Another day, another long-forgotten 80's slasher that came to my attention because it looked like it had to offer some decent murder sequences, T&A and a handful of clumsy and not-so-convincing red herrings. And yes, "Night Screams" is a more or less enjoyable horror effort, but only just as long as your expectations are kept to a minimum. We follow the usual crowd of stereotypical and irritating high school teenagers as they throw a graduation party in the football jock's house. However, there are two escaped criminals hiding in the basement and the hunky football star David himself suffers from aggressive behavior when he doesn't take his carefully prescribed pills. Soon after the party-goers are killed off in fairly imaginative ways (one girl has an axe planted in her skull, another guy's face is literally barbecued) and director Allen Plone begs us to think the culprit is either David or one of the mad thugs in the cellar. The plot twists don't really work, but I admire Plone for trying and there's at least a little bit of style to find in his film. Although that does not include the tasteless footage of porn movies and another inferior 80's slasher ("Graduation Day") that continuously plays on TV-sets in the background. I guess none of the actual actresses wanted to take her top off, so they needed to steal the padding from other movies. "Night Screams" is a forgettable and truly run-of-the-mill 80's slasher, but we've definitely seen worse already and avid fans of the decade will certainly not regret watching it.
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Coventry12 November 2006
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Scarecrow-8826 June 2010David seems to have such a bright future. He is the star running back on his high school football team, offered a scholarship to play for Oklahoma. He's got plenty of girls wanting to jump his bones if he so desires. Yet, we can see that without his pills(for "hyperactivity"), David isn't easy to be around, prone, as his mother says, to violent outbursts, rubbing his head as if a migraine was about to rumble his skull a loose. Two escaped lunatics, led by the sadistic Snake(John Hines), kill police officers, a cook and his wife at a diner, soon finding themselves at the home of David's parents, waiting inside the wine cellar as a prom party commences upstairs. Joni(Megan Wyss)is David's girlfriend, very thin-skinned and sensitive to any negativity offered her way. David's friends aren't that fond of her and Joni can sense that they would prefer him dating someone else. Lisa(Janette Caldwell)is the only high school girl who treats Joni with any class. Meanwhile, a serial killer is picking off David's friends one at a time as the escaped crazies seem idle in the wine cellar until the time for which they could go on the attack.
Director Allen Plone drags out the opening in tedious fashion, incorporating a lot of footage from the slasher GRADUATION DAY, this movie a couple is watching intently before being dispatched by a kid who uses a butcher knife, playing a piano tune shortly afterward. He later adds footage from pornos as extra filler. By 1987, the slasher genre was on the decline, and movies like NIGHT SCREAMS were just polluting an already worn premise regarding a psychopath destroying teenagers using various weapons applied in other films before this one. The ax to the head, death using a sauna with a trapped victim inside, electrocution in a hot tub, butcher knife to the back and torso, strangulation, fireplace poker, etc. Even the "escaped loonies" sub plot is old hat and shopworn, and, to tell you the truth, there were times where I almost forgot about them even being in the movie. The best scene, to me anyway, is the gratuitous blood shed of the diner murders as Snake just goes berserk, shooting everything in sight, before finding himself locked away in the wine cellar, just a few other scenes remaining of any worth featuring this character. Hines has this hilarious scene where he's rambling off some dialogue while pouring water over his face that should tickle the funny bone, he's not exactly a Shakespearian actor or anything. Joseph Paul Manno, as David, spends an awful lot of time either sulking or angry. No nudity except for the porno footage, with characters in NIGHT SCREAMS mainly kissing and groping. The identity of the killer will be of no surprise, I think, particularly to those who have seen any number of these kinds of slasher fare. -
I just saw "Night Screams" as part of an (obscure) slasher double bill with "Graduation Day" (1981). At least "Graduation Day" wanted to be a slasher. This, "Night Screams", I don't know what it wants to be. I do know it wants to be more clever but it ends up being a dumber movie all the same. A couple of escaped convicts find a hiding place in the basement of a house where a teenager on medication decides to have a party with his friends because his parents aren't home. There's bad music, bad sex, bad acting and eventually a few bad killings. On a technical level, it's not better or worse made than "Graduation Day". The latter at least played it by the early 80's slasher textbook and delivers as such a film. "Night Screams" plays it by the late 80's slasher textbook - not that the rules are much different, really - but manages to dumb things down to an almost intolerable level. Even with nada suspense or tension this time and the kills themselves aren't memorable either. The only mildly amusing aspect was the stupid twist at the end. It's such a typical conclusion, not at all original and you can see it coming from a mile away. But at least the filmmakers watched enough slasher flicks to get that thing right. Still, even if you're an avid slasher fan, I don't think you'll get too excited over this flick.
