Dear Matt: A Letter to a Friend from a Friend

Just reread that last post. This one right here is the definition of a much more "sober" state-of-mind.

Offering thoughts that even blink at a "review" about something like Dear Zachary: A Letter to a Son about His Father seems wrong. Unfair. Foolish. High-horse douchebaggery. How can any critic/writer ponder the faults of a documentary that's totally rooted in the filmmaker's personal tragedy, constructed from a brutally heartfelt place, and intended for a grieving family member? Fuck out of here. All you should ever do with something like this film is experience it and allow it to move you in ways that its balance of pain and love could only execute.



Fortunately for the critical world's sake, though, Dear Zachary has received universal acclaim and adoration. I'd read about the flick all of last year, but was never able to check it out until today, courtesy of trusty Netflix. And wow, I lost count as to how many times I was on the verge of tears. Filmmaker Kurt Kuenne pulls off such a well-rounded, flawless study of a beloved friend and the aftermath of his murder at the hands of a mentally-unstable older-lady lover that you leave the flick with a "I feel like I now actually know this Andrew Bagby fella, and what a great guy he was" sensation. Kuenne travels cross country and up into Newfoundland to interview practically every person Bagby came into contact with throughout his 28-year life, and through these candid, fearless sitdowns I immediately realized just how cherished he was by everybody in his life.

And then, the way Kuenne shifts the tone from happy retrospective to a dread-soaked murder recount is so sudden, so effective. I'm opting not to dissect Dear Zachary here, simply because I think it's a film that deserves to be seen firsthand, rather than relayed from my eyes.



While watching, I was reminded of something that happened to me back after my college graduation. One of the top five most amazing things that anybody has ever done for me, and easily the greatest graduation gift a dude could ask for. I'm not currently in the mood to write the page into a tizzy with an all-encompassing "college experience" account, though, so I'll just drop you into the days surrounding graduation from St. John's University, out in Jamaica, Queens, which I really do miss a bunch. When I look back on that four-year saga, there are many people who stand out for good reasons---friends I've sadly lost touch with, friends I'm still close with, and friends I wish I could've gotten to know more.

The one person who truly left her mark, however, was Ms. Day (which I'll keep referring to her here as, to keep identities somewhat disclosed to those who don't who I'm talking about). Nearly three years of some the biggest heartbreaks I've ever experience. Some of the closest feelings to "love" that I've ever been met with. Some of the toughest life-changing, eye-opening happenings I'll ever endure. I wouldn't take back or change a thing, though. She and I grew up so much together that all of the good and bad feels necessary to this day. Lessons ranging from racial acceptance and awareness to basic dating-ritual rights and wrongs were mutually absorbed. It was a hell of a relationship.


Ms. Day isn't in this pic, but it's still fitting. SJU, circa 2004.

The "She's truly something special" deal was sealed the moment she gave me my graduation gift: my very own "Matt DVD," which is this documentary-styled short film she and one of our on-campus co-workers put together by interviewing a slew of my closest friends and associates at St. John's. Asking each person all about me, capturing their kindest words and funniest memories. Due to time constraints and the general flakiness of mankind, they weren't able to interview everybody that mattered to me, but I'd say they managed to compile an impressive 70%.

The first time I watched the Matt DVD, I actually shed a few tears. Facial raindrops. One thing about myself that I hardly ever share with people is just how insecure and self-conscious I can be, a truth that has recently faded away piece by piece thanks to my successess and realizations of just how fortunate I am. But back in college, shit wasn't as sweet. Nowhere near. I can specifically recall times when I'd cry alone in my room, asking myself What was wrong with me? Why is it so difficult to look in a mirror? So to have somebody go through the efforts to make a multi-person testimonial in my honor was mind-blowing. Unbelievable. Therapeutic. Amazing. Life-changing (there it is again). I'd never realized that people at SJU really fucked with me on a respect-level. Heads who you would've considered to be the "big men on campus," or the "ladykillers," and even the "hot chicks."



