APRIL FOOL'S DAY!!!! (1986)

April Fool's Day (1986)
Rating: ****1/2
Starring: Deborah Foreman, Griffin O'Neal and Clayton Rohner

One day, Muffy St.John invites her college friends to her parents' secluded island home for one last gathering before living a life of jobs, tired sex and middle age mediocrity. Her friends, your would-be stereotype gang of surprisingly decent-looking and mostly realistic set of teenagers I've seen in a slasher (including none other than Amy Steel from Friday the 13th Part 2 (1981)), find out that the island home can only be reached by boat and, on board, they play elaborate pranks on one another as that day's April fool's day. Unfortunately, one bad prank leads to a bitter end when it caused one of the boat's crew members to fall off and have half of his face shredded on the boat's propeller! As soon as they make it to the island, said crew is taken to the nearest hospital, never to be heard of again...or will he?

The gang, though sour about the accident, continues with the gathering and discovers that the house is rigged with more pranks like exploding cigars, rolling-chairs and even holed drinking glasses. But soon the jokes go from fun to disturbingly personal: newspaper clippings, tapes of babies crying, hollowed eyed paintings with a figure watching them, someone is playing with them and they're playing it rough. Eventually, people starts to disappear and reappearing as corpses. It's April Fool's Day and what was once a day of fun is now a run for survival.

Seemingly echoing the classic Agatha Christie whodunit And Then There Were None (or also known as Ten Little Indians), which follows a group of people fished to a small island, only to get killed off by one of them who is secretly insane, in here though, the plot is mixed with a pre- Scream (1996) self-satire which is made clear once we get to see the final twist. Until then, April Fool's Day (1986) plays as a downright straight 80s backwoods teen-kill with an extremely tame violence.

Surely, if one has done their research on this film, you may have an idea or two about this film's little "secret" and why it's so underrated within slasher fan circles. I wouldn't blame them, the movie is an enjoyable run as, pranking aside, the cast here are well-acted and their characters are far from annoying. Yes, they have sex and they like to party, just like any other teen meat waiting in line to be slaughtered, but these kids are a likable bunch as you can tell they're really close and they're a bit more complex than your average queen bees and jerky jocks. It's quite a difference but a really workable jab as once shit hits the fan, you can really feel for them.

I can't really say much about this film without giving away the twist; once you see it, it will all depend on how well you could take the joke and how loyal you are to the slasher genre. It was the late 80s and audiences demanded new takes on their beloved horror sub-genre and April Fool's Day (1986) took a risky yet fairly underrated attempt. But looking at its production, some good story angles and some delicious albeit offscreen killings going so well with its build-up, I have to say this film deserves more love than what it is getting right now. The Butcher Brothers (who also directed The Violent Kind (2010) and the Masters of Horror episode, The Hamiltons) thought so and decided to remake this film in 2008, but they ended up doing a shit-hole movie that I'm more gladly to piss on together with the 2008 Prom Night remake. Appreciate the deeds, mates, just not there yet.

What else can I say? Relax, have fun and

APRIL FOOL'S!!!

(Fun idea: watch this back to back to back with Student Bodies (1981), Pandemonium (1982), Slaughter High (1986), Killer Party (1986), and Scary Movie (2000) for an APRIL FOOL'S DAY HORRORTHON!)

"Bodycount":
1 male found dead under a boat house
1 male decapitated, head found
1 male found with a throat cut
1 male found castrated
1 female killed, later found bloodied
1 male found hanged
1 female head found
1 female gets a throat cut with a knife
Total:  8