Prom Night (1980) - DVD Review by Anthony Thurber

Prom Night
Year: 1980
Director: Paul Lynch
Stars: Jamie Lee Curtis, Leslie Nielsen, Casey Stevens
MPPA Rating: R
Studio: Echo Bridge Home Entertainment / Alliance Atlantis
Running Time: 89 Mins
Review Rating: 5 Stars

(Please note, that this review may contain minor spoilers)

With the alleged Prom Night remake hitting theaters tomorrow, as it looks completely different from the original, yours truly decided to take a look at the original Prom Night and see it for the first time, as I have never seen the film until now. Prom Night is considered by many horror fans to be one of the classic slasher films of all time. The film stared Jamie Lee Curtis (Halloween, A Fish Called Wanda) and Leslie Nelsen (Airplane, The Naked Gun).

The film follows a group of teenagers who have hid the truth about a tragic event that ended with the death of a ten-year old. Six years later, the teenagers are getting ready for their prom night when someone who witnessed the event hasn’t forgotten about it or them. Now this person is planning his revenge on those teens by stalking them through the dark and empty halls of Hamilton High and using his axe to strike at them. He will turn their night of fun into a living nightmare.

I wish the studio executives go back and rewatch all these horror classics, like this film, and realize that what makes them great were the suspense and twists of these films. Not cramming too many pretty faces only to kill them off without going into their character. The original Prom Night deserves to be up there as one of the greatest horror films of all time. Director Paul Lynch did great job building the film’s suspense by the way he shot the film, as it gave me an uneasy feeling that make me wonder when the killer was going to strike. His direction of the actors was very good. They seemed like teenagers that didn’t come off as stupid or clichéd.

But the main reason this film succeeds was its screenplay, written by William Gray. He does a great job making this film suspenseful. Gray does that by inserting subplots that make you think that this person or that person is behind this, when it’s neither. This is what makes a film suspenseful, when you don’t know who is behind this. The character development is very good here. Gray does a good spending almost an hour developing the characters and the film’s backstory, which is something I would like to seen in some horror films that I’ve been watching as of lately (i.e. Cruel World, Unearthed). Gray also focuses on the police perspective here. He does that so the film twist can be effective, later on in the film.

There were only two problems that I had with the film. First I could not stand the disco music in the film but then later realized the film was done in the early 80’s when disco was big. The other problem was there were no special features on the DVD, which is a shame for this classic film, but at least the DVD transfer on the film was very good. Echo Bridge Home Entertainment did a good job restoring it original print, as it looked good for a film that came out in 1980. Hopefully someday, somebody will give this film its proper special edition release.

Please go and rent the original Prom Night first before you have to see the remake and tell me which version you like best. Prom Night is a suspenseful horror that deservers to be mentioned with some of the best slasher films out there.