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Katatonia23 August 2002I think this is a really good slasher flick from the 80's that most people have never seen or heard of. There's a lot of 80's music, fashion, puns, etc. The plot is actually not that bad, and the acting is "mostly" very good considering this was filmed in Witchita, Kansas. Some of the killings are quite interesting in their method and approach. The ending was particularly well done in my opinion, it leaves the idea open for a sequel that never came. Not everyone will enjoy this movie, but if you like well executed slasher films from the 80's then you'll most likely be very pleased. On a side note the DVD which was put out by Image is above average, the picture is very clear and the sound is in Dolby 2.0 Surround. Sadly there are no special features besides scene selections and two trailers for other Image DVD releases.
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BA_Harrison5 October 2019Behind the uninspired title lies an equally uninspired slasher that fails to deliver those essential ingredients of any good trashy horror: gratuitous nudity and gore. Initially, the film shows promise, opening with a girl getting topless in a changing room before being attacked by a masked maniac, but then it becomes apparent that this is actually a scene from 1981 slasher Graduation Day, as watched by two of this movie's characters before they are stabbed to death. Nudity borrowed from another film doesn't count (which also negates some T&A later on, which comes from a porn film being watched at a party), and the subsequent stabbings are lame.
The rest of the film continues in this disappointing fashion as a group of friends at a post-graduation party are bumped off in tame and uninventive ways off by an unseen maniac. Suspects include the escaped lunatics hiding in the basement, and football star David (Joseph Paul Manno), who is prone to outbursts of violence if he stops taking his meds. Of course, these turn out to be red herrings, but the real identity of the killer isn't hard to guess.
Of the numerous murders that occur in the house, we get a guy skewered with a fire poker, poisoning in a sauna, an axe in the head, a guy barbecued on a stove and stabbed in the neck, strangulation, suffocation, electrocution in a hot-tub, and choking with a pool cue, none of which are likely to satisfy gore-hounds. The best part of the film comes earlier on, when the escaped criminals are involved in a shootout with some cops and kill the staff of a diner in cold-blood: it's a surprisingly brutal scene, with some bloody squib-work.
2.5/10, rounded down to 2 for diabolical dance troupe The Sweetheart Dancers, whose terrible moves would get them four 'NOs' on America's Got Talent. -
gridoon23 September 2003This worthless, bottom-of-the-barrel, stupid slasher film is only for those who have A LOT of free time on their hands, and simply want to see a few gory killings, without any concern for quality. If you don't belong in this category, however, skip it and go watch any of the roughly 3,784 better horror films available in the video stores. (*)
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anxietyresister2 May 2008Things in this film you can expect to see: BAD acting, BAD music, BAD hair, BAD gore, BAD dialogue, BAD camera-work... Oh and did I mention, the front cover was BAD?
Things in this film you won't see: Anything vaguely of any interest. Unless you like watching car crashes.
Best part: A totally random moment... A loving couple are doing it in a sauna, and a random girl who we never see again is massaging her breasts in the shower. Since all of the main actresses refused to shed their togs, the director decided to hire an adult film actress to satisfy his nudity quotient. Obviously the chore of writing her into the movie was too much for him.
Worst Part: The gang are in a nightclub before the nights debauchery, we get a cutaway to a bunch of spangily clad dancers jiving to perhaps the MOST HORRIBLE SONG EVER. The spectacle goes on for a painful three minutes, and amazingly no-one walks out of the pub or complains to the manager. Are the clientèle deaf?
