The Story:
Splatter University has every cliché of the genre. At the beginning, a mental patient performs a truly ball-busting hack job on a male doctor. We get plenty of "3 years later," "6 years later" and even "3 weeks later" typography keeping us clear on the timelines of the slaughters. A Catholic university is the setting, and liberal minded young teacher Julie Parker is fresh on campus, and not playing by all the conservative rules that the head priest, Father Janson, tries to impose on his students. And neither are the students. This group of horrible young actors is having sex, getting pregnant, drinking, dancing like white people to bad 80s no frills filler music probably recorded by some never-was garage band, and wearing designer Jordache and Sassoon jeans. You know, the usual. And of course, they're getting killed one by one. It's up to Julie to find out who's after her students. Is it the head priest, whose movement is limited by the fact that he's in a wheelchair? Is it the sexy young teacher Mike that she's dating, who happened to date the teacher who was killed in the second flashback murder that took place after the first one in the mental institution? Is it the perverted priest on staff who is basically screwing half his female students?

So, how do the clichés and bad acting add up? Well, let's see. There are no scares. You see approaching murderer feet, stalking camera angles, then scary 80s synthesizer chords being sustained (they got something right) until the weapon is presented and plunged into a victim. There's a fair amount of blood being poured on people, if that's your thing. No inventive killing, just straightforward slashing. The whole "have sex and die" moral paranoia is played to exaggeration. No one who remains alive seems even vaguely concerned that there's a murderer on the loose, except Julie, our heroine. You can predict from the very beginning of the movie who the killer is that you're not supposed to think is the killer, and who isn't the killer that you're supposed to think IS the killer.

So, yeah, the movie is really bad. REALLY bad. But I have to confess, after sitting through the lame deaths and the excessive, unnecessary dialogue simply written to fill time between the murders, as I watched the predictable outcome, I was slightly impressed. There were some unique camera techniques used in filming the final chase scene between the heroine and the killer. The killer's weapon was sacrilegious enough to satisfy those still jaded by a tortured childhood in Catholic school. There was just enough of a twist at the end to make the movie leave a bit of a memorable scar on my psyche! That was the last thing I expected to happen. So, like it or not, I'm going to have to say any lover of the genre should check this one out just to say you've seen it.

The DVD

Video:
This is described as having an anamorphic widescreen aspect ratio of 1:85:1. For some reason, at times, it appeared to me like the film was being stretched on the sides as if it was a full frame movie being watched on my widescreen TV. The film itself is typical dark, bland low-budget 80s horror. There's a hint of oversaturation of the colors. But the big problem is the grain!!! Grain is putting it mildly. This movie almost looks like it is covered in television snow! Remember when you'd have the switchbox on your Atari 2600 game system just slightly pushed off the "TV" mode? That's the effect here. But giving this fact a positive spin—the snow does an amazing job of hiding most of the wear and tear on this old print.

Sound:
This is some mean mono. The eerie synth score is clear and upfront, but all voices and sound effects in the movie sound like they are passing through a tunnel. Honestly, it sounds as if the microphones weren't close enough to the actors and action when the movie was made. Oh, and while we're talking about sound, can I just say—there's a car skid sound effect used that I'm pretty certain was borrowed from the vault of the Flintstones.

Extras:
The scene index offers 10 chapter breaks. Other than that, you get two versions of the trailer. One is basically an edit of the longer one, with a slightly altered voiceover script.

Final Thoughts:
Splatter University takes you right back to 1984—when trying to make an original slasher film was like trying to get blood from a stone (or more likely, trying to make a bloody movie while stoned). This one's not scary, the acting is bad, and the death scenes are uninspired, although there's some red running for gore fans. However, the final moments of the film hint at a movie that could have had potential—that is, if the end had been attached to a different script with a different cast. This one's definitely for diehard 80s slasher completists (like me).