Mondo Celluloid - Review » SORORITY BABES IN THE SLIMEBALL BOWL-O-RAMA

SORORITY BABES IN THE SLIMEBALL BOWL-O-RAMA

In the mood for some 80’s terror sleaze heavy on the T & A, but light on style, substance or sense? Then have I got a recommendation for you! Sorority Babes in the Slimeball Bowl-O-Rama starring scream queen Linnea Quigley of Hollywood Chainsaw Hookers fame (that’s right, fame) isn’t really a B-movie. To call it such would be to do a huge disservice to the entire canon of more worthy B’s. No, SBITSBOR (how’s that for abbreviations?!) is actually a Z-movie of abysmal proportions. It’s the kind of flick ignored and unheard of by the JQ public but occasionally dredged up from the bottom of the barrel by die-hard cult film enthusiasts desperate for some hidden classic they haven’t yet seen. Well folks, this ain’t quite it. The story of three social outcasts (the nerd, the fattie, & the geek, or as this movie has it, the geeb[?]) on a quest to ogle naked tri-delta vixens (pretty much the whole first third of the film) would be tastelessly charming in a Troma kind of way if it adopted some of that studio’s trademark surrealist gore and gallows humor and if, oh yeah, you could see anything! Instead filmmaker David DeCoteau steeps all his shots (except the ones of tits) in such utter blackness (likely to hide the cheapness of the effects) that you’ll swear the cinematographer forgot to take the lens cap off! The result is that you constantly feel like you’re missing something really really cool, like the fat kid getting his flesh scoured off by a bowling ball polisher, or the Bride of Frankenstein having an axe fight with a punk rock motorcycle mama!

The plot concerns a couple sorority pledges, and our trio of dweebs, who break into a Bowling Alley to steal a trophy. (This after about ½ hour of close up shots featuring paddling asses, showering pledges, & whipped cream covered beavers. You know, necessary shit.) Turns out that the trophy they steal actually contains an evil jive-talking monster imp with 1 and a half facial expressions (smugly-sarcastic-with-left-eyebrow-raised or smugly-sarcastic-with-right-eyebrow-raised). He immediately puts the bowling alley on lockdown (using those cool blue lightning bolt effects which were all the rage in the 80’s) and turns a couple of babes into blood-lusting demons for good measure (don’t you hate when that happens?) The demons of course can only be killed by removing the head or destroying the brain (with a bowling ball!). It’s too bad that the kids accidentally lock up the kindly old janitor/prospector, perhaps their one chance for survival! But it’s good that they have biker bitch Spider (Quigley) and a seasoned horror movie pro (well, he digs Slumber Party Massacre a lot at any rate) on their side.

They just might make it, but they have to be careful not to accept any wishes from old Uncle Impy! After all those of us who have read W.W. Jacob’s The Monkey’s Paw (or seen Aladdin) know that when wishes come true they often do so with terrible consequences! SPOILER ALERT: The terrible consequence of wishing for lot’s of gold? The gold will eventually be made of wood. Wait, what?

So ultimately, the gleefully masculine-lensed depiction of female sexuality, the Duke Flyswatter voiced ghetto puppet imp (real culprit: Michael Sonye), the terribly lit gore and action sequences, & the one cool car crash moment add up to a film that’s so bad it’s, well, bad. But the crazy old Prospector is good for at least a chuckle, the breasts are perfectly bronzed and perky, and let’s face it, you’ve spent a worse two hours of your life. My suggestion, pair this cinematic atrocity with Ghoulies 3, Ghoulies Go to College for a double feature of sexy sorority monster madness and remember, it’s all Greek to me.