Most unwanted bonus: Over the end credits we get every death in the film repeated. If you were stupid enough to stick around that long, you deserve to be tortured by all the crap a second time. AND some outtakes, which are better acted than the rest of the film.
Final Verdict: I bought it for 50p from a rubbish dump sale. I should have left it there. It was the perfect place for it. 0/10 -
dagonseve16 October 2010Trying to fairly evaluate a film this far down the totem pole is a pretty difficult task – it's no secret how poorly-made it'll be and leaves you comparing it to weaker selections in order to justify a viewing of it. Night Screams is a title, like some of the others I've reviewed thus far, that arrived late to the game and was immediately engulfed by the ever-growing Slasher cesspool. Whether it was looked at as an exercise in futility or a point of experimentation directors were forced to introduce something new and shocking to grab audiences or release the same old drivel in order to gain back what was spent. I can boldly say that Night Screams is not a good film; it sucks, to be honest, but somehow the premise isn't all that far-fetched.
The film sets the stage with a married couple watching Graduation Day on television (now you can see why I reviewed these films back-to-back, eh?). While the husband is outside preparing hamburgers on the grill his wife is stabbed to death by an intruder. After he notices the body he immediately calls the authorities; the call is cut short when he is murdered in turn. The story shifts its focus to David, the star of the local high school football team who's pressured by the presence of a scout from Oklahoma University. David and his friends decide to throw a party at his parent's house in celebration of his achievement. Meanwhile, across town, two mental asylum escapees kill a few police officers and after they arrive in town, hide out in David's basement. Added to this complex equation is David's mental state; prone to bouts of anger without his prescribed pills. With the maniacal duo hidden away in the cellar, David's volatile temperament, and the demented knife- wielder, who is responsible for the deaths of the party-goers?
I mentioned a moment ago the inclusion of archival footage of Graduation Day. The initial thing that occurred to me was, " of all the movies to reference, why that one?" I wish I had an explanation. If you haven't seen the murderous segments from Graduation Day, fear not! Night Screams does a fine job of spoiling them for you – I suppose it's not much of a let-down anyway. After several wasted minutes of this in the opening segment the husband displays the most hysterical reaction to his wife's murder...I don't think it's possible to sound any less shocked. Speaking of less than shocking, the quality of his deliverance doesn't come as much of a surprise since the majority of the cast debut'd their acting talents with this movie.
In the same swift motion, they exited the business – even the director, Allen Plone, would only make three more films after Night Screams (spread out over the span of 12 years). The only actor worth mentioning in this affair is Ron Thomas. Viewers may recognize him as "Bobby Brown" from The Karate Kid parts 1 & 2; certainly not the most prestigious credentials but among the other bit players featured in this film he comes across as a master of the arts.
The audio, specifically the intro music, is laughably bad. I can envision the composer's son sneaking into the recording studio, laying down a few stock tracks, and messing around with the volume dials. It's rickety and experimental sounding; an experiment gone terribly awry. Clearly, the composer's body of work in this feature is an uninspiring, synth-based cling-a-clanged crescendo of awfulness. Whoever had the displeasure of being the first to listen to this monstrosity would have been better off reproducing similar sounds by throwing a few pots and pans into the dryer and walking off the set.
The herrings displayed in Night Screams aren't vividly red; they are dressed up in nice little outfits so you aren't aware of their intended purpose. You may feel that your intelligence is underestimated with the use of obvious over-aged guys and gals to portray high schoolers. It's really that bad. I seem to make this complaint with every Slasher that I review but the creators of Night Screams must've desperately been in search for actors and actresses that appeared age-appropriate. For instance, the football locker room in the beginning of the film looks like a police precinct with all of the bravado, extreme chest hair, and mustaches to go around. Even David, the film's star character, looks as if he's been married with a kid for a few years with another on the way.
Night Screams isn't as bad as I predicted. The production values are bottom-of-the-barrel stuff. The acting is mostly crappy and the use of special effects is limited because of the angles used during the death sequences. While there are many clichés to point and laugh at Night Screams tried its little heart out despite the lack of budget. It's a disgraceful movie for sure but at least they tried. I've chosen to happily accept their sentiment but I'll never watch the movie again. -
acidburn-106 July 2011The plot = David (Joe Manno) is the captain of the football team and is also the most popular guy in school but he has a problem he's on medication to control his violent fits, so what does he do he throws a party for all his friends at his house while his parents are away. But while the party starts going two convicts escapes from a nearby prison and hides out in his basement ready to terrorise the party guests.