I'm confident in saying that the Matt DVD was my first real step toward self-acceptance, and I have Ms. Day to thank for that.

Time to time, I toss the Matt DVD back into my DVD player and go back to Queens, in spirit. People looked so much younger. Things were much more innocent. I just finished watching it again, promptly as Dear Zachary came to its conclusion, and that knot in my throat, the jiggling of the eyelids returned. The Matt DVD is completely positive, and in no way on par with Dear Zachary's profound impact. But in a way, the two "documentaries" are kindred entities. Both were made out of love and appreciation, and both are intended to serve as letters to their focal subject(s).

And both do chin-ups on my heart.

Drunk yet fully aware of the brilliance of these two audio treats, you bastards!

When you're drunk as a fucking skunk, as I am right now at about 3am after an evening of Bacardi Orange shots and 22-ounce Coronas (great times had by me and my two co-defendants tonight), you come back home in a rather vulnerable, loose, susceptible state of mind. As in, the type of fucked-up mindframe that would voluntarily watch the following videos on repeat just to fuck with his own cerebellum (worth mentioning....I've had to proofread and retype every fucking word of this post due to severe inebriation at thisi current moment).

But anyway, back to the mission at hand. Me, watching these bizarre, brilliant, subversive, off kilter, what-the-fuck opening bits from a pair of foreign cinematic gems, one I own on DVD and love (Irreversible) and the other I'm ready yo buy come April 7 instantly, as I'm ready for some heady ish from the sick fucker behind the wildly wonderful Calvaire, Fabrice Du Welz (this flick being Vinyan). Revel in the craziness, won't you?:

The dizzying, mesmerizing, genius spin-cycle score from the early section of Gaspar Noe's amazing Irreversible: [The damn file has been removed from Youtube, sadly, but trust me, it's incredible-ness.

2) The opening sequence for Du Welz's Vinyan,a credit bit that I'm in love with for its utter ballsiness and otherworldy demeanor. Just listen to the sound on this bitch, give it a couple of minutes to kick in, please:

Martyrs Watch -- The End Is Nigh

A little over a month left before I finally see this nasty, subversive little French ditty. Been close to a year now that I've been anxiously, impatiently twiddling my thumbs and reading polarized review after reaction. Weeks of checking the Film Society of Lincoln Center's website to check if this would be playing at their annual "Rendezvous with French Cinema" series (just as Inside and Frontiers did last year) proved useless once the playlist was released and not one horror flick was included, let alone this. Reality settled in, and it became obvious that I'd never get to see this on a big screen, which blows but I'll live.

At least the Weinstein Company has balls enough to release it on DVD here stateside, uncensored. In preparation for its looming April 28 street date, a new United Kingdom advertisement, or "quad," has made its way onto various horror websites. Take a gander, it's a good one:



It's almost mathematically impossible that this one will disappoint. Enormously unfeasible, even.

First spotted over at: Bloody Disgusting

From Greek to shriek.....

Work with that headline....that's all I got today.

For all the shit I talk about horror remakes, there's just something about this October's House on Sorority Row (1983) redo, simply titled Sorority Row, that has me feeling totally supportive. Could be that I've yet to see the original, so I have no loyalty or investment in it. Or maybe, it's the generally-negative reviews I've read of that first go-round that prove its room for improvements. Perhaps it's a general need for a fun, mindless, well-done slasher flick in today's genre marketplace that has me optimistic here.



Vegas odds, however, would lean toward the fact that Sorority Row's cast is predominantly "sexy young actresses," plus hurt-in-the-face Rumer Willis (the daughter of Demi Moore and Bruce Willis). The last time such stars were aligned was that putrid Black Christmas remake, which I frequently erase from my memory only to re-discover its awfulness on cable, like some sort of cruel joke being played on me by the television overlords. How that film managed to downgrade a meeting of Lacey Chabert, Michelle Trachtenberg, and Mary Elizabeth Winstead into anything less than a hormonal paradise is beyond any logic of comprehension.

