Leofwine_draca
A mildly scuzzy women-in-prison movie of the 1980s, REFORM SCHOOL GIRLS is far too cheesy to be a successful movie. It was somehow posited as a spoof of the then-popular movie, but the laughs are in short supply unless you find terrible overacting amusing. The story is the usual mix of prison flick cliches, rivalry, gang culture, exploitative shower scenes, and cruelty. Sybil Danning has a small role as the warden but the cast is mostly unknown. It does get unpleasant at times - that branding scene! - but overall it feels remarkably light and insubstantial, with a real lack of characterisation making it hard to care about what happens to any of the cast. Wendy O. Williams steals all her scenes as the resident psycho.
oprlvr33
While I am not hugely familiar with O'Williams' alternate metal-head band "The Plastmatics" from the former classic MTV days (a few songs were very good), she does her role here very well as Charlie the boarder-*itch. However, I was horribly unconvinced with Pat Ast as Matron Edna. Much of her acting was way overdone. Even Danning was more convincing in her supportive role as prison warden.The most laughable I considered was matron Edna's posterior "complete control". Way too many plot holes during those scenes.. which really only added to the comical ambiance of scenes anyway.The remaining supportive cast of school girls were very good, esp the one black gal (exact name I cannot locate) who befriends the Jenny. Overall it had its legit moments. The most annoying plot begot is the board meeting and latter with Dr. Norton addressing the abuses behind the scenes. Pat Ast should have been fired and her role recast she was so ridiculous in that scene.
ozoneocean
It's a WIP movie: Women in Prison. In this "Reform School" the girls night time gear consists of g-string panties, lingerie, high heels... basically sexy to a silly degree. This has all the clichés you want, with nudity, violence, girl fights, all that sort of stuff. Wendy O Williams was great as the ultra violent gang leader Charlie. She also did great work on the sound track.We know this is a WIP cliché film and the purpose is titillation and all that sort of stuff, but it didn't really seem clear to me. A lot of the violence was pretty brutal for the sort of movie it was and many of the scenes are quite realistic, with realistic, emotional performances from some of the key actors, which is quite at odds with that "women in Prison" titillation theme, especially when you have inmates incongruously wearing high heels, thigh high stockings and g-strings to bed!It seemed almost like a bizarre mash-up of two different films that'd been crudely rammed together: You have Wendy O Williams and her gang of ultra-sexy, violent, tough girls, and the huge lumpy, hilariously sadistic and over the top Pat Ast as "Eddie" doing their very best to make it a sort of Rocky Horror Show ridiculous soft core romp (which would have been marvellous), VS this other theme with the sympathetic characters Jenny, Lisa and Dr Norton where it's a serious look at abuse of power and the horrible toll abuse takes on its victims- almost as it they're going for Cool Hand Luke or Full Metal Jacket sort of stuff...That made a weird mix that didn't really fit together well at all. It's as if the film makers were trying to be too smart for the material.
The Red Bull
My friends and I are always looking for the diamond in the rough (as it were), that one movie that's just so bad it serves as the topic of conversation for the next few days. I read a few comments after viewing this movie and don't think people realized: This movie is exactly what it claimed to be.Sure it's hardly an example of a "good" movie, but the increasing ridiculousness of the story was matched only by the quality of the cinematography. Sure they could have spent more time on a foley stage, but when you're looking at a room full of naked women showering, who cares? The only gripe was about one character who obviously didn't belong in a juvenile detention center. As my friend pointed out, they neglected to tell her it was reform school, not old school.All in all, get some friends, get some buds and prepare to be entertained. The only thing missing from this reform school is a giant tub of Jell-O.
AD
