All is not well at Central High. The bullies run the school and every single kid there is too scared to do anything about it. Mark (Andrew Stevens) is one of the bullies and he foolishly thinks that his old friend David (Derrel Maury) should come to the school and join the gang. David is immediately appalled by what he sees going on there and runs headlong into skirmishes with the total dickbagels who run the school. Their shockingly violent retribution on David sets in motion a whole mess of escalating murders- oops, I mean accidents! After David has finally taken his revenge, an unexpected power shift begins and the entire school is plunged into chaos.
Speaking of movies that would never get made today, Massacre at Central High (1976) is the brainchild of Dutch writer/director Rene Daalder. The mood he establishes very early on at this fictional school is one of paranoia, complacency, and dread. It sure does have a lot to say about society and stuff, dude. I’m not sure if I like this film or not, but it sure as hell is unique, and never boring! Did the writers of Heathers (1988) see this one or what?
Before he passed away in 2019, Daalder kicked around the move industry for years after Massacre and made some odd little science fiction movies that I need to check out. He made an apocalyptic music video for Supertramp’s “Brother Where You Bound”, which is on YouTube in all of its 17-minute epic glory. Alois Brummer, one of this film’s German producers, had his hands in distributing all kinds of wacky stuff like The Demon (1979), The Grapes of Death (1978), Gamera vs. Gyaos (1967), and Snuff (1975) in his home country. The cast is loaded with fun up and coming 1970s faces including the lovable Robert Carradine as a leftover hippie reject and Kimberly Beck of Friday the 13th: The Final Chapter (1984).
1976, y’all. My birth year. I adore the tone that films from this weird freakin’ year had. So many titles from this era feel so strange as if nobody knew what the heck was going in terms of style, and a “throw everything at the wall and see what sticks” aesthetic was the order of the day. This surreal satire initially fools you into thinking it’s based in reality but the ever-escalating hijinks that these wild kids get up to is never confronted by any parents, faculty, or police presence. This film contains full frontal nudity, hang-gliding, AND a food fight. Luckily (or unluckily depending on your kink), these things happen in different scenes. Well, you know how the old saying goes: “Revenge is a dish best served on a cafeteria tray.”
Somebody must love the balls off of this film because the Synapse disc of Massacre at Central High is a real knockout in both audio and visual presentation. Extras include a 43-minute documentary about the making of the film (sadly, no one will explain what the heck I just watched), trailers, and a radio spot.