Student Bodies

Student Bodies
Student Bodies
	Theatrical release poster.
Directed by	Mickey Rose; Michael Ritchie (uncredited)
Written by	Mickey Rose
Produced by	Allen Smithee
Starring	Kristen Riter; Matthew Goldsby
Cinematography	Robert Ebinger
Edited by	Kathryn Ruth Hope
Distributed by	Paramount Pictures
Release dates	August 7, 1981
Running time	86 minutes
Country	United States
Language	English

link title:For the Canadian-produced television series, see Student Bodies (TV series)

Student Bodies is an American comedy film first released on August 7, 1981, written and directed by Mickey Rose. It is a spoof of slasher horror films such as Prom Night, Halloween, and Friday the 13th. The film's style of humor can be compared to other spoof films, such as Airplane! and The Naked Gun (the latter 3 of which were also made by Paramount Pictures). In one scene, for example, sign language is used. Every time somebody dies, an on-screen body count appears.

Michael Ritchie produced the movie, but later took his name off the picture and used the well-worn pseudonym Alan Smithee instead. One of a group of movies directed towards teenaged audiences during the late 1970s and early 1980s, Student Bodies had little box office success when it was originally released. However, the film developed a cult following when it was released on home video, and shown on cable television. The DVD is scheduled to be released on June 3, 2008.

Aside from Richard Belzer, Joe Flood and Cullen Chambers, a large number of the cast contains completely unknown actors and actresses, most of them having appeared only in this film. Even IMdB holds nothing of their biographies.

Plot summary

Student Bodies is about a serial killer who stalks female students at Lamab High School, while at the same time, voyeuring on them as they walk around the school's locker room. The killer's name is "The Breather", because the killer has trouble breathing; therefore, he breathes very hard all the time.

"The Breather" enjoys stalking victims over the telephone, and, much like Jason Voorhees of the Friday the 13th movies, he hates seeing youngsters having sex. The Breather used many unusual objects to kill his female victims such as a paperclip, an eraser, and a horsehead bookend; However, he would put his male victims in trash bags while still alive.

It is initially suspected that the school's principal is the killer. While the principal has a killing instinct, that theory was later proven wrong, as he became "body number 12" when he slipped over some marbles and impaled himself while trying to attack a student with a trophy won by the school typewriting team.

The Stick

One of the film's oddest aspects is a character called Malvert, a creepy-looking janitor (itself a familiar trope in slasher movies), who does bizarre things like urinate in trash cans and move about in a herky-jerky fashion. Malvert is played by a tall, double-jointed comedian known only as The Stick [1], who never made another film and passed into obscurity. (The Stick's real identity, or if he is even still alive, remains a mystery.) Several on-line reviews give the film itself a mixed reaction but praise The Stick's performance. [2] [3] [4]

Movie cast

Kristen Riter as Toby
Matthew Goldsby as Hardy
Richard Belzer as The Breather
Joe Flood as Mr. Dumpkin
Joe Talarowski as Principal Peters
Mimi Weddell as Miss Mumsley
Carl Jacobs as Dr. Sigmund
Peggy Cooper as Ms. Van Dyke
Janice E. O'Malley as Nurse Krud
Kevin Mannis as Scott
Sara Eckhardt as Patti
Brian Batytis as Wheels
Cullen G. Chambers as Charles Ray
Joan Browning Jacobs as Mrs. Hummers
Angela Bressler as Julie

Filming locations

Lamar High School, Houston, TX [5]- Known as "Lamab High School" in the film

Parodies

External links

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