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Night School/aka "Terror Eyes" (1981)

Dir: Ken Hughes

A series of gruesome decapitation murders on Women (where the heads are discovered shoved in water, like a fish tank) have the Police baffled.
Judd Austin (Leonard Mann) is assigned to the case and quickly a number of suspects are revealed.
Is it the randy Teacher Vincent Millet (Drew Snyder)? Is it the predatory Lesbian Headmistress? Is it the creepy peeping tom? Is it Millets Assistant Eleanor Adjai (Rachel Ward)?
I shall not tell!

Briefly banned in the UK under the "Terror Eyes" title, this is an effective little thriller that keeps the viewers attention despite the relatively small body count.

Mann does a good job as the Cop on the case, with some nice interplay between himself and his very short (do U.S Police have a minimum height requirement!) partner Taj (Joseph Sicari).
Snyder turns in an effective performance as the Women chasing Teacher and has a chance to get very messy with Rachel Ward in a pretty erotic shower sex scene involving some unidentified red gunk!
Mention of Ward brings up the films major failing though. And that's Ward herself! This is her film debut and how she ever worked again is a complete mystery. With a voice deeper than most Men she so wooden in her delivery that she almost turns into a forest before the viewers eyes!

There is some nice macabre humour on show to counter the suitably nasty and blood spattered knife murders (especially a brutal attack in a white tiled shower room), the most effective being a wonderfully playful 'where is the head going to pop up' sequence in a kitchen, where Director Hughes piles on the visual red herrings.

The film is generally flat, with that 80's blandness that marred many films only kept at bay during the effective stalk and slash set-ups, where the black clad killer (complete with black crash helmet) makes a memorable visual impact.
The 80's would be the decade of eerie masked killers, with the GI gas mask of "The Prowler", the miners helmet of "My Bloody Valentine", and Jason's iconic hockey mask in "Friday 13th 3" being the most memorable.

The killers big unveiling is not much of an event as there are not enough credible suspects, and too many things throughout the film have pin-pointed them anyway. But there is at least an enjoyable double twist (even with it's dubious comical content) that adds to the macabre atmosphere of the movie overall.

Despite Wards clunky efforts and thanks to the sly black humour, (some, hopefully intentionally, funny lines about severed heads are a hoot), well used nudity and violent knife attacks help make "Night School" one of the more entertaining slasher films that deluged the 80's.

Ken Hughes is probably most famous for Directing "Chitty Chitty Bang Bang", but don't expect any red gunk smeared naked chicks in that!