Jennifer (1978)

Jennifer is a teenager from West Virginia who works with her Bible-quotin' papa in his pet store and attends an elite all-girl boarding school on scholarship (the rich, pampered girls call her "skag" and "hayseed"). When the leader of the popular clique gets caught cheating on a test, she blames innocent Jennifer, who defends herself but gets into trouble anyway. These kids--and the pill-popping, money-grubbing school matriarch--really have in for Jennifer, unaware that as a child she performed in tent-revival meetings as the girl who could communicate with snakes and make them do her bidding. Screenwriter Kay Cousins Johnson, working from a story by Steve Krantz (who also produced), is responsible for this shameless repeat of "Carrie"--and not even an effective one, as telekinesis is a far more showy display of psychic power than having snakes slithering along the pavement or on the hood of a car. With a handful of TV-movies already mining the "Carrie" vault ("The Spell", "The Initiation of Sarah"), a theatrical retread of the same scenario seemed like a backwards step, and audiences stayed away. Lisa Pelikan has the lead (she was the young Vanessa Redgrave in "Julia" the year before); she has beautiful red hair and green eyes, but no screen presence. She's asked to stand-in for Sissy Spacek, though she looks much more like a teen-version of Piper Laurie in her high-necked white nightgown. Mild "product" from AIP at least gave work to several veteran actors, including Bert Convy, Jeff Corey, Nina Foch and John Gavin. * from ****

Jennifer is a poor and hard-working student and she possesses a power over snakes,an ability to control them and communicate with them.Her father Luke is a mentally unstable religious nut.The worst of all some wealthy students led by cruel Sandra constantly harass Jennifer at school.Sandra turns many other students and teachers against Jennifer including the school's headmistress.Eventually Jennifer gets revenge on her cruel classmates with the help of her snakes.Vastly enjoyable and fun to watch "Carrie" clone with likable main character.There is no gore,but if you like your horror cheesy and entertaining you can't go wrong with "Jennifer".I'd love to have a date with such a pretty girl.7 out of 10.

Jennifer is a poor young redheaded woman from West Virginia attending a private girl's school on a scholarship. She and her father had left their home in disgrace, when around the age of seven some snakes Jennifer had been handling in church apparently bit and killed the preacher's son. She refused to handle snakes ever since, though her father now runs a pet store and often encourages her to use her power again.Her father is a bit of a simpleton, unable to make meals for himself without burning them, relying on his "Jenny" ever since his wife died. While he does operate the pet store, most of the time he's in a back room listening to Christian radio.Pretty Jennifer is quite smart, though. I'm not sure if her scholarship was based on her low income or her high intelligence. She gets in trouble with a cruel clique at school. They already hated her for being different, but when she snitches on them for cheating on a mid- term exam (only after they accused her of being the ringleader when they were caught), they're literally prepared to kill her.The main culprit is Sandra, the daughter of a Senator. The school's headmistress is quite eager to kick Jennifer out as well, preferring students with rich and powerful parents.The swim team invites Jennifer to join them, but the movie does not make much of that plot element. One of Sandra's crew, an overweight girl, also sticks up for Jennifer occasionally, to her own detriment. Additionally, one of the teachers also wants to be Jennifer's friend.Eventually Jennifer is pushed to the point where she does start using her power.This was an OK movie, nothing exceptional. Some of the giant snakes, briefly glimpsed, are a bit silly. Is it a rip-off of Carrie? Well, probably. The video distributor was selling it along those lines, with a tagline on the back of the video box reading "Compared to this, 'Carrie' was an angel." The overall plot is similar: misfit child of religious fanatic is picked on at school and resorts to using psychic powers.Beyond that, I don't know if they're too similar. Jennifer's father is a bit of a loon, and while he pulls a belt out at one point to threaten Jennifer, it's unclear whether he's ever actually delivered on the threat: he doesn't seem to be as cruel as Carrie's mother. Jennifer doesn't become filled with rage like Carrie, attacking innocent people, but acts in self-defense, only attacking those who are prepared to kill her.

I have this movie from when I taped it on non-cable television a couple of years ago. I wonder were a lot of parts cut out that I may have missed to get the full picture of the movie. Anyway, I did get the meaning of the movie. This movie was okay/average enough to watch, but kind of boring. Instead of Telekinetic powers (Carrie had), it's snake powers. My rating of this movie is 6.5 stars out of 10 stars.