Art and horror have a long and fruitful relationship, from every cinematic rendering of The Portrait of Dorian Gray through to Fulci, Barker and Begos. Regrettably, End of Term (2021) won’t be making any ‘best of’ lists for its own treatment of the art theme; neither the art nor the horror are either plausible or fully-formed.
Starting with a voiceover which addresses the hackneyed cultural idea of the ‘tortured artist’, we meanwhile meet main character Melissa (Chelsea Edge), whose job will be to talk us through a sequence of events which took place at a recent graduation party. To judge by the strategic raised cuts on her face, things turned violent; true enough, given she’s whisked into a police interview, this is now a murder enquiry, and she’s a valuable witness.
She’s an art student, living at – ulp – the Old Rectory at Borley (something which is a namecheck only and has no links to the Borley legend). Voila, our first problem: in its haste to frame the film as a horror, the police whizz us through the highlights of the fateful night in short order, which leaves Melissa the job of filling in all of the details. The jump scares are already past tense before she can get stuck into her narrative; from here on, all she can do is recount things more slowly and, it seems, in a surly monotone, which suggests that all of this is very tedious, and so it comes to feel. We are also asked to keep the perspective of two timelines: the police interview, and the erstwhile party, which is difficult to do meaningfully – especially given that the art students involved are all so difficult to like.
But, that aside, we go on: one of the student’s art pieces is, apparently, an ‘S&M torture chair’ (and yes, she’s the resident goth; why do you ask?) Frankly, whilst it becomes notionally plot-relevant, it doesn’t look like a lot to show for a £27,000 student debt, but this may stem from personal frustration about Not Understanding what art is; several asides during the film furnish us with platitudes about this topic, at the expense of pace and characterisation. Also at the expense of pace and characterisation: there are lots of attempts to encourage affiliation with the graduates themselves – their politics, their relationships, their former relationships. At the art show, we also meet some of the professors, as well as learning more about the legend of art school founder Garth Stroman, who is rumoured to haunt the very student accommodation we have already seen. This kicks the film into the next phase, where it either becomes a supernatural thing or, as seems somewhat possible, a hijacking of the legend by a disgruntled student, or critic, or someone else. You do get some denouement by the end, but until that point – who knows, or could really keep their minds on it?
Whilst the production values on this film are essentially sound, End of Term is a frankly baffling, disjointed affair where compounded errors around pace, character and narrative rapidly blow any borrowed goodwill. It’s keen to put its big-ish British TV stars front and centre (odd couple Julie Graham and David Bamber feature as the two detectives) but this is still a minimal role for them; even so, they threaten to overshadow Melissa and all of her recounted storytelling about the fates of the others (who, for all of the back story offered, fade swiftly from the memory). They’re an odd bunch; we’ve already discussed the surprising paucity of the art on show, but this weirdly pampered, repellent group of people are barely plausible as students at all: maybe student life is like this, now, for some, but it’s a big ask to make them sympathetic with their luxury housing, crap paintings, personal non-problems and inability to hold anything like a debauched party; everything here is too lacklustre to really land. Do the searching questions around art go anywhere, either? You could argue that more time spent on other aspects of the film would have meant more tension and drama to carry things through to the ninety-minute mark. There’s just no guts, no fun: everything fizzles out. The true role of art here is, arguably, to spit out a baddie to stalk the pristine corridors; everything else is just filler.
It’s interesting to note that this film – the work of a first-time director – was made seven years ago; it’s then credited as a 2021 production on IMDb, and getting a release now. No doubt Covid played a part in its delayed appearance, as it did so many titles, but you can’t help but wonder if other issues held some sway here too. As it stands, End of Term is a weak, flimsy and derivative horror which comes across as having pretensions, rather than solid ideas, which tends to feel unforgiveable for many genre fans – this one included.
End of Term (2021) is released on digital from the 2nd October 2023.