The House on Sorority Row (1983)

“You’re the last one of your friends alive.  You’re the bait.” , 7 October 2019

A group of sorority sisters decide to play a prank on their vindictive house mother, but things go horribly wrong and the woman is killed. With a party about to begin, the girls decide to hide the body in an abandoned pool until they can decide what to do.  When their friends go missing and the woman’s body disappears, the girls are convinced she’s come back to seek revenge. Meanwhile, the whitest party ever put on film carries on like nothing’s going on.

 I’ve always found The House on Sorority Row to be a lot of fun with some creepy moments and a few nice death scenes.  As with a lot of films of this type, the best parts only happen once the final girl is running for her life - and here, she has to do it will half-drugged out of her mind.  And that finale always gives me the creeps. The first time I saw this movie, when the killer makes his presence known near the end, I about jumped out of my seat.  It really worked on me. If you can get past some of the acting and a murky plot point or two, The House on Sorority Row can be a very effective, little, low-budget 80s horror movie.

Reading reviews around the internet tonight, I’m a little shocked to see how much hate The House on Sorority Row gets. I can’t tell you how many times I read that it’s cliched or unoriginal.  While I agree that it does borrow from some of the slashers that came before, a lot of what you’ll see here has been copied endlessly since the film’s release. The prank gone wrong, the college / sorority house setting, the exposition-filled flashback - they weren’t the standard slasher movie tropes then that they are now.  When I saw this in the theater in 1983, it was as fresh and innovative as any of the boatload of other slashers being pumped out.  

7/10