So I've reserving hope that Sorority Row can avoid the pitfalls of Black Christmas. And now there's this new trailer, which gives me even more reason to believe. Looks better than expected. Not saying I'm expecting horror greatness in the least, but there's a certain air of "playing it straight" that Black Christmas failed miserably at....but, as a Devil's advocate would point out, Black Christmas also had a nice-looking trailer. Let's hope this here preview doesn't dupe me in equally painful ways. Biggest plus for now: the director has said that he's looking at an R rating. Take that, pussy-ass Prom Night.

Sorority Row, out October 2
SORORITY ROW trailer in HD


[Yes, that was Audrina from The Hills. I'm actually not mad at the casting, even though she'll surely smell on screen. I hate The Hills and everything about it with fiery passion, yes, but that doesn't mean I can't acknowledge Audrina's rampant sex appeal.]

Extra: This seems as good a time as any to call out Jamie Chung as a one-time The Real World cast member that I completely slept on during her season. Was she as unbelievably hot on the show as she is now? Check out her photo spread in the new Maxim mag issue (with Malin Akerman) on the cover, or just rewatch this Sorority Row trailer. She's a problem, my friends.



Also worth nothing: One of Sorority Row's other stars, Briana Evigan, is also a dilemma. In a good way. Shit, I sat through Step Up 2 the Streets just to ogle her. I deserve a date, or a phone number, at least, right?


Yes, that ish above her eyes looks like a five-head in this picture, but that's a-okay

The first available bit of "Shutter Island goodness" (expectedly) has me all hot and bothered

If you know me, I'm sure that you'd suspect Quentin Tarantino's Inglourious Basterds as my most-anticipated movie of '09, but then you, my friends, would be stricken by some false assumptions. Well, maybe not. I have rambled on and on here about how much I'm dying to see some Nazi-scalping and listen to Brad Pitt's Foghorn Leghorn accent, so I could understand. The more I think another high-profile flick coming later this year, though, I realize just how quickly I'd punch an old lady in the face across the street at Chelsea Square Park to catch an early screening of Martin Scorcese's Shutter Island (or, Ashecliffe, whichever he's calling it; I much prefer Shutter Island). For the unaware, Shutter Island is Scorcese's next tag-team with Leonardo Dicaprio, and it also stars Mark Ruffalo, Ben Kingsley, Jackie Earle Haley (Rorschach, bitches!), and Michelle Williams. Its an adaptation of Dennis Lehane's astoundingly-great novel, which still reigns supreme as my favorite novel of all time.

As of now, the flick is looking at an October release.

Simple plot breakdown (courtesy of Barone's World): Set in 1954, and Dicaprio plays a detective sent with his new partner (Ruffalo) to investigate a missing person case on a secluded island off the shores of Boston. Only, this island is actually a Riker's Island-like detention center for the criminally insane, and their "missing person" is a homicidal woman (Mortimer). The investigation itself becomes a royal pain in the ass, with lies, deceptions, mis-leads and other issues surfacing, but then all hell truly breaks loose once a freak storm traps the two detectives on the island, in the midst of an all-out riot.

I'd be a horse's ass if I said anything further, but I will tease with this: the book has such a captivating Gothic dread-power throughout, and it ultimately pimp-slaps the senses with some crazy Twilight Zone turns. I've read it twice now, and the novel literally went from "awesome" to "holy shit" for me. So having such mega-talents like Scorcese, Dicaprio, Ruffalo, Haley and Williams has me feeling all warmly confident inside, but not 100%---if you read the book, you'll understand my questioning of just how Scorcese will pull it all off visually and structurally. And the overall tone is much more quasi-supernatural than anything Marty S. has done before; not that I'm doubting the god Scorcese, of course. I'm just insanely curious.


