay of Blood: A Ranking of Slashers (1974 - 1990)
Made-for-TV slasher without the slashing—instead we get a young Bill Paxton brushing a horse and hitting it off with Diane Franklin, which by all means, isn't the worst thing to see. Deadly Lessons is an incredibly tame film that does fit into the slasher genre like any other, it just happens to be a very PG rated one. Franklin's character arrives at a prestigious summer school and one-by-one its girl students are murdered without the least bit of blood—each body discovered in a similar fashion, with another student coming across it and screaming, and then cutting to the police office…
kinda bad but kinda rules also?? slow & tbh boring daylight bloodless mystery/thriller/soap opera, absolutely nothing interesting to look at, but it does have teen girl drama, baby bill paxton in a jean jacket (happy birthday :( ), nancy cartwright aka bart simpson, the girl from terrorvision in this weird purple pioneer woman dress, and a TWIST for the record books. also some interesting little semi-feminist bits snuck in here - bart simpson is a girl who's sent to the school because she's too chubby to be seen in public with her politician father, predatory teachers, sympathy for sad bitchy old ladies, and other stuff i won't spoil (as if you're going to watch this). so because the lady characters seemed to be treated like actual human beings, i checked and what a surprise, written by a woman.
“Stop it! It’s not a game!”
The opening gothic-laced credits accompanied by the perilous sounding music are the creepiest thing you’ll get from this practical made-for-TV whodunnit murder-mystery, or if you want to call it a slasher. I guess the tube also wanted to get into the act of the cinematic craze engulfing the early 80s. Someone is stalking, killing girls at a reclusive boarding school. The headmistress seems more concerned about her reputation than that of the girls’ safety. That’s one thing, nevertheless there are numerous questionable circumstances in the material, as throughout the whole time the danger never lets up, yet there’s a real lack of urgency on the grounds (by authorities, staff and students) as one by…
It is clear from the ratings of my mutuals that no one else has been brave enough to follow Packard into the abyss of his Death Box VHS transfers. Y'all might be warranted on that one, and though the quality of both transfers and films is decidedly mid, I do think it's worthwhile for archival purposes and because to paraphrase uncle Neil (Young) 'release it all and let the audience decide what's worthwhile'.
Deadly Lessons is a tame, muddled PG school slasher starring a young Ally Sheedy, Nancy Cartwright and Bill Paxton. You could do worse. Not many takeaways but two obvious ones; don't trust cops and don't trust creepy Tom Noonan looking caretakers.
A pretty engrossing TV movie whodunit. And what a cast! Donna Reed, Larry Wilcox, Ally Sheedy, Bill Paxton, Nancy Cartwright, the incest sister from Amityville II. The skies are dark because Deadly Lessons has all the stars.
girl vibes: (4/5)
gutter blood vibes: (0.5/5)
halloween vibes: (1/5)
sex vibes: (2.5/5)
Halloween/Scary Movie Month challenges/calendars with some made for TV horror (All We Need is Sleaze/All Hollows' Sleaze Day #8) (Unsung Horrors' Horror Gives Back #21)
Amazing cast list, we have 80s staples such as Diane Franklin (The Last American Virgin and Amityville 2, the year before), Ally Sheedy (busy 1983 also appearing in Bad Boys opposite Sean Penn plus Wargames with Matthew Broderick) and Bil Paxton! A couple TV stars with Larry Wilcox (CHiPS) and Nancy Cartwright (Bart Simpson!), screen legend Donna Reed and a couple other familiar faces (Renée Jones from Friday the 13th Part 6: Jason Lives).
There is next to no violence here and it's a slasher, so basically almost all the kills happen offscreen or without…