A Frightful School Horror (2001) Kyoufu Gakuen aka Terror School

Directed by Yamaguchi Makoto

The title is, lets say a little deceptiveThe film is made up of three short stories, all set in schools on the last day of the summer break. The acting at times is frightful but unfortunately the stories arent, also I cant imagine anyone finding the film horrific, unless theyre around five years old! As you can see, school is the only word that actually fits within the title, Spooky School Tales would be far more fitting in my opinion.

1. The Newcomer from Hell

Again an awfully deceptive title, three girls hang around their Junior school on the last day of summer break hoping to see the new kid, one of them catches sight of an elusive girl who constantly disappears whenever the others arrive. She manages (eventually) to follow her to a storage room that is strictly out of bounds to pupils and spends the day playing with her, but things are never what they seem and she ends up having a probably fatal accident in the storage room. Clearly the other girl is the lonely ghost of a pupil who had died in the same room sometime in the past, and now she has a permanent playmate. 

2. The Cursed Science Room

Three girls spend their last day of their holiday practising for the school swimming team, the sight of a tiny frog freaks them out leading one of them to relate the tale of The Cursed Science Room. This story revolves around three girls investigating a science room where another pupil was supposedly murdered and had her face removed. Fact and fiction blur as the same actresses are used to play out the roles in the story and the ones in the pool. In the end the fantasy leaks into the reality, as one of the girls appears to see something strange in the pool. 

3. The Crucified Girl

Where do they get these titles? A quick note on this last spooky tale because I feel it depends on your knowledge of Japanese mythology surrounding crows particularly dead ones. Another group of High School girls spend their last day of summer break practising dance, the sight of a dead crow upsets one of the girls and this leads to series of bizarre occurrences for her and several other girls. No crucifixion though! 

Overall

The camera is used to add effects to what is undoubtedly a very low budget enterprise, from the very soft focus first episode to the deliberate blur and strange angles of the others, apart from that there is very little in the way of effects, mainly fake blood.

The acting. In the first episode the acting is fine, mainly because its young children doing what comes naturally, running, playing and generally being themselves. The second and third stories suffer through stiff performances, you feel the cast were picked because they were attractive and either good at swimming or dance, not because they could act!

The film comes across as a Japanese version of Goosebumps or Are You Afraid of the Dark which would work fine for a young mainly female audience, but according to the dvd this shouldnt be viewed by anyone under the age of 18? Sounds like a marketing scam to me.

Recommended? Not in the slightest, only slightly better than compilations like Dark Tales of Japan.

Cheers Trev.

No BBFC rating and despite the box, Id rate it as PG.

Dvd distributed by Winson, a Hong Kong based distributor.