A paparazzi shot, of sorts, caught during the film's production

There won't be a trailer for this one any time soon, I'm sure, but I've just come across something a bit cooler, only because it's not something you see everyday for films you love (or expect to love). Here are some storyboard illustrations for the production, drawn by a great artist named Karl Shelfelman. Pretty cool stuff. Shows you just what goes into some of a film's pre-production process:




Note to self: Must figure out how to expand this site's width for picture-posting benefits.

Storyboards (including a couple more not posted here) spotted over at: Rope of Silicon

The shakiest homemade sex tape imaginable

Could there be a better job in the world than naming Skinemax spoofs? I highly doubt so. It takes a higher plain of genius to come up with gold medals such as The Bare Wench Project, or Spiderbabe. And don't even get me started on the masters who construct the accompanying screenplays. You can just color me red with envy and go on your merry way.

The latest genre knockoff courtesy of Cinemax's late night programming lords is Cleavagefield, a film so cleverly titled that I'm mad I didn't think of it before. I'm assuming, like the great Cloverfield, it's shot cinema verite style and stars pretty young people with mediocre to above-average acting skills but unafraid of excessive nudity and unnecessary sex. It premieres after hours the evening of April 1, on Cinemax.



Now, I hardly expected the monster itself to even hold the enormous jock strap of my dude Clover (I like to call the creature that), but this Cleavagefield image is a huge disappointment. Seriously....your movie is called Cleavagefield, people! How in the hell does this monster not have ginormous breasts?! Admit it, you were expecting the same thing. How could you not?

Wait for it.......

.........

.........



Is that the bastard child after-product of sex between a duck and a turtle? My three-year-old niece plays with animal toys that look better than this ish. Like it really matters, though, of course. Still, we're talking total "missed opportunity" here.

I won't even be able to enjoy the film now, thanks to this half-assed creature. Lies and fairy tales.

Monster image first seen over at: Dread Central

Here's the trailer:


Cleavagefield (trailer) - The best bloopers are a click away

Though I've been trying my hardest to avoid jumping on the pre-release-hype bandwagon....

.....I've now officially succumbed. "Spike Jonze tackling a surreal, wonderful children's book that I loved back in the early grammar school days" can no longer be ignored.



Loving this poster. Word is that the first full-length trailer for Where The Wild Things Are will show itself in a couple of weeks. I'll save a post for it. Of course.

Saluting an old, true friend.

Last night, Tobe Hooper's The Funhouse (1981) failed to live up to expectations set upon it by critical write-ups and general secondhand nostalgic appreciation, so I went into tonight's '80s-makeup-of-lost-time-watching, Stuart Gordon's Dolls (1987), with a palpable dose of apprehension.



Dolls struck me as a kindred spirit to The Funhouse, from its trapped-in-a-scarehouse setup (this time, motorists stranded at the home of a couple psychotic geezers who make killer toys) to its director, Stuart Gordon, a second-string horror giant with an uneven resume, a la Funhouse's Hooper. Glad to report, however, that Dolls is superior in nearly every way. Much more fun, balancing self-awareness with gleeful macabre. Still has its hefty share of faults, mainly in its lack of any pure tension despite its good ideas and too much goofiness, whether intentional or not. But in all, Dolls is slightly-more-than-passable entertainment on a quiet Monday night.

Unsurprisingly, Dolls has registered on a much more personal reflection level than any degree of cinematic stimulation. The reason: as a kid, I had tons of dolls. Action figures galore, from scattered G.I. Joes and Star Wars' (and I'm not even a Star Wars "fan," per say) "men" to every single Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles figurine visible to man's eye. Stuffed animals ranging from a Super Grover (silver cape and all) to Teddy Ruxpin (Teddy was my man...wanna fight about it?).

