Massacre At Central High (1976) -Review

PLOT

David who is a newbie transfer student to Central High School already knows Mark from another school.

David, from what you will learn later in the film helped Mark out in a tough bind from their past time together. Mark as a loyal friend, tries to have David all set up and no worries when he arrives at Central High. Unfortunately, David is not to keen on Marks new pals who he quickly realizes runs the school with bullying the other kids.

David rebels by not joining their little clique and tries to get the rest of the school to stand up
for themselves against this bunch of heathens.

Things take a tragic turn for David when the bullies pay him a visit while he is underneath a car working on it, a car recently totaled by these brutes that belonged to a student. David ignores the bunch as he tries to repair the vehicle. They in turn try to get his attention by pushing on his roll board, but the bully looses his balance and David gets thrown under the wheel of the car and it comes slamming down on his leg. David is now permanently crippled due to the bullying.

Now David steps things way up and decides to stop the madness once and for all.

REVIEW

Massacre at Central High was released September of 1976. I couldn’t find an exact date of its release. It was also released in France on January 11, 1978.

It also has several subtitles. Its also known as.. Blackboard Massacre in the UK, Les baskets se déchaînent in France, Masakra na Central High in Poland, Massaker in Klasse 13, in West Germany, Sexy Jean in Italy (X-rated version) and Terror i Central High in Sweden.

Massacre at Central High was directed by Renee Dalder, who also did the screenplay. This film also stars a young Kimberly Beck, better known for her role in Friday The 13th: Final Chapter as Tommy Jarvis’ older sister.

Massacre At Central High is one of those movies that some would like to see released on DVD soon. I believe this movie got a PAL format only release on DVD, but no NTSC format yet.

Most have never heard of this movie, I certainly didn’t until I came across it one time years ago in a rental store. I had seen just about everything on their shelves except this and decided what the hell why not.

Massacre at Central High falls into the category of teen slashers/revenge. As to be expected the quality of the film isn’t all that great. The sound of the film can be terrible at times. Lacking background noise such times at the beach, the wind blowing and crowds. Dialog can
be a bit off at times as well. But if you can forgive the film for its flaws it has some pretty good action in it for its time.

There are some really good kills in the movie for a 1970’s flick. For me personally, I really got into the whole taking revenge out on these bullies. I couldn’t wait to see what David was going to do  next to these creeps. Unfortunately, its to bad the other students couldn’t appreciate the fact that they no longer had to be bullied around by this clan any more. So what did they do? They turned on each other and started to bully each other around. Longing for a new group to “lead” them and keep them in line. David decides that he is just going to have to teach the whole school a lesson by attempting to place a bomb in the basement. Now who hasn’t thought about doing that at some point in time?

One thing I found pretty odd about this movie was the fact that there was never any police
involved. There was no adult authority figures what so ever. So did this school not have principles? That would be great wouldn’t it? But the lack of any authority seems to be appealing in all the same.

The script is a bit cliched but that’s usually to be expected in a exploitation type of film. If you are into slasher/revenge films then this movie is worth a watch. Its not the greatest film out there by any standards, but the director does try to widen the material as much as possible in order to get the issues out there that he finds  most serious.

Lastly, the sex! Who doesn’t like a bit of T&A in their horror movies right? Now I have heard about there being plenty of sexual situations in this movie that are pretty good. But I have seen 2 versions of this movie and I didn’t find the sex content to be all that. Unless, they mean its good for its time. Or there’s another version I haven’t seen. But maybe its the Sexy Jean X-Rated one in Italy.

Overall it still has plenty of explosions and death scenes to keep a person occupied.

CAST

Derrel Maury as David
Andrew Stevens as Mark
Robert Carradine as Spoony
Kimberly Beck as Theresa
Ray Underwood as Bruce
Steve Bond as Craig

Lilith’s Tidbits:

The movie was shot in only 4 weeks!

First feature films for Andrew Stevens and Kimberly Beck.

They considered Mark Hamill for the role of David!

The part where David crashes into the lockers was not scripted. He ended up hurting himself in doing so.

Derrel Maury was originally set to play Rodney. After Rex Steven Sikes was recast in the part, he was given the leading role.

Andrew Stevens accidentally elbowed Rex Steven Sikes in the nose and broke it during the scene where the students find Craig’s body in the empty swimming pool. Sikes had to complete the rest of the film with the injury clearly visible.

Collector’s Alert!:

If you are a collector of horror movies, then you know doubt know it can be a bit difficult to find this movie. Not as hard as some others to find though. But it is a must have for any collector.

This movie has been found on at least 4 different labels found here in the U.S.. Not counting the foreign releases. I myself have found 3 of the 4!

There is an elusive blood Red VHS cassette release. I have only seen it once and it belonged to a fellow collector. This is quite rare from what I been told. So if you ever go on hunting excursions and you come across this movie in a blood Red VHS cassette, snatch it up!

MY RATING:

3/5

TRAILER: