A runner, Laura, literally drops dead after winning a 200-meter race. Her sister, who is in the Navy, comes to town for the graduation ceremony in which her sister will be honoured. A killer then starts bumping off Laura’s teammates. But who is this murderer and what is their motive?

I still can’t believe that I hadn’t seen Graduation Day until yesterday. I *think* I was getting it mixed up with another school-based slasher movie, Final Exam which I’ve (unfortunately) seen before.

And what do you know, I was impressed by Graduation Day! It wouldn’t have made John Carpenter lose any sleep as this is nowhere near the perfection of Halloween which kicked off the slasher genre, but it’s an enjoyable yarn that I enjoyed immensely. It also passed the mobile phone test as I didn’t pick up my phone once.

Quirky characters (the early slasher movies fully knew their teenaged demographic and so included plenty of humour rather than just horror), a great cast (Christopher George, Linnea Quigley, Vanna White and there’s even the guy who plays Dr Mandrakis in When A Stranger Calls!) and some brutal kills feature here.

I loved some of the frankly absurdist dialogue. An example- Linnea Quigley’s character is with her boyfriend in the woods making out (we’ve seen them enjoying a joint in an earlier scene, so we just know they’re going to be slaughtered) when he announces that he has to pee. As he walks away to a nearby bush, she says to him, ‘I’m so jealous you’re able to just pee anywhere’, to which he replies, ‘Yeah! The whole world’s my toilet!’ Which, I guess, it is!

The film’s last act is batshit crazy even if belief is subsequently stretched to achieve this. But, I don’t care about realism in an early 80’s slasher movie. Near the end of the film, there is a domino effect of messed up scenes that feels like they will never end and is extremely enjoyable. I love the horror films that go the extra mile when it comes to the bizarre and unhinged.

Whilst Graduation Day didn’t win any awards on its release, it does go down in history as being one of the films that was placed on the third DPP List amid the Video Nasties furore. A dubious accolade.

One of the better slasher movies from the early 80’s.

3 and a half out of 5 stars