Graduation Day

Welcome back to Cinemiranda! A place where I brutally critique horror films from the 1980s. The first movie that I wanted to review and just so happened to inspire this whole blog is GRADUATION DAY!!!!! Graduation Day is a horror film that debuted spring 1981. It was co-written and directed by Herb Freed. It grossed 24 million dollars on a two hundred fifty thousand dollar budget.

Thats amazing.

This film is about a senior student named Laura Ramstead who dies at a track meet during her senior year of high school. The day before graduation Laura’s older sister Anne returns from the Navy to take part of the graduation in her sister’s honor. Anne then proceeds to go around the school, interviewing Laura’s classmates trying to learn about her sisters life and figure out what really happened to her.

EVERY TIME SHE TALKS TO SOMEONE THEY DIE.

This is Anne “I didn’t mean to get you killed but you know…” Ramstead, right before one of the best/worst fight scenes I’ve ever seen.

Lol its appalling. I can announce that she is not the killer, but that fact definitely set a aura of gloom around the character.

Its time for the break down.

1. Intro:
   • This movie’s introduction is single handedly what made me add the category. The intro was like a music video! I have never seen a more suspense inducing intro in my life. It also lasted at least 4 minutes, which made me question whether or not the movie was actually going to start. Towards the end, we see Laura running the race. Its tense, its exciting, its got my full attention. She wins the race and then DIES ON THE TRACK. 4 minutes into the film. My jaw dropped.
2. Kill Scenes:
   • The kills scenes are very “early 80s”, where they kinda show the viewers half of whats happening. They show the knife while its in the air, then they cut to the black and you hear a scream, then all you see if a body on the ground with a “supposed” stab wound. The death is more implied. But, we did get this amazing shot…

This, ladies and gentlemen… is called a 1981 slit throat attempt. High Fructose Corn Syrup for the win.

• 3. Creepy men:
  • This movie had 3 creepy CREEPY men that made the list.
    • First, would be Linda and Anne’s mother’s horrible boyfriend. No joke, at the end of the movie he tries to kill Anne with a frying pan for no reason whatsoever.
    • Second, is this weird man who is giving Anne a ride in the beginning of the film. All he does is touch her inappropriately and rant about lesbians for a solid 2 minutes. CRINGE.
    • Lastly, would be Coach Michaels. He’s the coach for the track team and the gymnastics team and literally after every scene that he’s in, you are CONVINCED he is the killer.
• 4. Stereotypes:
  • This movie didn’t have a wide array of stereotypes since the whole movie is about the track team. Every athlete looked and acted the same. One thing I can say is that Anne is supposed to be in the Navy and the creators tried to make her look as tough as possible in every scenario and that was a major fail on their part. lol
• 5. Killer Reveal: PLOT TWIST!!!!!!!!! The killer reveal in this movie was great. The movie keeps the killer underwraps until the very end and the killer was Laura’s boyfriend *shocker*. I personally didn’t see this coming because he honestly had only one scene to himself, but the writers of the film thought that is he made a huge speech at the end of the film, it would explain why he committed all of these murders. lol The speech explains nothing.

Overall, I’m giving this movie a 8/10. The intro, the cheap kill scenes, and creepy stepdad definitely deserve a second watch.

Thanks for stopping by,

-Miranda Priestley