SUMMER SCHOOL (2006 dir Ben Trandem, Lance Hendrickson, Steven Rhoden, Troy McCall, and Mike P. Nelson)

Random Creatureface Films DVD

The horror loving geeks of the randomcreatureface.com horror site give us their first feature film with this creative, one-of-a-kind, low budget gore outing mixing every element of the horror genre imaginable by rolling every major subgenre into one nice little nightmare-loaded package.

SUMMER SCHOOL is story of Charles a high school kid who reviews low budget horror flicks for a horror site. Charles arrives early in the morning for his summer school class before anybody else gets there and starts checking movies off his list that he watched the previous night as part of a horror marathon. As his fellow classmates and the teacher arrive, everything appears to be normal. As soon as Charlie gets up from his seat to use the restroom, things begin to get weird. From then on out, Charlie finds himself torn between reality and dreamland as he seemingly finds himself in one nightmare after another ranging from a cult of Satan-worshippers, to spider people who take over the school, to vampires, to Nazis, to crazed gun-toting killer hillbillies, and eventually to Charlie himself becoming part of the ongoing nightmares as a mad slasher. Charlie doesn't know what's real or what's a dream anymore as he wakes up from one nightmare to find himself in another nightmare and so on and so on, leading to a shocking "twist" ending.

SUMMER SCHOOL is a very well done first effort from Random Creatureface. It's a prime example of micro-budget filmmaking done by horror fans for horror fans. It was indeed a fine opportunity for RCF to blend subgenres by mixing slasher, supernatural, vampire, creature feature, backwoods horror, etc. It all makes for a very innovative, mind-bending experience. The enthusiasm of the filmmakers is really what helps with a film like this. The anthology-type story relating to the nightmares of one person makes it a very interesting, sort of experimental film. And being the first feature film from RCF, an experimental type film clearly allowed for them to use their imaginations and be creative. The splatter effects are pretty decent too, I must add. Overall, SUMMER SCHOOL is a very original and campy low budgeter that proves RCF knows the horror genre very well. It's a very promising start for them all around.

RCF's "Extra Credit Edition" DVD of SUMMER SCHOOL presents the movie in widescreen with the audio options of 5.1 surround and 2.0 stereo and contains numerous extras such as three commentary tracks, a behind-the-scenes montage, deleted scenes, a gag reel, several short films, trailers, and a few hidden Easter eggs. There's also a cool insert booklet included as well.

Those looking for a good genre blending "experimental" horror film will find much to enjoy with RCF's SUMMER SCHOOL. Grab a pencil and paper, make some popcorn, and give the DVD a spin for a nightmarish evening of chills and spills! Visit RCF at www.randomcreatureface.com