Sorority House Massacre

This week, I'm still not home yet, and my laptop was acting funny, so I apologize for the delay. With that in mind, I present a pretty random one, the bizarre Sorority House Massacre, starring absolutely no one I've ever heard of in my entire horror-movie-watching life. Great...I'll do You're Next as soon as I can get back to my apartment again to see it, I swear! Oh, and SPOILERS ahead...

So, we see, in the first scene, a young woman named Beth, sitting up in a hospital bed. Beth is visited by an older woman, presumably a neighbor, and she asks Beth "what happened". That, of course, leads into an extended flashback of the movie...

Beth is now walking along a sidewalk, and carrying an overnight bag. She heads toward a large white sorority house, then we see a figure sprawled out on a tiny bed. The house is entered, and the camera gives us a tour of spacious, empty rooms.

The figure in the bed begins to have convulsions, then we get to visit the second floor. As we see Beth arrive at the front door and open it, the stranger in the bed begins to punch their own arm. Kooky.

Beth is greeted by one of the sorority sisters, and then we finally see that the person in the bed is an unshaven man. He opens his eyes and stares into the camera, and there's a scream that brings a pair of interns running. Beth, meanwhile, is shown to room 5, which she'll be sharing with 3 other girls. She's not a member, but she was apparently invited to take a tour for the weekend.

The pair of schlubby interns exit the room again, and they reveal that they used tape to subdue the patient. They argue over whether to call a doctor named Lindsey, but decide that it can wait until morning. The patient is then seen struggling to free himself from confinement.

That night, Beth has yet another dream. In it, she's walking slowly toward the house again, but she watches a trio of little girls digging in the dirt and playing. They ask her where she's going, and she indicates the house. They warn her to be careful, and watch her enter again.

Beth makes a beeline for the dining room, where she finds a group of life-sized dolls seated at the table. As she circles around them, she notices that the silverware has been replaced by hunting knives. A drop of blood then hits the white tablecloth, and several more follow. Beth realizes that the blood is leaking through the ceiling, onto a chandelier, and the stain appears to be massive,

Beth goes upstairs to investigate, and finds the bedroom where the blood originated from. A glass container filled with marbles crashes to the floor in another room, so Beth wanders over for a look. She finds what sounds like a child in bed, covered entirely up by blankets, but pulling them back reveals more blood in the bed. Beth backs up, gasps as something behind her scares her, and the dream ends.

A girl named Sara bursts into the room, and they introduce themselves to each other. After trying to mooch a sweater from the houseguest, Sara makes a hasty retreat. This sorority house is like the Twilight Zone.

As various house sisters go on with their morning routine, we see Sara ask a girl named Cindy for a jacket, but she grumpily refuses. Another girl, Linda, tosses her a matching jacket for her blouse. Exciting stuff.

In the bathroom, Beth is just staring at herself in the mirror while other girls shower. Then we see a glimpse of our favorite mental patient, struggling to free his arms. He breaks free, tears the tape off of his mouth, then sits up. Finally! We're 11 minutes in, and I was starting to think that I had the wrong movie!

A girl named Tracy complains to some of the others that she finds Beth to be "glum". The other girls chastise her for being catty, then they all gossip anyway. Fortunately, they shut up seconds before Beth enters the room. As they head outside, they talk about having some kind of big party.

Beth realizes that she grabbed the wrong book, so she goes back into the house. In the bedroom, Beth looks into a mirror, but sees a guy glaring back at her instead of her own reflection. He raises a knife and plunges it through the mirror, where it gets trapped halfway into the glass, and drips with blood. One of the sorority sisters walks in, and Beth realizes that none of it was real.

The patient, now standing up, is busy throwing himself into the walls. A young female doctor asks an intern about how the patient acted the previous night, and they appear to be heading to his room. As soon as the flunky unlocks his door, the psycho attacks him, so the doctor swiftly shuts the cell door, then watches the scuffle through the door's tiny window.

After our sorority girls tell Beth a really corny story about a pet pig, we see that the killer has been sedated again. The doctor has a machine brought into his room, probably for something like electroshock therapy. BZZT! Do I smell toast?

We see a couple of the girls struggle in their classes, then Beth has another vision. This time, the killer is leering at her from the window. She disrupts the lecture, so she decides to leave.

