Graduation Day (or Red Herring High)

After the success of both Halloween and Friday the 13th, a ton of slashers came out that were based around life events, be it an actual holiday or something personal. One of the most successful was this 1981 film. I had never ever seen this one, and after seeing how big of a hit it was in 1981 (made on a budget of $250,000 it grossed $23.9 million) I decided to see why it was a hit.

The plot starts out immediately in the opening credits: a rising track star is pushed to the point of death at a track meet by her coach. Two months later, we cut to the day before what would have been her graduation day. Her older sister, now in the Navy, comes home from being stationed in Guam to accept a special award on her sister's behalf. As she arrives, the members of her sister's track team start to die. All in the course of the same day. 

Is this sister home to actually get revenge on what happened to her sister? Maybe...or maybe it's the coach, who has been fired from his job of producing Olympic medal winning athletes due to the death. Or maybe it's the dead sister's boyfriend, who is obsessed with the fact he was to marry his love on Graduation Day. Maybe...or maybe it's the school principal who has no care for his students and a desk full of knives. maybe...or maybe it's the gay not gay music teacher who is being framed for sleeping with his students to pass them?

What we do know at this point, however, is that some of the students give us epic Tori Spelling Realness. 

Graduation Day is a blast. Friday the 13th meets Fast Times at Ridgemont High. The film has a campy vibe to it, either intentional or accidental I cannot tell. The slasher acts as a slasher as if written by Stefan on SNL: from the military sister who is Jennifer Beals-ing all over the place, to the musical number that hosts two of the film's deaths that has band members who couldn't decide if they were a punk band, a glam rock band, or a ska band. 

If that was not enough, it even has early screen performances by horror scream queen Linnea Quigly and a then unknown VANNA WHITE!

If you love ridiculous 80s horror films, look this one up. It is available to stream via rental all over the platforms.