Unruly teenagers Rickie and JT play truant from school, and decide to spend the day messing around the remains of an abandoned psychiatric hospital. Exploring the basement corridors they come across a heavy sealed door. Intrigued, they struggle to open it and when they do are shocked to find a naked young woman strapped to a table. The woman is alive but appears to have been there a long time. She is feral, and possesses a unique quality. While JT sees this as an opportunity for free sex - becoming obsessed with the woman - Rickie refuses to take part. He only has eyes for a girl at school, who seems to have little interest in him, even though they were close at a very young age. When a mutual friend gives the secret of the dead girl away to a group of older boys, events quickly spiral out of control...

In the last few years screenwriters and/or directors - particularly those new to horror - have felt a necessity to make an impression by utilising the tactics of shock and distaste, rather than being more imaginative and chilling the viewer instead. This is simply one step on from the cheap-shot use of suddenly slamming doors to make people jump. Terror lives in the psyche; so unless your real fear is to be strapped naked to a table and abused on a daily basis Dead Girl is unlikely to provide those chills. Instead, you’re more likely to watch with distaste - if at all.

For fear of sounding contradictory, the concept here is original, and the film is well-made. It does successfully bring together the genres of teen horror and ‘torture-porn’ horror, adding the merest hint of psychological drama. The subtext explores the minds of wayward teenage boys: their secret lusts (secret only to them, it seems), and how far they are likely to cross the line. In its purest form it’s a sociology thesis on right and wrong - and the consequences thereof.

Some years back, quite out of character, outstanding supernatural horror novelist Graham Masterton wrote a short story called Eric the Pie. The boy of the title, having been taught no sense of right and wrong, sexually abused and slaughtered animals. The story was looked upon as so shocking and disgusting that it single-handedly closed down the then new publication Frighteners. I’m certain that Dead Girl will only appeal to prepubescent boys, but who else it might attract is debatable. Again, the objective seems to be to get people talking about the movie. After all, they do say that even bad publicity is good publicity, because it keeps the subject in the public eye.

So intent are the filmmakers on centring on the main characters themselves, that they leave a lot of questions unanswered. Where did the girl come from? Was she left behind when the psychiatric hospital closed? That's pretty unlikely. If she was forcibly taken to the abandoned building, why did her kidnapper not return? Is she an ex-patient? Or is she a feral beast raised by wolves? Where did the wild dog come from? And why are her violent actions so discriminatory and unreasoning? The questions go on.

Extras include a Cast & Crew Commentary, Behind the Scenes Featurette, and Make-up Effects Gallery.

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Ty Power