The opening scene we get a stereotypical 80's couple snuggling up watching "Graduation Day" and then surprise surprise they both gets killed and the credits come on and the movie starts. After seeing this part I thought that this movie was gonna be quite good but sadly I was wrong.
This movie has very little going for it although there is a big body count and a few fun kill sequences, but when it comes to everything else this movie just simply falls apart and becomes very boring, the acting for one is awful, even for an 80's slasher and the directing is strictly amateur. The last 20 minutes perk up a bit- but considering the unrelieved tedium of what's gone before it'd be a miracle if it didn't. The ending as well was predictable (I figured it out long before) and it well and truly shows that by the late 1980's that slasher movies just became tame and rubbish.
All in all this is a bad slasher with only a few redeeming qualities. -
deborahrighetti20 October 2020A little too much padding and an uneven story keep Night Screams from joining any list of great horror films from the 80's, but there's still a lot to enjoy. The murder scenes are executed with a little bit of pizazz and the filmmakers at least attempt to give some of the characters a little development.
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kjckb22 February 2022This was not worth the time I spent watching it. The ending irritated me to the extreme. It just didn't make sense at all. I kind of figured who the killer was, but I hate *SPOILER* when the killer gets away with it and an innocent is blamed. The late 80's were fraught with horror movies like this, including "Cheerleader Camp" and "Edge of the Axe" where the innocent is blamed for the real killer's deeds. I hate these types of endings. Give me real killers like Jason, Freddy and Michael where they take the blame and don't give a damn if you know it's them.
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By the late eighties, it had pretty much all been done before, hadn't it? The slasher film has always been the most blunt and unoriginal sub genre of horror, and I suppose that's what I like about it. Some slashers did get a little big for their britches and tried to be like the big boys, but that didn't quite work out (FADE TO BLACK being a crowning example of an egomaniacal slasher), but I like the ones that are more humble; more honest with themselves, who are comfortable with the familiar mold of the slasher film. Enter NIGHT SCREAMS.
David is the quarterback of his high school football team as well as the class hunk, which angers his steady girl, Joni, since girls are constantly throwing themselves at him. David's parents decide to reward him for getting a four-year athletics scholarship to O.U. by leaving him the house for the weekend, so naturally, David throws a party. However, someone begins bumping off the partygoers one by one. Is it the two escaped convicts hiding out in the basement? Or is it David, who needs medication to control his violent outbursts? Or is it a third-party?
NIGHT SCREAMS may be very straight-forward, but it does have a lot of good ideas in mind that don't fully fill themselves out. For one thing, the thought of two criminals hiding out in the basement wile partygoers are being killed upstairs is a nifty idea, but the two don't really DO anything besides serve as the red herrings. I also sort of liked the preposterous "twist" (it's really, really obvious who the killer is),which featured a nice bit of role reversal, as well as a downbeat ending similar to THE DORM THAT DRIPPED BLOOD (1982).
Really, there are two things you should be going into this to see: the deaths and the beloved cheese. Gorehounds will be more than satisfied with NIGHT SCREAMS, as it features more than twenty kills, and most of them have their fair share of bloodshed. There's a bit of variety with the kills as well, and we get an axe to the head, an electrocution in a hot tub, impalement with a fire poker, suffocation with a plastic bag, and, my personal favorite, one poor sap getting his head shoved on a burger he's grilling then getting neck surgery via fork!
There's definitely a LOT of cheesy moments in NIGHT SCREAMS, and it's fantastic! First off, we have what I like to call, "The Most 80's Opening To Any Slasher Movie", in which a couple (the male sporting amulet and a mustache; the female with huge hair) watching the 1981 slasher GRADUATION DAY and getting killed, followed by the killer playing "Chopsticks" on the piano, then cutting to the credits and very, very cheesy synth-music! We also get a love scene spliced with scenes from some seventies porno, a live band playing crappy music, the "nationally famous" Sweetheart Dancers, the comic-relief fat guy, and more.
