Prom Night (2008/I)

Director:

Nelson McCormick

Writer (WGA):

J.S. Cardone (written by)

Release Date:

11 April 2008 (USA)

Genre:

Horror | Mystery | Thriller

Tagline:

It's Midnight Everyone's Ready To Go Home...But Someone Has Other Plans.

Plot:

Donna's senior prom is supposed to be the best night of her life, though a sadistic killer from her past has different plans for her and her friends.

Plot Keywords:

Friend | Prom | Hotel | Killer | Murder

Awards:

1 win & 3 nominations

Cast

Brittany Snow	...	Donna Keppel
Scott Porter	...	Bobby
Jessica Stroup	...	Claire
Dana Davis	...	Lisa Hines
Collins Pennie	...	Ronnie Heflin
Kelly Blatz	...	Michael
James Ransone	...	Detective Nash
Brianne Davis	...	Crissy Lynn
Kellan Lutz	...	Rick Leland
Mary Mara	...	Ms. Waters
Ming-Na	...	Dr. Elisha Crowe (as Ming Wen)
Johnathon Schaech	...	Richard Fenton
Idris Elba	...	Detective Winn
Jessalyn Gilsig	...	Aunt Karen Turner
Linden Ashby	...	Uncle Jack Turner

Also Known As:

TV Dinner (Philippines: English title) (review title)

MPAA:

Rated PG-13 for violence and terror, some sexual material, underage drinking, and language.

Runtime:

88 min | 89 min (unrated version)

Country:

USA | Canada

Language:

English | Italian

Color:

Color (Technicolor)

Aspect Ratio:

2.35 : 1

Sound Mix:

Dolby Digital | DTS | SDDS

Certification:

Australia:M | Ireland:15A | USA:PG-13 (certificate #41474) | Canada:13+ (Québec) | South Africa:13V | Iceland:14 (original rating) | Canada:14A (Alberta/British Columbia/Manitoba/Ontario) | Sweden:15 | UK:15 | Singapore:PG | South Korea:15 | Malaysia:U | USA:Unrated (unrated DVD version) | Finland:K-15 | France:-12 | Philippines:R-13 (MTRCB) | UK:18 (special edition DVD) | Singapore:NC-16 (DVD rating) | Netherlands:16 | Argentina:16 | Peru:14 | Italy:VM14 | New Zealand:M | Germany:16 (unrated version) | Iceland:16 (DVD rating)

Filming Locations:

Biltmore Hotel - 506 S. Grand Avenue, Downtown, Los Angeles, California, USA

Company:

Alliance Films

Trivia:

Body count: 13, including the flashback. 1. Father (flashback) 2. Brother (flashback) 3. Mother (flashback) 4. Maid 5. Claire 6. Michael 7. Bellhop 8. Lisa 9. Guy in Trunk 10.Nash 11.Bobby 12.Cop outside house 13.Killer

Goofs:

Continuity: Despite being one of the few slasher films rated PG13, whenever someone is stabbed, their bodies show no stab wounds when they reappear. The only character with blood stains where they had been stabbed has no holes in their clothing where the stab wounds would be.

Quotes:

[from trailer]
Officer Shawn: Three years ago... a high school teacher got obsessed with a female student... He went psycho!... He's been in a maximum security prision until three days ago.

Movie Connections:

Remake of Prom Night (1980)

Soundtrack:

I Believe In Your Victory

Less scary than the kid toucher episode of Webster

Prom Night is shot with the artistic eye someone gives while finely crafting a Lifetime original film. You know the one. This October, Lifetime takes a break from the courageous tale of a woman surviving (insert disease name here) to tell the somewhat creepy tale of a woman pursued by a stalker ex-boyfriend. It's dramatic … it's sappy … it's immensely dull. It does nothing to further a genre, tell an original story, or strive for ANY sort of newness. Prom Night shares this plight. Watching the killer poke holes in his victims, we sit silently as they slump to the floor with not a drop of blood spilled. It occurred to me that this was the cleanest killer in movie history.

Our director is working with a fairly good-looking killer so he is forced to pour on the camera angles to make him appear creepier. Think about Matthew McConaughey coming at you with a knife. You'd probably go … "OH! Good lookin guy is going to kill me? Naaaa." Not scary even for a second, so the director throws Schaech into shadows and over the shoulder in the mirror. This mirror shot is repeated to the point of sickness as it practically becomes a fetish of the creator. You'll get 15 jump scares in this film, 2 of which made my date jump (I might mention she is afraid of EVERYTHING). I'd also mention she decided to take a nap halfway through the film and at one point threatened to leave me.

As if this film were not disjointed enough, it appears to be cut to shreds. I'm not saying it looks like key points were left on the cutting room floor as the crew scrambled to salvage some semblance of a horror film; I'm saying as the film moves from scene to scene, you often get a jarring jump. This is the kind of thing you'd expect when a film catches fire and a projectionist is forced to splice ends together, cross his fingers, and hope for the best. The editor should be shot.

With a plot you can pack into two sentences, one stray spray of blood, an emo killer, and the tension of a very special episode of "Silver Spoons", we're left with no reason to support horror this weekend … at least on the big screen. In fact, this is the sort of film that should be punished. Is it really that hard to make a scary movie? Was this crew even aware they were making a horror film??!! A complete waste of my time and yours. I bit the bullet to get you this review. Don't let my sacrifice be in vain. DON'T GO INTO THE MOVIE!!!