The cream of my toy closet's crop, though, was none other than the coolest doll of them all: My Pet Monster



My Pet Monster and I went to hell and back together. For as long as my imagination could sustain at any given time, the two of us fought off zombies, hung out with my imaginary friend Tim (who died in a house fire in Fair Lawn, fake story; I could even show the exact house that my childish mind pegged as his charcoal tomb), tormented my family's house-cats. Wherever I went, My Pet Monster traveled shotgun. Up until about age ten or eleven, I'm pretty sure that My Pet Monster ate with me at the dinner table, much to my parents' raised eyebrows. But public opinion meant nathan to me, because My Pet Monster was my co-defendant. See, I didn't get a dog until the first day of high school, freshman year, so My Pet Monster was really all I had when social interactions petrified me, or immature insecurities reigned triumphant over my adolescent subconscious. Shit, who knows where I'd be without MPM.



These days, he's lyin dormant at my parents' house. Resting comfortably in the top shelf of my bedroom's closet, all shoddy and worn down. Faded, some stitching having come undone. I remember a couple years back, I went to Toys 'R' Us to get my niece a Christmas gift. What an awesome, never-wanted-it-to-end experience that was. Aisle after aisle of melancholy memories, wishing I could be a little kid again, realizing that those days will never be again. And then, as some sort of cruel joke from up above, there it was. A new and improved My Pet Monster, a bit more gray than blue in coloring, but still with the same physical build and orange chain. I stood there in the aisle, frozen in happiness, for a solid two minutes straight. Pondering, Should I just buy this for myself? Would my own elder My Pet Monster be jealous?

Ultimately, I decided to save the $25 and put it toward an extra gift for Baby G. I figured, The MPM that's been nothing buy loyal to me all of these years is all I need. To get by. Byyyyyy. A slicker, modernized model couldn't offer anything worth shaming my old dude.



My Pet Monster was my original BFF, and I now have Stuart Gordon's Dolls to thank for bringing those fond recollections back into my mind's forefront. Indirectly. The namesake porcelain protagonists in Gordon's films are nothing like My Pet Monster, really. It just goes back to a line voiced by the evil old man character, something to the effect of (and I'm paraphrasing here), "Your toys never forget. They're always with you." Like MPM is surely smiling back at the 'rents', happy that his mans and them is doing well. Living life. Healthy and all that.



If I had more time on my hands, I'd now go into my other childhood partner-in-crime, Billy Baloney. The Pee Wee's Playhouse character that my parents brought into my world during the MPM years, and who battled through mutual jealousy with the Pet Monster before shaking hands and mutually accepting similar BFF duties in my life.



One of these days, I'll opine over Mr. Baloney. For now, though, this is My Pet Monster's moment. Time to let him stand under the streetlight.

Every guy should have a friend like Stevie.

Adding to my "Who loves me, man?" post, here's a quick tribute to the best friend a dude could ask for, "Stevie," my favorite character (aside from the man himself, Kenny Powers) on HBO's Eastbound & Down. Or, as I like to call it, "the greatest show ever created." Okay, that's a bit much. It's still the best show currently on the tube. The "only six episodes long" aspect is rather heartbreaking, unfortunately. That means only one episode remains, and who knows if we'll even get a second season. Consult your Shamrocks tomorrow in hopes that we do.

Here's "Stevie," played to pitch-perfect perfection (alliteration masturbation) by Steve Little. I knew nothing of Steve Little prior to this show, but now I'm hoping to pops up on every television program from here on out. He's dynamite as Kenny Powers' unstable, obsessive biggest fan/personal assistant, and owns every scene he's a part of.







If you haven't been watching Eastbound & Down, you've been fucking up, then. Rectify that, pronto.

Who loves me, man?