The script, however is very weak, even though they did manage to craft some likable characters. I would say the acting is slightly better than average, but it's understandable why not a lot of the cast won any awards. Some of the scenes are fairly dark, but that's a very minor complaint.
I guess the best way to sum up NIGHT SCREAMS is that it could have been a whole lot worse than it ended up being. Like SLAUGHTERHOUSE ROCK (1988), NIGHT SCREAMS is a cheesy classic that gets beat up for little-to-no reason. Yes, it is lacking in plot. Yes, nearly no suspense is generated (there were a couple moments that I could see were at least trying to be suspenseful).
But I can see that Allen Plone put his all into it despite lack of budget, and it's fairly obvious Dillis L. Hart II had faith in it (count how many times his name appears in the credits), and I can see that. It's a humble, unabashed body count flick that exists for the sole purpose of entertainment. It moves at a brisk pace and is nearly never boring, which is more than I can say for some other films I've seen. Did I mention this was made in Wichita, Kansas?
Highly recommended. -
HumanoidOfFlesh3 September 2010Somewhere in Wichita David is a potential college football star who's just won a four year scholarship to a college somewhere in Oklahoma.His mates decide to throw him a serious farewell party whilst his folks are out that night.Unfortunately three uninvited guests secretly gatecrash these nightly celebrations,two are convicts who've fled from lockup,now hiding out somewhere in the homes cellar while our third interloper is a mental patient escapee with a connection to the party guests and notably David himself.Soon the bodies start to pile up...Watchable slasher with gore,nudity and plenty of movie clips from Herb Freed's "Graduation Day"."Night Screams" tries to be a bit different than the rest of its low-budget neighbors.The action is slow and the bodycount includes ten murders or so.7 out of 10.
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BandSAboutMovies7 June 2023Wichita, Kansas is a crazy place.
David (Joe Manno) has been playing football his whole life to make his father happy, finally getting scouted and getting to be a Boomer Sooner for Barry Switzer's University of Oklahoma. But he better keep up on his pills, as his mother keeps reminding him.
Mom and dad aren't around tonight, though, so his friends D. B. (Ron Thomas, Bobby from The Karate Kid), Russell, Chuck, Brenda, Mason, Joni, Lisa (Janette Caldwell, who also shows up in small parts in Heart and Souls and Striking Distance), Frannie, Doug and Chris throw him a farewell party - I mean, college does not work this way, you don't instantly leave town in the middle of the football season, which I would assume is late September - and set themselves up as sacrifices for Runner and Snake, two escaped convicts who have conveniently decided to hide in the basement of David's house, along with a former mental patient who has ties to David.
And boy do they die. Mason is impaled with a fireplace poker. Brenda tries to leave and someone attacks her inside her car, so she jumps out and hides under another car, which crushes her. Chris is hit in the head with an axe. Doug is killed by a light tube tossed into the hot stones of a sauna. Frank has his face grilled. Lisa is strangled. Russell is choked. Frannie is electrocuted in the hot tub. Even Russell gets killed when he starts to show some morality about the whole evening. D. B. Gets stabbed in the stomach but is able to kill Snake at the last minute. I feel like I should have buried some of the lyrics from "88 Lines About 44 Women" in this paragraph to see if you were paying attention.
David has had a hyperactivity disorder since he was a kid which causes him to lose his temper. You might start to think that he could be the killer - I mean, the cops and his parents sure do - but then you'd miss the twist.
Director Allen Plone went on to direct Phantom of the Ritz, Sweet Justice and made a winery's franchise video this year, so he's still working. Writer Mitch Brian went on to write Transformations and twelve episodes of Batman the Animated Series and his co-writer Dillis L. Hart II also produced this movie.
When this was first made, the producers felt that it wasn't long enough, plus it was missing the critical ingredients of the slasher: sex, nudity and gore. They grafted on scenes from Graduation Day, with the kids watching that movie - and giving away the ending of that movie! - and then shooting some skin so that no one would be disappointed when they watched it. And hey! The Sweetheart Dancers show up and dance in a nightclub!