A creepy nerd named Andy tells Sara about an experiment that involved killing kittens to see if the mother cat could sense the loss through telepathy. That discussion leads back to the killer. The machine is being used to see how his brainwaves react to the things she says to him.

Beth has a conversation with a woman who is apparently the house mother, Mrs. Lawrence. She's going away for the weekend, so she gives Beth some instructions to tell the other girls. Then she walks out of the movie, presumably forever. Is anyone else starting to think that this has way too much plot for a supposed slasher flick?

Back in the hospital, the doctor begins to ask the patient some questions about his sudden outbursts. After each question, she consults the machine, to see if his brain activity gets stirred up by anything. Oh, and before that, we find out that the killer has a rare condition, one that allows him to be both awake and dreaming at the same time.

Her questions get more specific, and she discovers that the killer had one of his waking dreams just before he went apeshit. She asks him what the dream was about, and he says the name "Laura". Who the heck is Laura?

The line on the graph starts to jump around like a kangaroo on crack, and the intern tells the doctor that he's amazed to hear the patient speak. Then we see Beth back at the sorority, nervously looking through each room for more scary images. As she sees flashes of her dead parents, the mental patient appears to be able to see her from his cell. Even worse, she sees him.

The patient has another outburst, so they pump him full of sedatives. They leave the room, but we see that he somehow managed to remain fully alert. Then Beth has a jump-scare while backing out of the house(Why do these nimrods always back into people?), and meets up with the group of girls from the previous sequence.

They all celebrate having the house unsupervised, and get ready to party. The wild night includes eating another girl's ice cream, and trying on some of Cindy's clothing. What a fun group. Girls Gone Mild. We even get a generic "look at us in different outfits!" montage.

At the end of the scene, they realize that Beth is upset. As she starts to discuss her dreams, we travel back to the psych ward, where the patient is about to get served his lunch. The guy delivering the tray has headphones on, and never hears the killer sneak up on him. The patient bashes his head into the wall, killing him. Then he boldly marches out into the world.

Beth wraps up talking about the dream, and they all decide to consult a book about dream interpretation. Then the killer literally jogs out of the hospital, and jumps a security fence. Yay! At this rate, he should get to the house by the third movie.

The girls start reading and drinking, while the killer strides into a sporting goods store. He smashes a display case, grabs the largest hunting knife he can find, then stabs the elderly clerk in the gut. Keep the change! Oh, and the old man does some Shatner-level emoting as he dies. Funniest scene in the film, so far at least.

Okay, so now the girls are looking up the images in Beth's nightmare about the dolls, and trying to sort through all of the possible symbolism. None of it goes anywhere, which is beginning to be a pattern with this movie, A car horn honks, and they abandon the book to see who it might be.

The killer steals a station wagon. Meanwhile, Tracy reveals that she had a bunch of stuff dumped onto the front yard, to decorate for the party. And then we see the killer reading highway signs. Would it kill this movie to actually be scary? I mean, I like plot and suspense, but this thing has no clue about where it's going.

A car arrives at the sorority, but it's just a collection of nerdy guys. Literally. Despite being the oddest misfits in the universe, the girls start to make out with them. The nerds see all of the random junk on the lawn, and offer to help with the decorations.

A bored-looking hospital worker discovers that the mental patient escaped, then we have to watch the sorority house being set up for the pow wow. This movie is an endurance challenge. A tent is put up, but falls over because one couple is inside smooching. I hope all of these people die in the most painful way possible.

The hospital worker announces the escape over the P.A. system, and we FINALLY learn that the patient is named Robert Henkel. At this point, I'm going to consider that to be progress. The only massacre has been the killing of time...

The girls are in the dark, literally speaking. The power has gone out. They build a fire, then accuse their nerdy dates of playing with the fusebox. The guys deny it, but then the nerdiest one scares the girls as a prank.

The hospital worker calls the cops, and one detective straight out of central casting arrives to interview him. Seriously, this guy is such a Danny Glover clone, I almost expect Mel Gibson to be right behind him. He gets a description of Bob, then starts looking.

