Pranks (aka Death Dorm)

 

Picture: C+     Sound: C+     Extras: C-     Film: C

 

 

Who is killing college students as the closing of a dorm hall and Christmas approach?  That is the question in Pranks (1981), another serial killer film a bit too happy with killer point-of-view shots.  The potential victims are not of the “dumb” kind, but are not that well developed either, nor is the screenplay by Stephen Carpenter (the cinematographer here too), Jeffrey Obrow, and Stacey Giachino.  Carpenter and Obrow also co-directed and edited.

 

Since they were not going for the “dumb cast” bit, it is too bad more was not done with the characters, because getting us to care for them would have helped.  The inability to create suspense and terror is blocked by cliché and bad timing throughout.  The violence is never graphic, and the stylized attempts just plain silly.  The killer and motivation thing is not as bad as expected, but by the time we get there, it does not add up to much.

 

The full frame 1.33 X 1 image was shot on film, but this transfer is nothing to write home about.  It is from a clean print, but is analog, with limited fidelity and some grain, not even counting the NTSC limitations of the composite transfer.  The Dolby Digital 2.0 Mono is clear enough to hear the dialogue and the flat score.  At least the Chris Young score was not of the tired, electronic, shallow variety.  The only extra is a bio/filmography of Zuniga, but I really want to know what happened to the rest of the cast and crew.

 

This obviously got made in the wake of John Carpenter’s Halloween (1978) and Stephen is not kin.  Daphne Zuniga has an early supporting role.  OK, so it’s a curio, but we have seen worse.  The alternate titles of Death Dorm or The Dorm That Dripped Blood sound better, though no one looks like they are getting any kind of education, just getting killed.

 

 

-   Nicholas Sheffo