In 1986, after the success of the Toxic Avenger came Troma’s cautionary tale about a high school that sits next door to a nuclear power facility. When a toxic waste leak poisons the water supply going into Tromaville High School, the students are mutated into hideous forms. The honor students are the first affected as they are transformed into a gang of sex-hungry, devious and sinister cretins. They terrorize the students, beating them up, having their way with them, and forcing them to buy joints of what they call ‘Atomic High,’ marijuana grown in the back lot of the nuclear plant where the soil itself runs green with toxic ooze.
Mr. Finley, the crooked manager of the nuclear facility refuses to make repairs or clean up any mess made from various spills. Too afraid that the public will shut him down, he would rather contaminate the school next door than make necessary repairs.
Meanwhile, our two heroes, Warren and Chrissy, get invited to a wild party where even a Cretin or two can show up and not destroy the place. The problem is that one of their friends bought some of that nuclear weed off the cretins and cajole Warren and Chrissy to partake. After our two straight A students become contaminated is when everything goes down hill. Warren kills two of the Cretins in a street fight (being poisoned by nuclear waste makes you punch really hard,) and Chrissy finds herself suddenly nine months pregnant with a monster inside her.
Troma did an excellent job with makeup and special effects. There isn’t a whole lot of gore in this film, but the few graphic scenes are impressive for such a low budget film. The acting isn’t too bad either, and has a good measure of slapstick humor thrown in. Even the hideous mutant monster in the school basement looked damn good. If you watched the Toxic Avenger, you should have no problem noticing some of the repeat actors in Nuke Em High. I looked on IMDB, and none of these actors went on to star in anything really major. I think that’s a shame because these guys do a great job and made an enjoyable, fun to watch movie. In the end, there’s not much I can fault with Class of Nuke ‘em High because if all you’re expecting is B-Movie schlock, this is one of the better titles. In a few areas, it’s even better than some of the mainstream horror films that were out at that time. Hell, I’d watch this over that Paranormal Activity snoozefest any day.
Again, just like the other Troma films I’ve reviewed, there is a 100% free and legal copy on YouTube for you to watch thanks to the TromaMovies channel that I have embedded below. Watch it while I light up this strange looking cigarette some weird smelling punk gave me. Just holding it has made my arm go numb.
Oh well, I hear the school bell ringing…
UPDATE: Unfortunately, I had to remove the embedded video. Something got buggered up with the embed link and is not displaying the correct video. Until I figure this out, I’m simply going to give you a link to the TromaMovies channel page. The movie is still available to watch, but I have to figure out this technical error.