This movie hit just right for me, thanks to a religion-obsessed killer, a hidden secret killer (double positive or negative, depending on your morals), a cop not only set on fire but shotgun blasted, the jokester character getting killed in a satisfying way, a couple that just wants to watch porn (she even complains about watching the same one all the time but man, I recognize Seka on the TV and this makes me happy and realize what a pervert I am that a brief clip of early 80s hardcore shows up and I say, "Oh yeah, that's Seka and John Holmes" and wonder who I would have thrown on and yes, it would have either been Siobhan Hunter at the time this came out) and a synth soundtrack that pleases my ears as much at 50 as it would have at 15 when this came out.
Someone wrote on Letterboxd "it's hardly deserving of an individual release" and the jokes on you. It's not just a DVD or blu ray, it's a 4K now. -
lor_22 March 2023My review was written in December 1987 after watching the movie on Prism video cassette.
"Night Screams" is a subpar specimen of regional horror filmmaking (shot in Wichita). Slasher pic is loaded with cliches and the running time is padded shamelessly with footage from a porn film and endless end credits (intercut with "highlights" condemning the preceding pic).
A group of graduating high school seniors get together for a party at a remote house and are killed one at a time. Suspects include two vicious escaped criminals prowling nearby, plus the hero, an unbalanced football great who, hint, hint, has left behind his medication. Twist has an unlikely character proving to be the deranged killer, and getting away with it at film's end.
Film was edited by noted film doctor Herbert L. Strock and is spiced up by lengthy excerpts of softcore sex footage from a porn feature starring Seka, Honey Wilder and John Holmes. Acting, gore and tech credits are routine. -
bombersflyup19 May 2023Night Screams is a low-budget, low quality slasher, making little sense throughout.
The characters are terrible and the dialogue woeful, but the cinematography and casting choices are even worse. There are multiple killers at the same estate, who have never met and never do, yet the football star resident of the house takes the rap, because of his outbursts of violence when not taking his pills. The film is padded with scenes from another film, much better than this one. Nothing to see in the death scenes and once again there's no reasoning or point, just another stupid bloody slasher film, the end. -
poolandrews19 February 2006Night Screams starts as a couple named Ethan & Beth are watching a cheesy horror film (the very thing I was doing at that point!) when Ethan decides he's hungry & goes outside to cook himself a burger on the barbecue, inside unknown to Ethan back inside Beth is stabbed to death. Finding her body Ethan tries to phone the police but he to is stabbed... Wichita, Kanas & college football star David (Joseph Paul Manno) has won a four year scholarship to a nice posh college in Oaklahoma where all his 'dreams' will become a reality, nice. Before he heads off David is throwing a big party at his house for his friends. Meanwhile it has emerged that two convicts have escaped from prison & in a desperate search for shelter come across David's large, isolated country house. As David's friends gather it seems that they are far from alone as one-by-one they meet grisly ends at the hands of an unknown killer, are the convicts responsible? Or maybe it's someone else with even more sinister motives...
Directed by Allen Plone I thought Night Screams was an OK slasher at best & a tired clichéd rehash at worst. The script by Mitch Brian & producer Dillis L. Hart II has all the usual slasher ingredients, the isolated location, the disposable cast of annoying teens including the obligatory comic relief character, the hero, the bad guys & a steady stream of murders so if all you want is a slasher film then you could do worse than Night Screams although having said that you could do a lot better as it does nothing particularly original or outstanding to distinguish itself in an overcrowded & limited sub-genre. There are a few sub-plots that I imagine were supposed to add to the mystery but are underdeveloped & feel almost like afterthoughts, the medication that David is on that is so important to him is occasionally mentioned but never in any great detail, one of the escaped convicts talks a load of religious psycho babble but for no apparent reason, the opening murder of Beth & Ethan seem almost to be from a completely different film & the stupid way everyone falls out with each other over girls & jealously might have made for some good red-herrings but again it seems the filmmakers merely wanted to pad the film out & weren't that interested in connecting these various ideas & plot threads together to make a better film. When the killers identity is eventually revealed in a supposed twist ending their motives are slim to say the least & as a whole has little impact.
