Tubi Thursday: Hell Night (1981)

 With School out now, let's look back at the dangers of, well, School.
Specifically, a Frat/Sorority tradition that goes terribly wrong!

This is...

A quartet of young people- including Linda Blair and Dick Van Patten's son Vince- are locked in a spooky house for the night as their frat/sorority inititiation.

I think the fact that Vince is dressed as Robin Hood after his Dad was in When Things Were Rotten is probably a coincidence.

They split into two duos, since Vincent and the other girl- Suki Goodwin- are horny teens.  Naturally.

Blair and Peter Barton's Jeff talk about class warfare and such until...

...spooky stuff starts to happen.

It turns out that the people who made them stay set up 'scream boxes' and rigged up stuff like projectors to make ghosts appear.

Boy, this Lobby Card makes you think that this is a Ghost Film.
It's not.

Something- or someone- is killing off the people behind the pranks and scares.

It all relates to a crazy, impossible story of a Dad that killed off of a family of mutants in this House.

The killer (or killers) is kind of slow at this, mind you, and likes to spend about five minutes sneaking up on each victim.

No rush, man- you can fill up the 1 hour and 42-minute runtime.

Can Jeff- who sadly doesn't have the titular Powers of Matthew Star in this one- and Blair survive the night as the body count rises?

Can they stay dressed like this to make every promotional image look like a Gothic Film?

To find out, stream it now.

A solid Film that could do with a bit of Editing to deal with its pacing issues.

The Film is honestly better than I was expecting.  In part, I get it confused One Dark Night, which doesn't help.

In any event, the Film looks great, has a simple premise and really delivers on the setup parts of a Slasher Film.

In many ways, it hits the same beats as Slashers were all starting to hit at this time.

At its best, it milks maximum tension from each setup.  At its worst, it lingers on long shots past the point that most modern viewers will get bored.

The Film also has a subtle message about how 'lower class' people can often have very useful skills (like Blair) that save their lives.
Snooty rich guys- less so.

Hell Night is a solid recommendation for fans of early Slashers and '80s Horror.  It will really pull you in.

A Film that is honestly way more engaging than you might think.  Then again, Frank Darabont worked on it, so...that tracks.