It feels so long ago, I keep forgetting that I've already seen the film, but early this past December I was able to get myself into a very-early screening of the new Paul Rudd/Jason Segel comedy I Love You, Man, which hits theaters this weekend. As I expected, the film was/is a winner, capturing that same nice-cutesy humor of Forgetting Sarah Marshall, but with tons more effective supporting character actors elevating their respective scenes. You get J.K. Simmons (too briefly, frankly) going line-for-line with Andy Samberg, who plays Rudd's personal-trainer gay brother who happens to be more manly than his straight bro. There's the should-act-more Jon Favreau doing his best douchebag-ery as the husband of Rudd's fiancee's (Rashida Jones, aka "Ms. I Make Freckles Super Sexy") best friend (blonde jackpot Jamie Pressly). And then you even get an attractive new face, Sarah Burns, complete with slick comic timing and ample charm, leaving a lasting impression and begging the question, "Will she get more work? Because I'd really like that."


Pressly, Jones, Burns

Rudd as a leading man is as foolproof as you'd suspect, and Segel is much better here than he was in Forgetting Sarah Marshall, a high compliment since "Peter Brenner" was one of my favorite characters of 2008. In I Love You, Man, Segel does a great job of never showing his Ace card---is he a con artist, or simply a fun-loving, unassuming sweetheart? The chemistry between the two leads is a clear product of a tight off-screen friendship, an added bonus that gives their banter a naturalism that's impossible to dislike.

Chances are highly likely that I'll see it again this weekend, or one night next week. So I can both refresh my memory, and enjoy some good-natured entertainment in light of my recent theater-going choices: I've seen The Last House on the Left twice now, as well a double-viewing of Watchmen, and neither comes even centimeters near uplift. I have a feeling that this Clive Owen/Julia Roberts flick, Duplicity, will be a smile-friendly trip, and I'll be seeing that tomorrow, actually. Could this be a total reversal of film tone for yours truly? Not quite---I also plan on catching that new Nicolas Cage end-of-the-world flick Knowing this weekend, despite the fact that its a Nicolas Cage flick. The action scenes look good enough to bypass Cage's recent suck-a-thon streak. Which is going He-Man-strong.

Back to I Love You, Man, though, and it's central idea of a "bromance." No need to explain what that terms means; it's pretty self-explanatory. Besides, that brain-numbing sign of televisial apocalypse MTV's Bromance with Brody Jenner conveyed enough bad will to soil the expression into your mind like fossilized feces. I Love You, Man should rectify that manure-taste, thankfully, and give guy/guy interactions of the heterosexual stance a good name.



The question I've ben posing to myself, in relation to the film, is this: would one of my boys and I see this together? As in, would any of my boys be comfortable in self enough to make it a "movie night" with me, possibly even buying my ticket (okay, that part is a stretch, but was worth wondering about). Back in the days of high school and less "must enter at least one bar this weekend" requirements, I'm sure myself and a good five other dudes would gladly buy tickets and sit seat-by-seat for something like I Love You, Man. Times were much more innocent. Girls somewhat-less of a top priority on weekend evenings. This was a time when me letting a friend know about party approaching for a college friend or work acquaintance wouldn't have immediately been met with "Will there be any hot girls there? If not, I'm good, man. I'll pass." Call that selfishness, or shallowness, or just regular-old lameness. Whatever the case, the times of casually kicking it at the movies with my boys is fading away slowly. Which sucks, especially for a movie-addict such as myself, who'd gladly spend every weekend night at a cineplex over a bar.

Grabbing dinner with just one guy friend always feels acceptable. I'm all for it, and typically my other friends mirror the sentiment. Even showing ID at a bar's entrance before knocking back some Coronas is welcome consistently. So why not a movie? Is it the darkly-lit setting? Confusion as to whether we should sit at least one seat apart or not, assuming the theater isn't too crowded?


The Brokeback Mountain reference brings this pic to an out-of-context-to-my-post field, but some pics are too funny to avoid.

This isn't to say that none of my friends would be down to have a bromantic evening this weekend in front of I Love You, Man. Laughing alongside Rudd and Segel as they attend a Styx concert, or Segel foolishly picks a fight with Lou Ferrigno, or Rudd awkwardly coins the term "Slappin de bass." It's just that, honestly, I can only think of two such friends. Thus is the reality of growing up and becoming more bromantic with Johnnie Walker and/or Jack Daniels. I've accepted it. Moved forward. I get the feeling that movie-nights are seen as "childish." "Missed drunken-hookup-with-sloppy-bar-maven opportunities." That's hogwash to me, but I'm willing to gamble that I'm in the minority.

