SORORITY ROW - Stay Away From It

SORORITY ROW (slasherpic)
Cast: Briana Evigan, Leah Pipes, Rumer Willis, Jamie Chung, Margo Harshman, Audrina Patridge and Carrie Fisher
Director: Stewart Hendler
Time: 100 mins
Rating: * (out of 4)


PREAMBLE: If the title reminds you of the 1983 thriller The House On Sorority Row, it is because this 'Row' is a retread of that Eighties movie written by Mark Rosman. For some reason, the producers have not mentioned its 'original', specifying only that the film is based on Mark Rosman's screenplay "Seven Sisters."

It is just as well that this 'remake' is dissociated from its predecessor. This one is a sorry mess compared to the earlier film.

WHAT'S IT ABOUT? A bunch of Theta Pi sorority sisters (Briana Evigan, Leah Pipes, Rumer Willis, Jamie Chung, Margo Harshman and Audrina Patridge) are playing a prank on a guy (Matt O'Leary as Garrett) when they inadvertently cause the murder of one of their sisters.

Instead of notifying the cops, they agree to keep the matter to themselves and never speak of it again. This proves easier said than done. After their graduation a mysterious killer goes after the five girls and anyone who knows their secret.

HITS & MISSES: Stewart Hendler is not as famous as Uwe Boll in the realm of making crap movies, at least not yet anyway. However, if this turkey is anything to go by, he may soon overtake Boll. At least Boll knows that he is making bad movies and he seems to be great at it.

Stewart, on the other hand, can't even decide what sort of movie he had wanted to make. There are times when Sorority Row appears like a slasherpic but there is just not enough blood and gore to justify being a slasherpic. Then it has flashes of being a college-chick flick, especially with more than half-a-dozen nubiles cavorting all over campus. But no, there isn't enough character build-up or plot mileage to go in that direction. Also, all the nudity flashes have been exorcised by Malaysian censors.

Hendler borrows from genre classics like Carrie, Prom Night and the recent Drag Me To Hell and then fouls them up totally. Imagine scenes inside a burning house where the characters analyse their motives and suspicions instead of just getting the hell out of danger! And Hendler expects us to believe that a teenage girl can go missing for eight months and no one made any issue about it.

I pity the cast, really, having to portray such illogical roles. Still, a few stand out, like Willis' hysterical Ellie and Pipes' queen bee Jessica. The one who seems to be having great fun with her role is Carrie Fisher, playing a real men kick-ass house mother.

THE LOWDOWN: Avoid.