Rating: 
Summary: HELL NIGHT- perfect example of a good time!
Review: HELL NIGHT, while it may be deriative of other 80's slasher films, is one of the best in the pack. It is also quite original- if you think about it, it was made before many of the others (in 1981) and cannot really be considered a rip-off- and is lackluster in the nudity in gore department (with absolutely no nudity), which is not an altogether bad thing. The atmosphere of the film is quite creepy and is TONS of fun to watch!A group of four teenagers- two boys and two girls, including THE EXORCIST's Linda Blair- being initiated into a fraterity/sorority is dared to stay for one night in Garth Manor, where a man killed his wife and kids, and one- a retarded/deformed boy- survived. Now someone- the boy, now grown-up perhaps?- is stalking the four teens, until only poor Linda is left. HELL NIGHT is not exactly one of those cheaply made horror films either. Irwin Yablans, who helped in the making of HALLOWEEN, produced this thriller, which was directed by Tom DeSimone. The acting is great, featuring a great cast of seasoned actors- Linda Blair, Peter Barton, Vincent Van Patten, and Suki Goodwin. The film is- simply put- one of the best slasher films ever made! Anchor Bay does a cracker-jack job (as usual) with the DVD of HELL NIGHT. The presentation, which is in widescreen is excellent and gives this wonderful film a genuinely creepy look to it. Special features include: -Widescreen Presentation
-Theatrical Trailer
-TV Spots
-Audio Commentary with Star Linda Blair,
Director Tom DeSimone, and Producers
Irwin Yablans and Bruce Cohn Curtis All in all, Anchor Bay's DVD of HELL NIGHT is a must-own for anyone's collection and is a film definately worth owning!
Rating:
Summary: HELL NIGHT- perfect example of a good time!
Review: HELL NIGHT, while it may be deriative of other 80's slasher films, is one of the best in the pack. It is also quite original- if you think about it, it was made before many of the others (in 1981)...and is lackluster in the nudity and gore department (with absolutely no nudity), which is not an altogether bad thing. The atmosphere of the film is quite creepy and is TONS of fun to watch! A group of four teenagers- two boys and two girls, including THE EXORCIST's Linda Blair- being initiated into a fraterity/sorority is dared to stay for one night in Garth Manor, where a man killed his wife and kids, and one- a retarded/deformed boy- survived. Now someone...is stalking the four teens... HELL NIGHT is not exactly one of those cheaply made horror films either. Irwin Yablans, who helped in the making of HALLOWEEN, produced this thriller, which was directed by Tom DeSimone. The acting is great, featuring a great cast of seasoned actors- Linda Blair, Peter Barton, Vincent Van Patten, and Suki Goodwin. The film is- simply put- one of the best slasher films ever made! Anchor Bay does a cracker-jack job (as usual) with the DVD of HELL NIGHT. The presentation, which is in widescreen, is excellent and gives this wonderful film a genuinely creepy look to it. Special features include: -Widescreen Presentation
-Theatrical Trailer
-TV Spots
-Audio Commentary with Star Linda Blair,
Director Tom DeSimone, and Producers
Irwin Yablans and Bruce Cohn Curtis All in all, Anchor Bay's DVD of HELL NIGHT is a must-own for anyone's collection and is a film definately worth owning!
Rating: 
Summary: Childhood Trauma
Review: I first saw the Trilogy of Terror when I was 3 years old. Why my parents let me watch it I have no idea. While the first two stories are decent psychological thrillers, it was the third story, "Prey" that truly disturbed me. I am now 22 and I have been plagued with nightmares my entire life centering around the Zuni hunting fetish that hunts Karen Black in this movie. For some reason this just really got to me. I still find this chapter of the movie the scariest thing I have ever seen in any film. The raw viciousness of the doll, the evil sounds it makes, and the final scene, all are truly horrifying. I nicknamed the doll "Cut-Out" as a kid since it cuts it way out of a suitcase in one part. I was curious if anyone else found this movie as frightening as I did. It's something I may never stop having nightmares about. I'd recommend it to anyone, just don't let your 3 year olds watch it.
