School of Death

Director - Pedro L. Ramirez (The Jinx, The Fish with the Eyes of Gold)

Starring - Dean Selmier (Take a Hard Ride, The Hunting Party), Sandra Mozarowsky (Night of the Seagulls, Devil's Possessed), and Norma Kastel (Vengeance of the Zombies, The Girl from the Red Cabaret)

Release Date - 1975

Genre - Horror

Tagline - "A dark tale of gothic horror set in a school for orphaned girls."

Format - Bluray (Personal Collection) (Screener)

Rating (out of 5):

     The last two weeks has been pretty entertaining for the most part.  I've been working on the last few releases from Mondo Macabro because my day job has picked up a lot over the last few months so I haven't been able to watch and review like I should be.  Last week I busted through three previously released MM titles then took a break to watch a few indie releases before moving on to the four newest releases from Mondo Macabro.  The first of these four that I decided to check out was the 1975 gothic horror tale School of Death.  It was one that was new to me so I was very interested in it.  Like always, I want to thank CAV and Mondo Macabro for sending this one over for me to check out.  

     The film follows a mad doctor who is severely burned that takes women from a London orphanage and subjects them to his strange experiments that ultimately wipes them of their memories.  He then fakes their deaths before his partner sells them into prostitution.  

     I knew nothing about School of Death prior to Mondo Mcacabro sending this one over for me to review.  I knew it was a Spanish horror film but that was it.  I was very pleased with the atmosphere and aesthetics of the film but the long, drawn out scenes made it feel a lot longer than it actually was.  I liked it, for the most part, but this is one of the many instances where some of the fat could be trimmed to make the film flow a lot better.  The acting in this one is solid.  The characters are fairly generic and flat but they fit the film very well with the cast does a decent job with their performances.  No one really stands out and a good bit of the character lack personalities but the cast does the best with what they had.  The story for this one is a gothic style mad scientist film with a fun little twist.  The movie makes the twist known fairly early but the ride to it is still worth it for the most part.  As I stated earlier, the movie is way too long during certain scenes and could benefit from a trim but it's not as bad as my complaint makes it.  It's tolerable but does break the pacing up.  Finally, the film has some make-up effects but that's about it.  The make-up effects are not the best looking and the doctor's face made me laugh.  It reminded me a lot of the monster from Frankenstein's Daughter.  I've seen much better in other films much older than this one.  I was a little disappointed in the lack of fun gore or deaths but the story doesn't really leave room for that.  Overall, School of Death has some things I liked and others I didn't.  It was a decent first time watch with some impressive atmosphere and scenery but it is long winded.  The Mondo Macabro blu looked fantastic which should be the only way you watch this film but go into it with an open mind.