Return to Nuke 'Em High Volume 1 (2014)

2 Stars (out of 4)

Student Gaudy

By Jeffrey M. Anderson

Troma Entertainment, whose list of exploitation movies goes back more than 30 years, has always been a good source for "good-bad" movies. Although, depending on your tastes, your sense of humor, your mood, and perhaps the company you keep, sometimes their movies are just flat-out bad. I'm disappointed to report that, in my experience, their newest film, Return to Nuke 'Em High Volume 1 is one of the bad ones.

It's the third sequel to the original Class of Nuke 'Em High (1986), and it begins with a sort-of recap of that movie's plot. Now the school is still there, but the power plant has been shut down to make room for a new "organic" food plant. Unfortunately, some leftover nuclear sludge mutates the Glee Club into a violent gang called the Cretins. It's up to cute bloggers Chrissy (Asta Paredes) and Lauren (Catherine Corcoran) -- who of course become lovers -- to save the day.

There's a duck, a girl with a giant penis, references to high school shootings, a cameo by Motorhead's Lemmy, references to other Troma films, and more. It's not necessarily scary or even gory, but it is disgusting. It has that kind of humor that kind of laughs at itself before the audience can laugh. As reckless as it seems on the surface, it's almost as if it's really scared to actually try real jokes. (It just goes to show how hard this kind of self-referential humor is, and how well it's done in things like The Lego Movie.)

Troma's longtime fearless leader Lloyd Kaufman directs. Inspired by Quentin Tarantino, the movie was split into two parts, and this is only part one. Part two is on the way.