Director Plone does an OK job, it's reasonably well made throughout although the scares are minimal, there isn't much build up to the killings & as a result Night Screams lacks tension during it's most important scenes. While at the party David's friends seem intent on watching porn & every so often Plone cuts to showing random clips of porn which is strange when the film is going along nicely then all of a sudden it cuts to a naked woman in a shower washing herself & paying close attention to her breasts! The murders are OK, they're not the goriest but they're not too badly done, there are various stabbings, a poker impalement, an axe in someones head, electrocution, strangulation, death by pool cue, someone has their face grilled on a cooker, someone is suffocated with a plastic bag, someone is squashed by a car & there are some gory gunshot wounds.
Technically Night Screams is pretty good, it has 80's written all over it from the hair styles & clothes to the cars & furniture but that's not really a criticism as it's a product of it's time. The cinematography, music, special effects & general production values are all decent enough. The acting is average at best but not bad enough to spoil things to any great degree.
Night Screams is an OK slasher, if your a die hard slasher fan than you may like this as it's not too bad. If you just want to see the 'highlights' of Night Screams then fast-forward straight to the end credits as for some bizarre reason it replays short clips from the film between the names, including all the murders... -
This film is so incredibly dreadful. That dialogue is, crazy, and mix that with bad acting! Its so, jerky and forced sometimes. I think the women are the worst, they are falling all over their men, really bad image. And oh my god, the killings, they are ridiculous! in the bathroom at the start with the fencing sword, and all shes saying is "what are you doing", she doesn't try and stop him or run or anything, typical. I don't get why in these films, they gotta constantly have topless women. I watched Hellgate on the same night, topless women once again, daft. Its good for a laugh. I watched it at about, 1:30am, cos i was bored and couldn't sleep. Definitely helped that little problem
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forecastfortoday28 July 2010By the late 80s, slashers were past the peak of gracing theaters with their ill-fated characters and their cliché murder scenes, only giving slasher fans Friday the 13th sequels, and direct-to-video terrors. Every now and then, something new would come around, such as Evil Laugh, Slaughter High, Doom Asylum, and this. Night Screams is a pretty typical cheesy slasher romp with enormous trends of big curly perms, catchy pop music, numerous red herrings, and fake looking death scenes.
David (Joe Manno), a hunky high school football player, is throwing a party for his friends at his mansion while his parents are out of town. His shy girlfriend, Joni (Megan Wyss), is looked down upon by David's friends, who would prefer David to be with someone else. The only person who likes Joni is Lisa (Jeanette Allyson Caldwell; one of the few characters that are actually likable), whom defends Joni whenever someone is rude to her. During the night, David is horrified to realize that he can't find the pills that help his hyperactivity, making him short tempered and easily angered. What David and the rest of his friends don't know is that two maniacs who escaped from an asylum, Snake (John Hines) and Johnny (Troy Mays), broke into his house and are hiding in the basement (Why does this strangely remind me of The Majorettes?). Also, they don't realize that someone is beginning to kill them off one by one. Could it be the two maniacs? Could it be David? Or could it be someone else...? (I bet you can already guess who the killer is!)
The movie, while not completely original, does try to stray from most slashers, taking on the sub-plot of the two escaped lunatics to help out the killer add to the body count. The identity of the killer, while obvious and cliché, is interesting in that they have a motive that is understandable and actually makes sense. Another interesting thing about the movie is that part of the film is made up of two other movies, Graduation Day (1981), and a softcore porn shown towards the end. The movie's climax, which consists entirely of characters walking around in the dark and one character strangely disappearing, is pretty unimpressive and muddled. We see three characters outside, fighting, then one of those characters is stabbed. Next we see one of the two surviving characters back inside the house without giving any explanation as to what happened to the OTHER survivor.
