(1984)
Dir - Fritz Kiersch
Overall: MEH
The most, (somewhat), inexplicably prosperous of any cinematic Stephen King franchise was the one that spawned after the initial 1984 version of Children of the Corn, based off the short story of the same name. While King himself initially penned a screenplay, it was rejected by Hal Roach Studios for being too wordy and coming from King, this is quite the believable criticism. The project was in turn sold to New World Pictures after George Goldsmith was hired to re-write it. In any event, the resulting, low-budget affair is both sluggish and embarrassingly corny, (har, har). The film's premise of a town besieged by fanatical, malevolent-entity-worshiping youths gives way to an awful lot of scenes with obnoxious child actors ranting ominous mumbo jumbo to each other. It is also a case of a conventional plot structure being less fitting than a comparatively more experimental one. Bouncing back and forth between the kids and the grownups, the mystery is not as engaging as if, say for instance, we never saw the children until the very end and the majority of the film was instead just the adults exploring the deserted, ultra-creepy Nebraska town with corn crucifixes scattered all over the place. Then again that might also get a bit boring if it went on for too long. Perhaps it is simply a case of being one of the many short King stories that does not really work when fleshed-out into a full-length film then.
(1986)
Dir - Eugenie Joseph/Thomas Doran/Brendan Faulkner
Overall: MEH
Despite its relative obscurity, Spookies has still garnished a reputation as one of the most laughably incomprehensible 80s horror movies ever produced. An entire film titled Twisted Souls was initially shot, but quarrels between producers and financiers halted it from being completed in post production. A year later and for no conceivable reason, additional footage was shot by a different director with different actors and a different story line to boot, at which point said footage was mixed with the Twisted Souls stuff to make for one absolute mess of a finished product. One has to give up immediately as the disorienting editing starts right out of the gate, leaving the viewer no choice but to sit back and try and be entertained with the barrage of horror cliche nonsense that throws proper narrative structure recklessly to the wind. Wildly uneven make-up and special effects, nonsensically tripe dialog, stereotypical, dipshit characters arguing with each other, venomously inept acting, fart zombies, and one illogical amusement park haunted house set piece after the other, yup its got all of that. Some of it is amusing in a knowing way, some of it is awkward and boring, some of it is embarrassingly funny, and a whole lot of it is just embarrassing.
(1988)
Dir - James Signorelli
Overall: MEH
After a few years of being a horror hostess for L.A.'s KCAL-TV station, Cassandra Peterson brought her Morticia Adams with giant hooters hybrid Elvira to the big screen in Elvira, Mistress of the Dark. Written by Peterson along with Sam Egan and John Paragon, (Jambi from Pee-wee's Playhouse), and helmed by frequent Saturday Night Live director James Signorelli, it is your typical, feel-good, fish out of water comedy except with an endless stream of rawdy puns and boob jokes. Taking anything in this movie remotely serious is a grievous error, but its relentless stupidity does get a bit much. Considering that three people are credited with writing the screenplay, it is rather remarkable that it comes off as if it was penned in about five minutes by a single horny twelve year old. While this is surely meant to be part of the charm, it is frequently about as funny as a baby seal with ass cancer as it tries a whole lot harder to be a whole lot funnier than that. In the title role, Peterson is likeable yet tiring at times and a small handful of other familiar 80s character actors get to ham it up in the spirit befitting to the movie, most notably Ferris Bueller's Day Off's Edie McClurg as a stereotypical, uppity, gossipy, village council member. Boobs are always hilarious though right guys?
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