Sorority Row

Some films require endless analysis to be understood and appreciated; others merely require consumption. Sorority Row is most definitely the latter. Very little effort was put into writing and shooting it, so very little effort will be put into reviewing it.

Sorority Row is a bog standard slasher movie, set on a US college campus called Theta Pi, where the only admission criteria is you have to be a complete and total slut. After a prank goes wrong, five campus sisters end up killing one of their own, Megan (Patridge), and maintain their silence until graduation, where they start getting picked off one by one by a robed figure with a tyre iron. Needless to say, bitches get jacked.

[gallery]This is a movie so formulaic it could have been written by Microsoft Excel*. The college stereotypes are all present and correct (jock, rich bitch, slut, nerd, obviously heroic lead etc.) and the entire cast are all morally reprehensible - chopped liver, in other words. Sadly the direction is so poor, even the deaths are ruined by sloppy, choppy close-ups. Save for one grotesque offing by wine bottle and an effective kill scene in a giant bubble bath, the fatalities are bloody but otherwise dull.

Dialogue fares a little better, suggesting a slight wink and a nudge towards caricature with some knowing exchanges. "Let's not panic here," reasons prom queen Jessica (Pipes) after the girls are spooked by their would-be killer. "No one here is dead! Well... except for Megan." Sadly, you're never sure whether the script is smart enough to play dumb - characters always pick the deadliest possible solutions, no matter the scenario they find themselves in. There's one inexplicable scene where a cameoing Carrie Fisher starts going mental with a shotgun. Why? Because BANG! That's why!

As I mentioned, Sorority Row is not a movie ripe for analysis, simple because there is nothing more to it than murder and tits, both of which feature frequently. It's a movie put together on the cheap by hack writers with a young, inexperienced but pretty cast, designed solely to reap decent opening weekend box-office figures and be forgotten forever after.

Mildly diverting fun for a boozy Friday night, perhaps, but you'll still have to suffer the hangover the next morning.

* I've used this joke before, but I did say I wasn't putting much effort into the review.