Rating: 
Summary: Equal opportunity horror
Review: In the usual teen-slasher flick, all the cute guys get killed off immediately, leaving 70 minutes of girls taking showers and falling out of their nightgowns. Here a girl is still the sole survivor, but the majorly hunky Vincent Van Patton runs around in nothing but boxers for the first hour or so, and 80's teen-idol Peter Barton holds out until almost until the end. There's a plot, too, but who cares?
Rating:
Summary: A forgotten 80's Horror
Review: It's hard not to think that Linda Blair was offered the part in 'Hell Night' in 1981 to cash in on the ever popular 'The Exorcist'. In 1981 she had recently completed 'Exorcist 2 - The Heretic' so she was the perfect choice to be part of another horror theme. In this film, she plays the role of a teenager who, along with three others, has to spend the night in a haunted mansion. It's all part of initiation for their college. The film has some definite scary moments, although doesn't quite have the punch of Halloween. And while we're on the subject of Halloween,there are definite moments when you feel that they've borrowed ideas from that film. Watching 'Hell Night" again is fun, but I can see why it has been forgotten by so many people. Whether it's because of the pathetic looking zombie maniac or the slowness in the first half of the movie, or the predictable scares ... not sure Hell Night though is worth owning if you are a collector of 80's Horror films, but it's far from being the finest horror film made. DVD EVALUATION:
Anchor Bay have released a clear transfer of Hell Night - and in widescreen too. You also get the the movie trailer, 2 TV spots and commentary form Linda Blair and production executives. I was disappointed that the soundtrack was only in Mono. Considering other horror films have been remastered to 5.1 mix, I felt this let the film down. A 5.1 mix helps create atmosphere.
Rating:
Summary: Guilty pleasure
Review: Linda Blair stars as a sorority pledge who, along with three others (Van Patten, Barton and Goodwin) must spend the night in Garth Manor, an old abandoned house, as a part of her initiation. According to legend, the house's former owner killed his wife and three children there years before, though one of the children (who was said to be horribly deformed) is rumored to have survived and may still be lurking in the labyrinth of tunnels below the house. After Blair and the others start finding the mutilated bodies of their classmates on the grounds of Garth Manor, they begin to wonder if the legend is true. Blair turns in a surprisingly effective performance as a teenager from a working-class background who feels a little out of place among her well-heeled counterparts. She manages to make her character seem almost three-dimensional, which is rare indeed for a slasher flick. It's a shame that Blair didn't get more screen time. The film has some real pacing problems: after a great setup in the first 15 minutes, the film really lags, making the middle third tough going at times. But the intense final minutes of the film feature some terrific scares, and are definitely worth waiting for. Two and a half stars out of five.
Rating: 
Summary: Linda Blair saves this otherwise nondescript horror flick
Review: Linda Blair stars as a sorority pledge who, along with three others (Van Patten, Barton and Goodwin) must spend the night in Garth Manor, an old abandoned house, as a part of her initiation. According to legend, the house's former owner killed his wife and three children there years before, though one of the children (who was said to be horribly deformed) is rumored to have survived and may still be lurking in the labyrinth of tunnels below the house. After Blair and the others start finding the mutilated bodies of their classmates on the grounds of Garth Manor, they begin to wonder if the legend is true. Blair turns in a surprisingly effective performance as a teenager from a working-class background who feels a little out of place among her well-heeled counterparts. She manages to make her character seem almost three-dimensional, which is rare indeed for a slasher flick. It's a shame that Blair didn't get more screen time. The film has some real pacing problems: after a great setup in the first 15 minutes, the film really lags, making the middle third tough going at times. But the intense final minutes of the film feature some terrific scares, and are definitely worth waiting for. Two and a half stars out of five.
