6/10
Precedes Texas Chainsaw Massacre
15 December 2023
Warning: Spoilers
The movie's also known as 'Schoolgirls in Chains.' Are they also stored in your locker as well?

This is a Code Red release. They're on the same tier as Substance DVDs.

I'm just surfing the trailers before the feature starts. A lot of nakedness in 'SS Experiment Love Camp.' Yeah, it's what you're thinking. 'Divine Emanuelle' is strictly for R-rated perverts. 'Rica' looks like a total waste of time. 'The True Story of the Nun of Monza' is the Italian way of mocking religion. There is nothing too appealing there. All exploitation trash is for the easily pleased.

This version of 'Schoolgirls in Chain's' has retained the "schoolgirl" in its title, but my DVD cover doesn't display it. The DVD calls it only 'Girls in Chains.' That's like the Dixie Chicks dropping the Dixie part today, like the Yankee burying what's her name's brother. Now, why'd I write that down? It made no sense the next day when reading it.

Moving along, the movie introduces two slackjawed brothers who prove on their birth certificates that they're genuinely from West Virginia and struggled to graduate beyond kindergarten.

What looks like Rose from 'Dogfight' is picked up, held captive by Flea, and taken back to 'Grandmother's House.' Is that the same vehicle from 'The Car?' Or was it called 'The Hearse?' Wait a minute, they're not schoolgirls; they're grown ladies!

Three women are kept as pets locked down in a cellar. They're some sort of reserve date who didn't make the cut for 'Dogfight.' Chained up like a dog Rose is led out to the orchid to play hide-and-seek with Flea.

A twenty-second head start is cut short in the hunt, and you just know she'll be retrieved any moment now. And shazam! She tasted only two minutes of freedom before being recaptured. Silly girl. Chancing her hand with a second throw of the dice, she makes a mad dash in the daily double, only to be confronted by Block Head, the other brother. Or, Box Head, more like it. He has an anvil for a head that's made out of granite. He looks like Major Chip Hazard, with darker hair. Like the dirty, rotten yellow belly that he is, he shoots Rose in the back with a double barrel, and what they do with her remains I'm not entirely sure, as I was writing down my review and not paying attention to the screen.

The other two are degraded as Flea plays the adult version of Doctors and Nurses with them against their will, and is that Whistling Dixie music playing I detect in the background? Why don't these two overpower Flea? Kick him where it hurts, then stomp him one!

Why does this remind me of 'Tourist Trap' at times?

An unpleasant rape scene is a bit too confrontational for my liking.

If I remember correctly, isn't Box Head Chip Hazard a transsexual and dresses as his mother as the big shock at the end? Or am I confusing that with 'Tourist Trap?' I haven't watched that for a while. It's not a bad flick. Clu Gulager, wasn't it? I forget. He was a country and western singer, right? I think 'Tourist Trap' failed because of the country and western singer being the Leatherface in it.

A backstory reveals that Box Head Chip Hazard sired his own mother, and Flea is their incestual offspring, if I'm reading it right.

I wonder if Ed Gein ever got fresh with his mother. Did he make it that far, do you reckon? I only mention The Plainfield Butcher because this movie is similar to 'The Texas Chainsaw Massacre.' It's unusual that this was released a year before Tobe Hooper's classic, so I can't find 'Schoolgirls in Chains' guilty of ripping off Hooper's movie.

Flea scouts the college grounds in search of new pets and targets Long Tall Sally. She's the kind of girl who'd look good trampling on autumn leaves as Jack O' Lanterns rot while the sunsets. How can she be a Bonny when I just labeled her Long Tall Sally? She's easily captured by dummies using dummy techniques and then given the Barney Cousins ammonia treatment to render her unconscious, then added to the collection of pets in the cellar.

Lashing out at Flea results in her being belted around the head by Box Head Chip Hazard as a harsh reminder that family can't be trifled with. It must be a Philly brotherly love thing?

While her teacher boyfriend becomes suspicious of her absence from his bed, he starts playing detective, and it's pretty flimsy how he tracks down the whereabouts of both Long Tall Sally and the two demented siblings, or father and son?

Flea looks a bit like Steve Railsback. He's an annoying actor with that stupid hair of his. Not to mention that vacant space between his teeth. He'd be the hitchhiker from 'Texas Chainsaw' in this movie.

Getting game, Long Tall Sally deceives Flea again at hide and go seek, but Box Head Chip Hazard picks off the escapee immediately, then plays the same game inside 'Grandmother's House.' The ending is similar to 'Texas Chainsaw.' Who would have thought Ed Gein would be the influence for all these movies years later? That lonely little man inspired hundreds of actors to copy his methods and gain notoriety for his actions.

A gas station attendant comes out with the best line in the movie when he says that he's glad that the two weirdos mother is dead. It reminds me of Hal Holbrook in 'Girls Nite Out' aka 'The Scaremaker' when he says of someone passing, "Christ, I hope so." Instead of dressing as his mother, Box Head Chip Hazard only speaks like her, and he hangs himself at the end when they get sloppy.

The two candy fairies lose their composure as Long Tall Sally uses reverse psychological techniques and bests them both as her teacher boyfriend shows up to compound their downfall. A fistfight between Box Head Chip Hazard and the teacher boyfriend breaks out, and some decent punches and kicks are administered. That dude's old enough to be her father.

They had it all under control but quickly became unglued, and it all fell to pieces.

The movie ends on a disturbing note as Flea stares into the void and chants "mom" over and over, and you kind of feel sorry for the dullard.

The movie's okay, I guess.

I'm not a fan of women being held against their will.

You can watch it once, and that will do you for eternity, as I doubt you could watch it on repeat like 'The Room.'
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