SYNOPSIS:
Since
a fire broke out in Lap Lan Secondary School ten years ago.
There is always a silhouette on the wall, coupled with eerie
singing in the middle of the night, resulting in all kinds
of scary and disturbing rumours being spread in the school.
Lap
Lan Secondary School is a girl school. However, under the
new education policy, Goh Keung, Charles, Ben and Dick are
assigned to Lap Lan Secondary School to continue their education.
The
four boys found excitement among the boring boarding school
girl school. As love and rebellion are the given right of
the youngster - no matter how the Dean of the school has forbid
the romantic relationships between the guys and gals.
After
a secret party, love blossomed among the youngsters. Unknowingly,
the relationships had revived a hidden curse which haunted
the school ten years ago…
Very
soon, Dick, Ah Sze and Cat went missing and found dead bizarrely.
The death of their schoolmates caused Goh Keung and Yat Man
great distress, and the two were on the verge of breaking
down. After much consideration, the two decided to challenge
the rule of “Students are forbid to fall in love”,
which they found totally unreasonable, hoping that this will
lead them to the cause of their classmates’ death.
In
the meantime, the old school office which is destroyed by
the blaze ten years ago, appear again with the ghost of the
Dean… Step by step, the cursed spirit of the Dean traced
the lovebirds, confronting their mutiny against the school
rule…
MOVIE REVIEW:
If the Haunted School achieved anything in the horror genre,
it would be to educate movie watchers on how to spot problems
from a terrible horror film movie as the Haunted school got
quite a few to share.
The
most obvious mistake was the over usage of special effects
and camera tricks in a weak attempt to create the scary atmosphere.
This film laden with extreme zoom in/out and close up on figurine
and old portraits does nothing to create a genuine scary ambiance
but distract the viewers from the story and numbing the viewers
from feeling any fears in this tale.
Another
problem was the usage of spooky soundtracks to highlight the
spookiness in this movie. It would have been more effective
if the filmmakers used it to emphasize a truly scary moment
or an important moment but in Haunted School, it was wastefully
overused and it seems that the film was desperately trying
to use the spooky soundtrack to create fear but failed miserly.
Beside
the un-scary effects woes, the fast pace editing that jumps
from one plot device to another also leave the viewers cold
and uncaring about the characters in this movie or their motivation.
One of the best examples would be when one couple in this
movie broke into tearful farewell and you might be scratching
your head as you wonder when did this couple fall in love
prior to this farewell? This is because the film makers neglected
to spend any effort or time to build a decent background story
for this couple
This
type of MTV fast pace editing and the over-douse of special/
sound effects seems that their sole purpose was to cover the
most important ingredient missing in this movie and that’s
a good plot.
It’s
hard not to chuckle at the concept of the terrifying penalties
in breaking school rules, specially the first and major school
rule which states that the student of the horror school are
not allowed to fall in love. There are skillful suspensions
of disbelief in horror movies and then there is downright
childishness. The Haunted School’s characters and their
motivation felt that it had been written during juvenile school
days or by someone who still harbor an unhealthy vendetta
against their discipline mentor.
But
sadly, that what the Haunted School is build upon. That not
to say that it’s beyond redemption as it’s still
a good throwback movie to catch when one is looking for unintentionally
funny moments in a horror setting.
SPECIAL
FEATURES:
Making of - If you are unimpressed with the
movie, you will be likely to be equally unimpressed with the
making of this movie.
This
making off segment uncovers how the filmmakers got their inspiration
for making this horror movie. They displayed impressive professionalism
in showcasing how they came up with this idea and never once
came close to admitting in front of the camera that it might
had been a bad idea to suggesting the concept for this movie
in the first place.
Another
part of this segment is mixed with actors sharing their experience
in making this movie and their roles. But given that most
of the characters in this movie were one dimension, it severely
limits this bunch of actors from sharing any thing that were
remotely interesting. As again, it even tries too hard in
the making of segment to hype up the scariness of this film
with special cuts and effects but achieving very little of
what was desired.
Trailers - This movie comes with 3 form of
trailers that consist of a one minute trailer, a 23 seconds
trailer and a Theatre Lobby Trailer that ran for 52 seconds.
AUDIO/VISUAL:
Presented
in 16;9 with English and Chinese subtitles. This disc present
fine visual transfer for the movie and there is audio option
in the film’s original Cantonese dialogue or Mandarin
dialogue in Dolby Digital 5.1 or DTS.
MOVIE RATING:
 
DVD
RATING:
Review
by Richard Lim Jr
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