Rating:
Summary: Nice cheezy Blair horror film
Review: Lot's of gore in this fun horror flick! Lindalooks great in low cleavage period costume. She gives a spirited performance and jumps up and down alot when she gets spooked - check it out!Great chase scene with Linda in awesome cave! Also really cool impalement scene! Good DVD quality. Film has nice look - gothic house with lots of candles! Ifyou like Linda, your gonna like this one - pick it up!!
Rating:
Summary: Simply ingenious
Review: Now this is a great flick! You get scream queen Linda Blair and HALLOWEEN producer Irwin Yablans in one little dvd! Fraterniry and sorority pledges: Marti, Denise, Jeff and Seth must stay inside old Garth Manor for a night. But legend goes, 12 years earlier, Raymond Garth got fed up with his mutant family and killed almost all of them. Then himself. Remember, I said almost all of them. It seems that tonight is the anniversery of the murders. The group is locked in. But it's not so bad, Denise; the very sexy blond gal has snuck in a mini radio, some booze and some drugs. However, their night isn't all fun. It seems that some of the frat members decide to stay around and try to scare the ... out of the group (it's part of the initation). When they get used to it, it seems that there is something else that they should be very afraid of: the remaining child of the Garth family has been living there for a while and doesn't like the temperary guests in the house...... Frightening! That's exactly what this movie is. You think you see something, but it isn't what you think it is....or is it? That's what makes HELL NIGHT so much fun. Is it one of the frat members? Or is it real? The killer is quite shocking and the death scenes are quite fun. I enjoyed every second of HELL NIGHT. RECCOMENDED TO FANS OF:
Halloween (1978)
Sorority House Massacre (1987)
The Funhouse (1981) CAST
Linda Blair...................Marti
Vincent Van Patten.....Seth Peter Barton...............Jeff
Suki Goodwin..............Denise THE MOVIE: 4/4 THE PICTURE QUALITY: 10/10 Fantastic! Widescreen 1.85:1 enhanced for 16x9 TVs with very little grain. A bit dark, but it had to be so you don't see the killer until the end. THE AUDIO QUALITY: 8/10 2.0 mono, the commentary is the same THE SPECIAL FEATURES: A trailer, a few tv spots and an audio commentary by Linda Blair, the director and producers. SUBTITLES: none
Rating:
Summary: Hate those iron fences!
Review: So many horror movies came out in the early 1980's that movie makers sometimes had a hard time finding locations and situations that hadn't been used yet. Sorority and Fraternity initiations were a great way of sticking teens into situations no sane person would go into voluntarily. Hell Night sticks four unfortunate twentyish kids into Garth Mansion, the site of a grisly family slaughter years before. The sadistic pledge masters lock the huehuehuege iron gates behind them and inform them they have to stay the night. The pledge masters then begin setting off special effects they set up earlier to try and scare the four hapless pledges. As you might guess, there are real horrors inside which start thinning out the cast. Linda Blair is the obvious star of the show. I am a fan of Linda's but for some reason I just get the feeling while watching this that she is disinterested. In fact early on she seems to be improvising her lines. The GREAT commentary track explains some of this. Apparently everyone on the set had a great time and was loaded half the time. The director (Tom DeSimone)and producer (Irwin Yablans who brought us Halloween) are on the commentary as well. It's obvious everyone got along well and had fun making the film. Having seen the film before getting the DVD, I really liked the feel of it, although I wasn't sure why. The commentary hit on something I hadn't considered. The pledges are all in costumes since the Hell Night festivities were part of a costume party. The director mentions that this was done so they could logically dress the characters in gothic, period costumes without having to make an actual period film. The old mansion (a real location, not a set) combined with set lighting done almost exclusively with candlelight along with period costumes gives a very gothic, primative feel to the film. There are a few scenes of gore, but they are usually very, very fast cuts. The trap door in the floor scene rates as one of the all time great suspense scares. It would be easy to dismiss a lot of the horror films of the early 80's, and to be fair, there were many stinkers, but Hell Night holds genuine entertainment value (and not in a Mystery Science Theater kind of way). The movie is available in a double feature collection with the film Fade To Black. However if that edition doesn't include this great commentary track, I advise you buy this one instead.
| 
