Prom Night (1980)

Director:

Paul Lynch

Writers:

William Gray (screenplay)
Robert Guza Jr. (story)

Release Date:

18 July 1980 (USA)

Genre:

Horror | Mystery | Thriller

Tagline:

Tonight, someone has come to the prom alone. Someone who watches in the silent corridors. Someone who waits until no one can help.

Plot:

A masked killer stalks four teens responsible for the accidential death of a child six years earlier at their high school's senior prom.

Plot Keywords:

High School | Prom | Hiding | Killer | Masked Killer

Awards:

2 nominations

Cast

Leslie Nielsen	...	Mr. Hammond
Jamie Lee Curtis	...	Kim
Casey Stevens	...	Nick
Anne-Marie Martin	...	Wendy (as Eddie Benton)
Antoinette Bower	...	Mrs. Hammond
Michael Tough	...	Alex
Robert A. Silverman	...	Sykes (as Robert Silverman)
Pita Oliver	...	Vicki
David Mucci	...	Lou
Jeff Wincott	...	Drew
Mary Beth Rubens	...	Kelly (as Marybeth Rubens)
George Touliatos	...	McBride
Melanie Morse MacQuarrie	...	Henri-Anne
David Gardner	...	Dr. Fairchild
Joy Thompson	...	Jude

Runtime:

89 min

Country:

Canada

Language:

English

Color:

Color

Aspect Ratio:

1.85 : 1

Sound Mix:

Mono

Certification:

Norway:15 (DVD rating) | Finland:(Banned) (uncut) (1981) (theatrical release) | Finland:K-18 (heavily cut) (1983) (video) | Finland:K-18 (uncut) (2005) (DVD) | France:-12 | Singapore:NC-16 | UK:X (original rating) (1980) | Italy:T (VHS) | Italy:VM18 | Australia:M | Norway:18 (1980) | UK:18 (re-rating) (1987) | USA:R | West Germany:18 (nf) | Iceland:(Banned) | Sweden:(Banned) (original rating) | Sweden:(Banned) (re-rating) | Germany:BPjM Restricted

Filming Locations:

Don Mills Collegiate, Toronto, Ontario, Canada

Company:

Quadrant Trust Company

Trivia:

The line, "It's not who you come with, it's who takes you home," appears in all the Prom Night movies.

Goofs:

Boom mic visible: Kelly gets spooked and heads to the door to check to see if anyone is around. She proceeds to open the front door and the scene quickly cuts to an exterior shot of her looking out the door, and right above the door is a black boom microphone.

Quotes:

Kim Hammond: You seem a little anxious, Wendy. By the way, who are going with tonight?
Wendy Richards: It's not who you go with, honey. It's who takes you home.

Movie Connections:

Featured in Going to Pieces: The Rise and Fall of the Slasher Film (2006)

Soundtrack:

Fade to Black

Sit this one out

Another average slasher flick, one of two that scream queen Jamie Lee Curtis made back to back during her time in Canada fresh from her fame in John Carpenter's Halloween in 1978. It opens with four young kids in an abandoned building playing a macarible game when one girl joins them and it leads to her accidently falling out of a second floor window to her death. The four kids (three girls and a boy) make a pack never to mention it to anyone. But six years later, someone knows about the killing and decides to get those four responsible. As it also happens the anniversary of the death coincides with the big high school prom which the kids are all attending, making it convenient to borrow big ideas from movies like Carrie (1976) among others for the characters, situations and subplots.

Although it has some good qualities and was moderately successful when first released, the movie is bloodless in almost every respect, plus the murders are so murky and dimly lit. Jamie Lee Curtis, playing Kim, the older sister of the murdered young girl, is good as the popular student who wants to be elected prom queen. But she, unfortunatly, is not one of the four students targeted by the masked ax-weilding killer. In fact, she frequently becomes a suspect along with her father the school principal, as well as her younger brother Alex, the creepy school janitor, and the school bully. But the identity of the killer is fairly obvious. But so much time is spent on establishing red herrings that more than two-thirds of the movie pass before any of the killings begin. The production values are also good, but the film is starting to show its age.

Contents: Six killings, scant blood, one decapitation, Jamie Lee Curtis as prom queen, no nudity, no real suspense, no pace, lots of disco music and dancing, sit this one out.