Cutting Class (1989)

Someone is killing high school students in "Cutting Class". The movie begins with us finding out that a teenage boy who killed his father is being released from a mental institution, clearly the writers wanted us to suspect him from the start. We meet out main cast of characters next. Brad Pitt plays short tempered Dwight who is going out with Paula (Jill Schoelen). The boy just released from the institution is named Brian, and throughout the film he is written as the prime suspect along with the school principal and janitor. Some of the teachers are murdered as well as a few of Paula's friends, but the body count is actually pretty low in this. Eventually, Paula discovers who the killer is. Will she survive? ... A mistake I made with 'Cutting Class' is reading the back of the DVD. The identity of the killer is revealed in a picture on the back of the DVD case, so I wasn't all that shocked when it was revealed. We get a lot of classroom scenes and love triangle scenes which, at times, make 'Cutting Class' feel like more of a teen drama rather than a slasher film. Jill Schoelen, who was a pretty well known late-eighties scream queen, does a great job in the lead as always. It was interesting to see Brad Pitt in one of his early movies, he did a decent job given the material he had to work with. Roddy McDowell and Martin Mull had comedic roles, but didn't really make an impact on the movie at all.What stopped 'Cutting Class' from being a great horror/slasher film was the lack of scares and the lack of kills. It has a decent plot with the guy getting released from the asylum, but it never get's to the level of being an elite film. I however enjoyed 'Cutting Class' enough to recommend to horror fans.6/10

By the end of the 80s, the traditional slasher movie had pretty much run its course, the genre becoming too formulaic and over-familiar to its jaded audience. Rospo Pallenberg's Cutting Class is an attempt at sending up such conventions, but it's hard to poke fun at a genre that has already unintentionally turned to self parody, and the film winds up being virtually indistinguishable from the countless genuine films that it intends to mock. Jill Schoelen stars as virginal and studious teen Paula Carson, object of affection for two ex-best-buds, overbearing basketball jock Dwight Ingalls (Brad Pitt) and creepy loner Brian Woods (Donovan Leitch). When Paula is left on her own for a week while her father, a district attorney, goes duck hunting, she promises to behave, but with rival friends fighting for her attention, the school principal (Roddy McDowall) perving over her ass, and a crazy murderer bumping off her schoolmates, staying out of trouble is going to be harder than she thinks.Cutting Class certainly makes sure to pack in all the standard genre clichés, with red herrings and misleading clues a plenty (hands up who though that sodium chloride would actually save the day: I know I did), but veers awkwardly between silly humour (Paula's bumbling dad somehow surviving to the end of the film) and genuine attempts at horror (the killing of the school's vice principal), delivering crappy gore featuring patently rubber props and uninspired direction along the way.The acting also does little to improve matters, with future A-lister Pitt being unmemorable, unlikeable and offering no hint of star quality, Leitch giving an equally unimpressive turn, and a performance from poor old Roddy McDowall that can only be described as extremely embarrassing. Thank heavens for the lovely Schoelen, who is as winsome as she was in Popcorn and The Stepfather, and makes the whole film just about worthwhile by simply showing off her magnificent butt.

Cutting Class (1989) 1/2 (out of 4) Incredibly bad slasher film sat on the shelf for many years but finally got released after Brad Pitt became a huge star. I'm sure Pitt wasn't too thrilled with this but he's the only reason this film doesn't get a BOMB rating. Jill Schoelen and Pitt play a couple who find themselves trying to discover who is killing all of their classmates. Fingers point to a former friend who was just released from a mental house due to killing his father. This is a really bad film and there's no way around that fact but seeing someone like Pitt in a movie like this makes it somewhat entertaining. Pitt isn't too bad in the film but God knows no one will mistake this for Fight Club or something to that nature. The death scenes are all incredibly lame and the limited amount of nudity does nothing. Martin Mull plays the girl's father and his scenes are the strangest of the film as they come off as a spoof yet these scenes go against everything else going on in the movie. Roddy McDowall plays the perverted school principle.

A mysterious killer bumps off various students and teachers at a high school. Possible suspects include angry jock Dwight Ingalls (a moody turn by a pre-stardom Brad Pitt), troubled former mental patient Brian Woods (an excellent performance by Donovan Leitch), lecherous principal Mr. Dante (a deliciously leering Roddy McDowall), and creepy weirdo janitor Shultz (a hilariously manic Robert Glaudini). Sweet Paula Carson (winningly played by the adorable Jill Schoelen) finds herself caught in the middle of Dwight and Brian. Director Rospo Pallenberg, working from a witty tongue-in-cheek script by Steve Slavkin, milks the standard premise for maximum campy entertainment. The game cast give it their proverbial all: Pitt and Leitch make for fine adversaries, Schoelen is her usual pretty and appealing self, Martin Mull contributes an amusingly droll portrayal of Paula's bumbling dad William, Brenda James delightfully vamps it up as the luscious Colleen, and Dirk Blocker has a grand jerky time as browbeating ramrod Coach Harris. The nifty murder set pieces -- art teacher stuffed in kiln, vice principal killed by a Xerox machine (!), gym teacher impaled on a flagpole -- all do the trick. Avi Karpick's slick cinematography, Jill Fraser's funky shivery score, the cool'n'catchy 80's rock soundtrack (the fantastic New Wave band Wall of Voodoo have three songs featured herein), and the rousing conclusion are all up to speed. Good, goofy fun.