Private School (1983)
(On Cable TV, September 2019) It’s one thing to know, in the abstract, that the early 1980s were filled with cheap sexploitation comedies made in the wake of Porky’s success. It’s quite another to experience a wholly average example of the genre such as Private School, which reliably features naked breasts (never male nudity) once every 5–10 minutes. The plot is as basic at it gets for the genre: teenagers looking to lose their virginity, and the lengths to which they’ll go in order to even see naked women. I’m sure that at some point (probably when I was 13), I would have thought this was the best movie ever. Now, it feels more than vaguely puerile, with a side order of misogyny considering way the female characters are treated as nothing more than targets to be tricked or surreptitiously leered at. (The best moments of Private School occur when the female characters take back some agency, although the film is often frustratingly indecisive as to whether they’re playing along or actively being deceived.) Phoebe Cates is the biggest name here, and as such does not have to disrobe. But even if you take aside the obnoxious premise and obvious intention to revolve around naked set-pieces, it really doesn’t help that the film is truly, exceptionally, unarguably dumb. The jokes can be seen coming minutes in advance, the characters don’t notice things that any half-wit would, Noel Black’s direction is as basic at it comes—nobody’s smart in this film, including the writers (one of them a woman). The set-pieces are familiar to the point of being exasperating in how long they’re drawn-out. It’s bad enough that it actively undermines the reason why the film exists—for all of my favourable predisposition toward female nudity, I found my patience sorely taxed by the dumb filmmaking and worse writing. Private School sounds like a good time but really isn’t—don’t make the same mistake.
