April Fool’s Day-1986
Director Fred Walton
Starring Thomas F. Wilson, Deborah Foreman
Scott’s Review #498
Reviewed October 24, 2016
Grade: B-
Emerging at the tail end of the late 1970s and early 1980s slasher film craze that defined that period in cinema (for better or worse), April Fool’s Day (1986) capitalized on the “holiday theme” marketing tool that had propelled Halloween (1978) and Black Christmas (1974) to superstar status.
Unfortunately, this film is not a traditional horror flick; it has plenty of comic elements but also contains the standard slasher characteristics, thereby making it a blockbuster failure.
It does not know what its identity truly is.
From a storytelling perspective, the film has one great twist, but otherwise suffers from mediocre writing and unmemorable characters nobody cares about.
We are treated to an ensemble of actors, most of whom are unknown, except for horror maven Amy Steel (Friday the 13th Part 2), who portrays Kit, arguably the most relatable of the female characters.
A clever facet, woven by director Fred Walton, is the casting of eight principals in April Fool’s Day, all with similar amounts of screen time, rather than one obvious “final girl” surrounded by minor characters, who we know will be offed.
The setup is all too familiar in the slasher genre- the group of college-aged kids escapes mundane life for a spring break weekend getaway at their wealthy classmates’, Muffy St. John’s, island estate.
Conveniently, her family is away- leaving the friends to have the run of the mansion, with a dinner party as part of the plan.
Even more convenient is that the ferry the group takes does not run on weekends, so once they are dropped off at the island, they stay until Monday.
This sense of foreshadowing sets the anticipated peril and dread in motion.
We also sense that there is something very off with Muffy- despite being everyone’s friend. When Muffy finds a jack-in-the-box in her attic and recalls a childhood memory, we know this is the setup for the mystery.
Is she mentally unstable? Is someone out to get Muffy for a childhood prank or an event that once occurred?
Since it is April Fool’s Day weekend, the groups spend most of the film playing pranks and amateurish jokes on each other (a whoopee cushion, an exploding cigar), mixed with a dash of intrigue- someone is leaving trails of history as part of the jokes.
One girl had an abortion, so the prankster left an audiotape of a baby crying. In another room, heroin paraphernalia is left for someone with a former drug habit.
Slowly, one by one, the college kids disappear, but is it just a hoax? Or is the hoax just a hoax?
The final twenty minutes or so are really the main reason to watch this film.
As Kit and boyfriend Rob are the last remaining “alive,” there is suddenly a startling twist that changes the entire dynamic of the film- in one moment, everything the audience thinks of the story is turned upside down.
This is wise writing, but it comes too late in the game.
Sadly, some parts of the film are downright silly, and most of the characters are of the stock variety- the flirtatious blonde, the obnoxious jocks, the stuck-up preppy, which ruins the creative twist that is aforementioned.
With glimpses of genius and a striving for something more clever than the standard run-of-the-mill 1980s horror film, April Fool’s Day (1986) has some potential but ultimately leaves something missing.