The college kids sit around in a group, then try to scare each other. They talk about psychic energy, ghosts, and even refer back to the kitten-torture story. Then one of the guys claims that the house has a violent past. Of course, that's right where the scene ends.

More footage of Bob driving. Then one of the nerds, John, claims that a maniac killed his own parents in the house, and we see it in some flashbacks. The weapon was an axe. As we see the killer pick up a hunting knife and leave the house, the girls beg the storyteller, John, to stop.

After one girl leaves to rest, John continues with the tale. He describes the killer going after his 2 younger sisters, which we also see in a brief clip. Then the group disbands, spreading out around the house.

Beth finds herself alone, and tries a light switch. She bumps into John, and he offers to keep her company. Beth declines, claiming that she just needs some sleep. The others haven't paired off and ended the party, though...they're all watching Halloween. On television. In a house with no electricity. Think about that.

Dr. Lindsey is called. The intern leaves her a message, then the cop asks if she has a beeper. He gets laughed at, not really sure why.

Beth falls asleep, and then has a nightmare that the killer has entered the room. He comes toward her, but stabs at the bunk bed above hers. She gets blood all over her face and screams, and the rest of the group rush in. They wake her up, and the bed is now a regular one. Beth apologizes for being so much trouble, and they convince her not to be alone that night.

One girl decides to look at the fuses. As she opens the panel, her boyfriend Craig jumps at her, just to frighten her. He talks her into setting up the teepee for some sexy fun.

Bob arrives, parking at the house next door. As he looks at his childhood home, he starts to shuffle slowly towards it. Run, Bob, run! Get going on this massacre.

John asks for information about Beth's nightmare, and the girls give him an earful. Then Beth claims that she felt unafraid of the killer at first, as if she knew him...

Okay, I'm calling it. Beth is one of the killer's sisters. She somehow forgot about her family getting slaughtered by her brother, then also managed to pledge a sorority in the same house. It's stupid as heck, but I'm pretty sure that I'm correct. Just you watch.

Heh heh heh. She must have heard me, because now Beth "knows" that the killer hid one of his weapons in the fireplace. Intrigued, they all decide to have a closer look. Oh, and Bob is STILL just walking up to the house. How slow does he walk?

They put out the fire, and Beth points to a specific brick at the base of the fireplace. Sure enough, they find Bob's original knife.Of course, since a roaring fire was just there, the knife is incredibly hot to the touch. Andy ? fumbles it, and it get imbedded in a wooden surface in front of them.

They see dark stains all over it, and realize that it's blood. Sara picks up the knife, places it on the mantle, then declares that it's "neat". Another girl tosses it right back into the fireplace.

After Dr. Lindsey checks her phone messages,we see Craig pound in the last stake for the tent, using a brick as a makeshift hammer. He then tosses the brick a few feet away, and the camera clues us in to what the next weapon will be. Boy, that was subtle.

Doc Lindsey calls the intern back, and has him find Bob's file. They go over the details of the case, even telling us that one sister survived (See?), and manage to get the address for the house as well. The intern promises to give the address to the detective as soon as he hangs up.

Back in the house, Beth is encouraged to try to unlock memories through hypnosis. Andy then realizes how late it is, and leaves the party. As soon as he's alone, he runs into Bob. The killer stabs him, then heads for the house again.

Beth, now in a trance, is told to go back to her dream, then back to wherever the dream originated from. As I predicted, Beth is Bob's sister. She survived his killing spree by hiding in the basement. Oh, and she's also the mysterious "Laura" we heard about earlier in the film.

A flashback shows Bob finding Beth, and her friends see that she's in distress. After several attempts, they manage to break her trance. As ridiculous as this sounds, not one of them ever realizes that the event was something from Beth's actual past. This is just soul-crushingly stupid.

Tracy and Craig head back to the tent, and Bob watches from a hiding spot. As Beth and her date watch the rest of Halloween with the volume cranked up, he murders the couple. Some of the girls upstairs hear the screams, and assume that it's all from the television.

Craig gets away while Tracy is being killed, and shouts a warning to the rest of the household. He runs into the nearest bedroom, completely naked, and finds the phone dead, Then they remember that Cindy has a second phone line, so they rush to check it out. Just as they dial 911, Bob cuts that line as well.

