“School of Fear” aka “Seven Days of Grace” is a well-mounted murder mystery that misses no opportunity to provide a rich portrait that lays bare every aspect of a boarding school. It brings out the boys attending, their teachers, the headmaster, and the custodian and his wife who maintain the facilities.
At the halfway mark, a police inspector Horst Tappert arrives from out of town. He’s looking for Kurrat (senior) who has disappeared. Not so coincidentally, the staff, led by Joachim Fuchsberger, have been hunting for Kurrat (junior), a student who also has gone missing. They didn’t call in the police in order not to scandalize this upper tier private boarding school.
The director, Albert Vohrer, had by this time directed a number of the Edgar Wallace krimis. This movie has a serious tone overall, but it also has definite strains of cynical humor and biting commentary that lard it too.
I watched a decent but apparently unrestored widescreen print of this movie with good subtitles. It ran 96 minutes and some seconds. The credits had the names of the production team and cast spelled correctly, so it was not the print viewed by the only other reviewer at present.
One chase scene occurs that is quite memorable, on foot. It takes us over snow-covered shores of a body of water.
The movie begins in a light way with the pranks of the boys who sneak out at night for fun and games at the apartment of a local prostitute. They also confront their teachers and eventually we hear their satires recorded on a tape. This establishes the conflict between the new generation and the older stuffier one. The boys also harass each other.
One teacher named Fromm (Konrad Georg) loses his temper with the younger Kurrat and has to apologize when the elder Kurrat interferes. He later reconciles with the boy. The custodian is taking money from the boys to let them in and out at night. His wife is unhappy with his subservient role and spies on the boys taking a shower. The headmaster is anxious to maintain the school’s reputation. One teacher is gay and he comes in for some ridicule from the boys, but the younger Kurrat seems to turn to him for counsel. Fuchsberger is courting a female teacher and they are satirized by the boys.
Gradually the picture grows more serious with the disappearances and then we are confronted with several deaths.
Overall, a decent mystery and social portrait that survives its time.
