Girls' Nite Out (1982)

“Friday the 13^th” was hitting up its third installment by the time “Girls’ Nite Out” was released, so it comes as no surprise that the B-movie crowd decided to cash in on the trend of teenage slasher flicks. “Girls' Nite Out” obviously takes influence from 80’s slasher flicks but also throws in a dash of Hitchcock’s 1960 masterpiece “Psycho.” This mixture is topped with a heaping helping of 80’s B-movie sensibilities.

The movie opens up after the DeWitt Bears have won a huge basketball game. In the locker room, we’re introduced to the obnoxious team. Sitting quietly in the middle of said locker room is Mike Pryor (David Holbrook), a contrastingly gloomy fellow who looks a little like a young Charlie Sheen. The team’s mascot, Benson, pokes a little bit of fun at Pryor and receives a scathing rebuttal. After this bizarre exchange, we cut to the campus itself.

Women: The other alcohol.

Soon, an elongated party sequence ensues at some random dorm. The place is filled to the brim with college freshmen doing what college freshmen do at dorm parties. After a while, this kind of set up gets boring. Luckily, there are a few scenes that stand out as particularly entertaining during this otherwise unengaging exposition. For example, amongst this chaos, a drunken senior with bags under his bloodshot eyes tells a few freshmen the campus mythos of Dickey Cavanaugh, a DeWitt alumnus serial killer. A few of his campus buddies chuckle as he proceeds to inform them that he is going to take off to, in his words, “drink some women”. (You certainly have to commend this man’s ability to shift gears).

Later it’s revealed that DeWitt is holding a large scavenger hunt, the clues to be transmitted via the local radio station. Everybody is excited; everybody except for Benson, that is. Benson, the first victim of our killer, is sprawled out on the floor, his body covered with stab wounds as the unidentified killer proceeds to put on his bear mascot outfit. The dude modifies the outfit a little for maximum killing potential, and off we go on our journey to slasher goodness!

To “Girls’ Nite Out”’s credit, for everything it gets wrong, the murder scenes are great. They’re gruesome, well-acted, and at times downright demented. The movie even makes effective usage of the oft-abused jump scare during a few of these scenes. You’ll have a clueless, happy little freshman girl trotting through the gymnasium looking for the next clue, the music is peppy and happy, and then suddenly… BOOM, BEAR MASCOT ATTACK!

Unfortunately, “Girls’ Nite Out” doesn’t exactly make as optimal use as they could have out of the murderous mascot. The protracted second act of the movie features a large amount of assaults; however, these assaults are broken up with absolutely nothing but build up. Customarily, slasher flicks take the time in between attacks to add a little more character development to the story, something that this movie neglects. Instead, we’re given extended sequences of confused young adults walking through darkened hallways with no pay-off.

This movie suffers from a very common pattern in B-movies; a pattern I'll call “Too Long Syndrome.” Movies that suffer from “Too Long Syndrome” aren't necessarily lengthy. Instead, symptoms include too many pointless characters interacting on an uninteresting level, causing a large amount of scenes that are boring to watch. The aforementioned excessive build up scenes are a great example of this; so is the pointless documentation of the campus freshmen. I could easily picture taking “Girls’ Nite Out,” editing out about 15 solid minutes and coming out with a much more gripping movie.

David Holbrook plays the depressed
outcast Mike Pryor. It's a real shame
"Girls' Nite Out" didn't take advantage
of its talented cast.

“Girls’ Nite Out” features very little character development at all. I could hardly remember the names of all of the characters while watching the movie and even while writing this entire review, I’ve only had to look at IMDB once or twice. These characters are that disposable. It’s a shame, too, because the grizzly* murders eventually lead to a scene where cops question various students, and some of these people are really great actors. As Pryor is being questioned, you can sense his irritation with life in general.

And so for the final half hour or so, “Girls’ Nite Out” fizzles to a halt. We get a few more murder scenes, a ton of pointless build up and an ending that’s simply odd. The movie means well with its great murder scenes, but a vast amount of opportunities are missed primarily due to extreme lack of character development.

*Get it? Grizzly murders? HAHAHAHAHAH!!!!!