He enters the house, walks straight over to the fireplace, and fetches his old knife. Then Beth, who somehow managed to fall asleep with John before the mayhem, has another nightmare about her brother. She finally wakes up, just as Bob prepares to stab her, and he ends up killing John instead.

Beth runs upstairs, with her brother close on her heels. She reaches the others just in the nick of time, and they try to figure out what to do as Bob pounds on the door. The pounding abruptly stops, but they can still hear breathing from the hallway.

They attempt to get help by yelling out the window, then breaking some glass, but the neighbors don't respond. Then one girl remembers that there's a fire ladder, which they hang out the window. Craig goes first, bracing the ladder for the others.

As Linda starts down, Bob rushes up behind Craig, covering his mouth and stabbing him under his ribs. Linda sees Bob waiting for her, and furiously scrambles to reach the window again. He grabs her by the ankle a few times, but Linda manages to get back inside, with help from the other 2 girls.

They unhook the ladder from the windowsill, but Bob manages to reach the window before they do it. They slam the window down on his hands, and Bob screams. Then they mace him, and Bob plummets to the ground below.

They decide to escape before he revives, in case the fall didn't injure or kill him. Bob wakes up, just as they reach the front door. They open the door, and Andy's corpse is discovered leaning against the door. After locking it again, they run back to the bedroom.

Beth remembers the crashing jar of marbles, and Bob crashes through the window and loses HIS marbles. They look into each others' eyes, and then the race to flee continues. They find another victim, then arrive outside. Unfortunately for them, he also reaches the yard.


He shambles in their direction, in a visual "homage" to Michael Myers. They get scared and back away, because running would make too much sense. Linda and Beth get away, but the third girl(Tracy? Sara?) is a goner.

They hide in the basement, and Beth tries to convince Linda that they can survive the rampage, Then Beth recalls that there is a spare key to the door. They run upstairs again, alternating between hiding and searching for the key.

They hear sirens. Linda tries to be optimistic, but Beth doesn't see how the police could know about their predicament. Beth finally realizes that she's related to the killer, and she dumbs it down for her new friend. She even explains that Beth is her middle name, and her real name is Laura.

And the dreams? And Bob tracking her down? Beth thinks they have a psychic link, like the mother cat from that story. How can a movie with psychic siblings, college babes, a high body count, and silly montages be so boring? This should be crazy-fun!

Bob gets into the basement, so they try to be even stealthier. Linda spots the spare key and grabs it, and Bob attacks them both as they hurry back up the stairs. As they lock him in the basement, Bob attempts to stab his way through the door. Beth uses her telepathy to time his next impact, and they run to the fireplace to grab the other knife.

Bob reaches them as they try to open the front door, and he corners Beth. She tries to hit him with a shovel from the fireplace, but it's small and ineffective. Linda helps by slamming him from behind with an actual shovel, but Bob barely reacts.

As he raises his arm to stab Beth with a fatal blow, Linda's shovel slams into the back of his head. She pummels him a few more times to be sure, then decide that he must be dead. As they limp away, Bob manages one final kill, planting his knife in Linda's back.

She takes a few more steps, then falls against a doorway and dies. Bob is trying to crawl after Beth like a snake, but she sees him coming. They attack at the same time, and Beth succeeds in thrusting her knife up through his chin, and out of his skull.

The cops find the house at last, and a pair of them help Linda. As she recovers in the hospital, she asks a nurse how bad the wounds are, and the nurse assures her that they'll be fine. After the nurse pulls her curtain shut, Bob pulls it back again. Beth screams, revealing that it was another nightmare. THE END

Wow, what a terrible experience this one was! There were only 2 silver linings: One was that the women were quite attractive and charming. The other was that we got to at least see some of Halloween. 1.5 killer trees out of 5 for this travesty.

And what did I learn from Sorority House Massacre?

-When the best friend is the character you'd rather see alive, you have a terrible main character.

-It takes all night to walk across a single lawn.

-It's possible to forget your entire past, despite seeing it every day in your head. Oh, and to also not remember where you lived, then move back in to the SAME DAMN HOUSE.

I'll have to pick my next one more carefully, to avoid getting a movie-related brain tumor. Any suggestions for a good slasher online that I haven't done yet?