By Geno McGahee
In the 1980s, horror found a home with college-aged kids. KILLER PARTY, HELL NIGHT, NIGHT OF THE DEMONS and many more would have people in their early twenties put into some situation where they had to fight for their lives. I always enjoyed the ones that took place at a college and that is the setting for the 1992 slasher “HAPPY HELL NIGHT”, AKA – “FRAT FRIGHT”. It seems to have missed that window for this type of slasher, coming along just five or so years too late. There is a lot of bad and a lot of good with this film.
Zachary Malius (Charles Cragin) is a priest that goes on a killing spree, murdering seven Frat boys. The visual of the bald, black-eyed priest standing there, covered in blood, was very creepy. We fast forward 25 years and the Frat is having a big party and this is when the film shows how much it truly lacks in structure and story. Two brothers, Eric (Nick Gregory) and Sonny (Frank John Hughes), are reunited and a love triangle is exposed between them and a girl. It’s difficult to like either one of these guys and that is part of the trouble with this movie, but they are far from the most unlikable character. That goes to the host of the STV show on campus, Ned Bara (Ted Clark).
Bara hosts a show where he hides cameras and records the frat brothers having sex with girls without them knowing. His commentary during the recordings is terrible. His “I’m gonna make a star out of you” and “she likes it,” is cringe-worthy. This guy and his fucking mullet annoyed the hell out of me. His character reminded me a great deal of the DJ in HALLOWEEN 6. These characters are created to annoy the viewer, I think. You want to see them taken out, but when one character can disrupt the film and make it nearly unwatchable, they are not doing what they were intended to do.
Sonny and his buddy (also sporting a mullet) take on the frat prank to prove their worth and unleash the evil priest from his holding cell. Henry Collins (Darren McGavin), a man that aged forty years in the twenty-five years since the massacre, hears of the prank and gets hit with his dark history. It was nice to see Sam Rockwell in the role of young Henry Collins. He just smiles and smiles, but he smiles well. So, good job Sam! McGavin knocks it out of the park in this. He was so overdramatic. It was great.
Malius crashes the party and the film misses the opportunity to really bring home a memorable horror villain. Obviously influenced by the later NIGHTMARE ON ELM STREET films, the evil priest with a terrifying look elects to use one-liners as he kills his victims. He just adds a word to “no.” “No TV.” “No STV.” “No problem.” And so on… It’s just ruining a potentially good killer that could have built on this and created a lower tier franchise. Every time that Malius opened his mouth, his creep factor went away. What a shame.
It comes down to a battle with Malius and a couple of the forgettable characters, leading to a not-so shocking conclusion to this overall mess. The demise of Malius at the end is rather neat and he plays it up well. Realistically, Charles Cragin was the right guy for this role and had his lines been removed and he remained a silent killer, we would have had a much better film. Timing is everything and the timing of this film was the reason why it crashes and burns in the end.
HAPPY HELL NIGHT/FRAT FRIGHT is worth a watch. What makes this film terrible is what it could have been with a better script and more focus on a straight horror film rather than a horror/comedy mix. Had they lost the Bara character, developed the other characters in a more realistic way, this would have probably taken off. Unfortunately, it will leave you scratching your head and screaming: “Why did they do that?!”
Rating: 5.5/10
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