The movie overall is pretty bad. There are a couple of interesting deaths (such as a character having their face grilled, a character being poisoned in a sauna by toxic fumes), some characters that are pretty likable (Lisa, Joni, and D.B.) and a twist ending that is cliché but pretty well executed (it would've worked better had it have been a little bit less ambiguous). The movie tries it's best at being different and unique, and while it fails, it does give a good effort considering the budget and the bad acting. -
dutchtuga11 May 2002This MUST be one of the worst films I have seen in my life. I bought it because it was it was so cheap and because i was very curious. It was a bad move.....Everything's horrible about this! No words can describe this movie. Night Screams really shows you how to NOT make a movie. Avoid this one and stick to Friday the 13th. Even Friday the 13th part 5 is a classic compared to night screams. The script was a disaster and i wont even mention the acting. It's not worth it. The ONLY thing thats more or less good about this pick is the corny 80's setting, music and clothing. What fun to see that! I still don't know how these directors manage to get their money to make such crap. I could do better.
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maxineedwards-787846 November 2019By the time Night Screams came out, the slasher film had gone past life support and was at death's door. Night Screams doesn't do much to revitalize the genre, but it's competently and professionally made with a few reasons to tune in.
A seemingly unrelated murder kicks off the film as two people are murdered while watching Graduation Day on TV (if you think it's gonna get meta or something, think again). It's years later and a mentally disturbed football player has a party while his parents are away and his friends are brutally murdered one by one. There's also two homicidal bandits on the run who have chosen his basement to hide out in to avoid the law, but they're such obvious red herrings that their subplot doesn't amount to much.
If you're looking for gore, Night Screams actually does deliver in that department. People are stabbed, electrocuted, suffocated, and even burn on a grill like a hamburger. If you're an 80's fashion enthusiast, there's also a whole lot of questionable hairstyles and wardrobes on display. -
mark.waltz19 October 2023Certainly no masterpiece, and filled with an unnecessary scene of a female adult star fondling herself in the shower as well as a violent bloody prologue of random people being stabbed, but for the most part watchable. I found this to be decently written, acted and directed considering the kind of film it is, a believable set-up and teen characters that were far more believable and complex than they usually are.
For a cast of amateurs (no one who stands out worth mentioning), the line readings felt complete natural, and the film didn't drag, while the violent moments came fast and without warning. The suspects in the killings don't really dominate, and the lead character, Dave, is a high school jock that has more than just muscle dominating his thoughts. Locker room scenes show both the young men and women hiding little, although outside of a brief top front and backside, it's mainly in good taste. -
Leeccdoo15 July 2023Vinegar Syndrome put this out on Blu Ray & 4KUltraHD and it's totally worth the money. Sure it's NO masterpiece or Oscar-Award winning material of the sort but still is an outrageously entertaining, nasty and wildly inventive Slasher that is neither run of the mill or as bad as most of the people on here claim it to be. From reading other reviews, I was expecting something 'totally unwatchable' but instead got a flick that was quite brutal, enjoyably campy as well as trashy all at the same time. Sure it may not be 100% original either but the murder scenes are rather ingenious. Creative for sure but also just plain wicked too despite the low-budget! Good special effects.
The acting is pretty decent, although nothing to write home about but much better compared to some other similar efforts. IMO it seemed there maybe was some inspiration from Alone In The Dark (1982). It's definitely not for everyone but huge fans of Grindhouse Slasher movies and 80's Horror might get a kick out of it. Death Screams (1982) would make a good Double-bill with this long-underseen, obscure, and extremely underrated gem of Slasher cinema. -
Bobbysoxxx21 July 2022Night screams is awsome if you are aware of what you're getting into. It won't be getting a criterion release anytime soon but for those who are looking for a violent slasher with a high kill count you'll wanna pick this up. It is filmed a little too dark in points but it's still a sick lil flick I'm glad I got a vhs copy recently.
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dead_dudeINthehouse15 July 2003NIGHT SCREAMS is underrated in the slasher genre. The premise works: Three escaped convicts head to a mansion where a teen party is taking place. These teens start to disappear one by one (ok they are brutally murdered). Later it's revealed that the escaped convicts had little responsability with the murders. Shocking!
The plot is a combination of the SLUMBER PARTY MASSACRE and the 1982's classic ALONE IN THE DARK. NIGHT SCREAMS deserves a chance, watch it with low expectations and you'll have a good time!
3/10 -Terrible but tries to stand out of the garbage
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