Final Exam (1981) - A heydey slasher flick

1981 was a damn fine year for slasher movies. Everyone was trying to rip-off Friday the 13th, which was ripping off Halloween, and we ended up getting dozens of rip-offs of rip-offs until the genre died for a few years. It was slasher overkill, and that all piqued in 1981.

Our killer is as generic as it gets. He dresses like Jason from F13-3, but he doesn't wear a mask. He looks like some Sonny Landham type, only he sticks to the shadows, because his character is as generic as it gets. He's a Michael Myers rip-off in the sense that he prowls the shadows and uses a butcher knife. I'm not even sure he has a motive. I think they talk about some escaped lunatic, which is enormously original. He kills two people in the opening for no good reason, then proceeds to gets in a van, driving along until he comes across "March College" as it's named, and decides to kill people in this place for no good reason.

This school is no different from any other. We have Radish, the optimistic effeminate nerd who's confident in his abilities, and he has no worries on his final exams. This guy is a dork, but he's accepted in this society because he can help people with... the final exam.

There's another^a girl who's clearly set up to be the final girl, and we can take her or leave her. Her friend is the ditz in the red sweater, who's going out with Gary, the guy trying to get in the frat house by stealing the final exam questions, but he only manages to get hazed to a tree by the big dumb jock named Wildman.

Now this guy sucks. He's dumb as fuck brute who can't do his own tests and he gets outed in his criminal efforts. He hazes people, and drinks, gets himself filthy, and he's hot-headed. Suffice to say, whatever happens to Wildman is rather satisfying.

The big thing that stands out to me is one particular subplot of the movie... The school shooting. This wasn't a common thing back then, so it is rather original for its time, but it's quite funny to think that this movie's narrative wouldn't be acceptable in this day and age.

You know what happens, right? A van full of masked assailants pulls up to the school and sprays the crowd with automatic rifles. Some are hit, and their bodies are taken... because it's all a fraternity prank. 😐

What's particularly amusing about it is the aftermath, and how people react. A disgruntled sheriff is mad that someone wasted his time, and Radish has to explain to him that it seemed like genuine peril, but nah... sheriff is an irritable prick. Coach laughs it all off, even saying he thought the whole thing was kind of funny. Just like this movie. There's no real motive for the killings, and it's only loosely about any "final exam". That's what links the characters though. They're all still around to study for the final, or cheat, or make plans to screw their professors. You know... regular old college stuff.

It takes a while to get going, and it doesn't really know where it wants to go, either. Somehow, it's quite interesting to follow anyway, acting as mostly a regular story, with a few reminders throughout to tell you that the horror part is coming, because there's a lot bit in the middle without any action from our so aptly named "Killer". Even he doesn't know what's going on in this movie, and that's why he wants to kill everybody in it.

Somehow, it's actually quite decent. The structure consists mostly of the misadventures of our happy-go-lucky students as they strive to pass a final, sandwiched between a very uninspired slasher film. Not that I'm complaining. I don't look for too much logic in a slasher flick, and this one's lack of it is balanced nicely by the feeling that this movie is a little off. Like it has a screw loose, but it doesn't know whether to tighten it or loosen it more.

I would like an A.