Oh man, is this thing ever a mess. Even the title screams "what the hell are we doing?" It doesn't have anything to do with Prom Night at all (and believe me, I would know, for all the times I've watched that insipid glorious movie), but that doesn't stop it from shamelessly cribbing from every single other significant
slasher ever released. Nightmare on Elm Street is an obvious point of reference, but there's plenty of Halloween in the mix too, and even some dashes of The Omen and Poltergeist for flavor! It's a manic cash grab, the deluded flailings of a studio trying to get its fingers on the pulse of what was successful in horror at the time, but the concoction this bit of film alchemy produced is nothing but a riot start to finish. If you're looking for something to frighten you - nope, not even for a second. Prom Night II is over-illuminated, garish, and couldn't build up a scare if it was made out of Legos. If it's raw, guffaw-worthy entertainment you're after, though, this right here has it in spades. Wicked perversity, an evil rocking horse, the oldest person to portray a high schooler in a film ever, wildly inappropriate use of jazz standards...it just doesn't stop! There's never a dull moment to be seen, and if you don't mind a movie that completely fails at its original intentions only to produce something uniquely awful and hilarious, this is an absolute must.
February 2, 2011
