CRY_WOLF

US, 2005, 90 minutes, Colour.
Julian Morris, Lindy Booth, Jarrod Padalecki, Jesse Janzen, Paul James, Sandra McCoy?, Ethan Kohn, Kristy Wu, John Bon Jovi, Gary Cole.
Directed by Jeff Wadlow.

With so many slasher and horror films that have themselves ‘cried wolf’ over the years, audiences who do not devotedly check out every example of the genre might be wary of this one – and it even has a PG rating, so what kind of horror is this?

The quick answer is high school horror.

The setting is one of the preparatory academies that moviegoers have seen in Dead Poets Society, The Emperor’s Club and Mona Lisa Smile. Of course, it is fifty years on from some of those films’ setting and the students don’t go out to night meetings to discuss poetry or art. They go out to invent the equivalent of computer game scenarios (at more of a PG level) where conspiracies are hatched and the participants don’t know what is true or false.

Into this comes the very English Owen (Julian Morris) who has been shunted on from several schools (not always his fault). Dodger (she claims her mother loved Dickens!) is the bright student (Lindy Booth) who befriends Owen but leads him into the spiteful and lethal games of the group. It is Halloween and all kinds of macabre happenings occur leading up to a death. Whodunnit? And why?

There are enough twists to keep us guessing and, even if we do, do we have the right motive? Claiming nothing more than to be a thriller with scary touches, that is what it does (with the help of Jon Bob Jovi as the journalism teacher).

1.Entertaining teen horror, slasher thriller? Familiar ingredients? Originality?

2.The location, the campus of the American school, the buildings and classrooms, dormitories, meeting rooms? The contrast with the woods? Beautiful but eerie? The Halloween atmosphere? The musical score and the range of songs?

3.The credibility of the plot – the use of mobile phones and emails for communication? Their becoming sinister? The practical jokes and hoaxes? The deadly serious reality of relationships? Murderous characters?

4.The story seen through the perspective of Owen Matthews? British, the tense relationship with his father and the interchanges? His being expelled from other schools – and the later revelation, justifying him? His arrival? The encounter with Dodger, her friendliness? His meeting Tom, sharing the room? The other members of the group – and his going to the meeting, attracted to Dodger, Randall, Lewis, Mercedes, Graeme and Regina? His becoming more involved with the group, the hoax and deceptions? The background of a girl murdered in the woods? His relationship with Mr Walker? The difficulties, suspicions of Owen, the computer messages? The killer? His wariness of the other members of the group? His relying on Dodger – and seeing her embracing Walker? The knife in his bag? His touch of blackmail in threatening to expose Walker and the relationship, saved from expulsion?

5.The Halloween party, the stranger pursuing him? The further threats, the chases through the school, the kitchen? The discovery that Mercedes was disguised as the killer? The dangers with the gun? The group and their being confined to school? The meeting, the revelation of all the pranks and hoaxes and deceptions? The identity of the sender of the emails?

6.Owen, the build-up to the finale, his being pursued? The seeming murders? Owen and Mr Walker, the gun, the confrontation with Walker, the shooting? The discovery that the others were still alive? The police, the gun? The identification of the gun? Owen being freed – and the discovery that the villain was Dodger, her motivations? Her threatening him – that no-one would believe his story about her?

7.Dodger, charming, her background (and her lies about her background)? Friendship with Owen, introducing him to the group? Her participation in the hoaxes? Her relationship with Mr Walker? Owen depending on her? Her participation in the hoaxes? The irony that she turned out to be the villain? The murder of the girl in the woods? Vengeance on Mr Walker? Her control of Owen?

8.The other members of the group, their personalities, relationships, participation in the game, lies, deceptions? The dangers – and some of them almost getting killed? The boy absent in the town, with the car? People suspecting him? The actions of the group, the revelation of the truth? Their being alive? The convincing nature of their seeming murders?

9.Walker, his place on the staff, relationship with Dodger, the affair, his treatment of Owen, threatening to expel him, Owen blackmailing him? The struggle, his death? The irony that he had been having a relationship with the girl in the woods? Dodger’s revenge?

10.The staff at the school? Handling of the situation, the police?

11.Communication, mobile phones, emails – part of the modern repertoire of horror and slasher stories?