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Overall Rating : 4/10
Directed By : David Hess
Jennifer Runyon (Carnosaur)
Forrest Swanson
Linda Gentile
William Lauer
Supplied By : TrueGore Vintage DVD
BUY IT HERE : www.truegore.com
Film Reviewed By : Rick L. Blalock
Date Reviewed : Feb. 15, 2007
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| PLOT Five young girls at an exclusive boarding school drug their housemother and smuggle in their boyfriends for the night. A deranged Santa Claus soon appears to check on who's naughty -- and then kill them. |
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| THE REVIEW The plot to 1980's slasher TO ALL A GOOD NIGHT is simple. It's Christmas time and the girls at the Calvin Finishing School for Girls, want to party. While the school's President is away on break, the girls spike their house Mother's mile one night, thus causing her to retire to bed early. To them this is the perfect time to call up some boy's, from what I suppose is a nearby school - the boys arrive by private airplane(if you can believe that). As soon as they arrive the fun begins as the beers begin to open and sexual adventures start - it looked like the night would be all the girl's hoped for. It isn't long however, that their perfect night of partying, booze and sex is consumed by various gruesome murders and the hands of a person or persons dressed as Santa Claus. Yes I know, I bet you are asking yourself, "why is he reviewing a Christmas movie in February, the day after Valentine's Day?", well, no real answer really, but since I have already reviewed two titles for TrueGore this week, and for the fact that i'd always wanted to see this - I thought i'd include. Unfortunately the quality of video I had to review from wasn't all that great, so i'll try my best here. Killer Santa flicks are not that rare anymore, but in 1980 they were and TO ALL A GOOD NIGHT, was the first to really kick them off. Saying that it was the virtual pioneer of such slashers, does not mean it is the best, because it's definitely not, but to me the one good thing it had going for it was the story. The film begins with some kind of hazing ritual done by the sorority, which in the end goes terribly wrong -resulting in the death of a girl as she falls from the balcony - what they don't know is that what they did would catch up with them. It is late is the film we found out that this killer Santa Claus that as been hacking and stalking all night is actually the parents of the said girl who died in the freak accident - hmmm the parent's get revenge, is it just a coincidence that Actor turned Director, David Hess directed this - as he starred in LAST HOUSE ON THE LEFT, a film that had a similar ending? I don't know. The film does play out like a FRIDAY THE 13th-like slasher and has some obvious influence by films like BLACK CHRISTMAS(the original), but in Hess' filming style, you could clearly tell this was his Directorial debut in that most of the techniques seem to be borrowed from other Directors and films. None too original in that sense besides some weird cuts and fade outs that seem out of place - so don't expect anything flashy. TO ALL A GOOD NIGHT is your typical 80's genre slasher that is somewhat entertaining, as it has the typical fixtures, girl's their nudity... and the horrible dialogue known to grace many films of the decade - however I can see how and why this film is a "lost" film. Many film's followed this one that were just better executed(even some before this were)even then other similar films such as SILENT NIGHT DEADLY NIGHT come along, and did what TO ALL A GOOD NIGHT wanted to do, but better. Overall, TO ALL A GOOD NIGHT is a decent film in general, but definitely not the best of it's kind, nor of the slasher genre. |
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| GORE
METER 4/10 If I remember correctly, we have some strangulations, an axe to the head, a decapitation and more I can't recall |
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| MUSICAL
SCORE 3.5/10 The scoring of the film is very "80's indeed, a lot of synthesizer beats flood the film's suspenseful scenes |
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| OVERALL
IMPRESSION OF THE FILM As I said TO ALL A GOOD NIGHT, is just an ok film, as I have seen better of it's kind, and for a slasher film, it is unusually slow at times(such as the case with the Original BLACK CHRISTMAS, but it didn't ever seem to get boring to me. Even in saying this, I would still recommend as it is a great conversation piece and an inaugural piece in the "Killer Santa" collection of films that have been released over the years. |
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