Sunday, December 7, 2014

To All A Goodnight (1980)

A prank gone wrong results in the death of a student.  Two years later, the semester is over at the Calvin Finishing School for Girls, and the girls are headed home to spend Christmas with their families.  All except five young ladies whose parents aren't around. They'll remain at school during the break.

As with all young women in horror movies, they're interested in smuggling some young men into the house for a party.  The housemother is drugged with sleeping powder in her milk, and the boys fly in on a private plane since one of the kids is rich and has a pilots license.

Nancy is the odd girl out. Unlike the other girls, she's shy, naive, and never been kissed.  While the other girls are partying  and having sex, Nancy pours herself a glass of milk and gets into her pajamas.

What the kids don't realize is there's a killer in a Santa Claus suit stalking those left on campus.  He's already killed one couple, and is getting ready to wipe out the rest of them.

The next day two couples are missing, but no one worries since they figure the couples have gone off to make out.  But when Nancy stumbles over a body on the grounds, someone finally realizes there's more going on and the police are called. The solution - everyone stay inside and they'll leave two officers there for the night. Since this is a horror film, and the officers are drooling over the barely legal teens, we know that nothing is going to be okay.

I've been wanting to see this for a long time. It's been out of print and I love a good 80s slasher. Plus it's one of the earliest killer Santa movies.  So I was glad to see it was recently released on DVD.  It's not the most exciting slasher you'll ever see.  Most of the kills are out of nowhere. So the victims aren't aware that anything is amiss, and there's no tension for the viewer since the film hasn't even let us in on the fact that the killer is near. I wasn't expecting anything brilliant, so I wasn't disappointed.

This stars Jennifer Runyon in her first movie role. I always liked her because she tended to play characters that were sweet, and this film is no exception.  There's an interview with her included as an extra, and she seems very nice in real life also.  There are also two other interviews included and all three are worth watching.

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