I'm ready to see I Love You, Man alone. Well, I do love myself, so maybe I'll be inventing a new male-faux-pas term in the process: Self-Love Story. Minus any necessary "Pause" or Billy Idol song allusions, of course.

David Fincher, and a horror comic. I'm in.

The Goon = "The [Dark Horse] comic follows the adventures of a muscle-bound brawler who claims to be the primary enforcer for a feared mobster. The stories have a paranormal and comedic edge to them and concern ghosts, zombies, mad scientists and 'skunk apes.'" [Shock Til You Drop]

WTF is a skunk ape? Something tells me that I'd love it.

Why haven't I heard of this comic, and how come I haven't run out and purchased some back issues by now?

Earlier today, some images from an upcoming computer animated film adaptation of The Goon popped up online, accompanied by news (that I've somehow neglected until now) that its producer is David Fincher. Going from "cool" to "fucking awesome" with ease.

No clue as to when this is coming out, but I'm now watching over the project with a fine eye. And will pick up some The Goon issues upon sight. Check out these images, which are unanimously being praised for sticking wine-on-me close to the source material:





Feels a bit like a gangland spin on Hack/Slash, which isn't a bad thing at all.

Source: Ain't It Cool News

DVR Catch-Up -- The Funhouse (1981)

Here's one that has completely slid under my radar, something I should really be more ashamed of than I actually am. In some horror corridors, The Funhouse is hung on the wall as a fine piece of work. Don't ask me why, though because it's really nothing special. It's based around a nifty central idea (kids locked within a carnival's funhouse overnight with psycho killer sporting a badass Frankenstein mask and his dysfunctional "family") that never reaches its full potential. Or even halfway.



If you locked me in my room, strapped to my bed with only my laptop at hand and Microsoft Word open, and forced me to crank out a screenplay based around that premise, with only 24 hours to do so, my finished draft would surely slap the piss out of what The Funhouse is. A shame, really, because the film does pack scattered moments of effective atmosphere, namely during the latter portion, when the four doomed kids (being played by 35-year-old actors, of course) start meeting their fates.

Several of the necessary elements are in place: an amusement park full of the requisite sight gags and wax scare-givers; four dumbass teens who voluntarily "sleep over" inside a funhouse, rather than take their asses to a Quality Inn; a main villain rooted in a totally absurd suplot involving paid-for sex with a cougar gypsy lady that goes South once our Frankenstein-masked gruny prematurely shoots his ooze; and some rather cool creature effects by way of the killer's disfigured, bat-meets-Albert Einstein face. What else do you need for some crappy '80s horror fun? Apparently more. A tighter, less "freak locked in by deviant father figure." It turns into the horror equivalent of The Goonies in ways, with Sloth testing his Voorhees out a bit. Only there's no Chunk to be found here, or even Martha Plimpton.



I'm all for films that take their time rather than hurl out setpiece-after-gory-setpiece, but The Funhouse never gets to where I was hoping it'd go. What I got was poorly-done character development and an hour's worth of nothing-at-all happening. The final half hour is when some goodness kicks in, but even then said "goodness" isn't anything more than just that---good. Nothing to write home about. There's very little blood on screen, which is welcome, actually. Makes sense, when you consider that director Tobe Hooper's previous film was cinematic history's ultimate "virtually bloodless depsite popular/ignorant belief" film, The Texas Chainsaw Massacre. Now that's a flick that awesomely pulled off the carnage through implication over graphic indulgence. The same approach is used here, and it works. If only there was more of that subtle slaughter and mayhem, and less slowly-paced stalk-and-attack scenes.

The Funhouse is at its best when giant ventilation fans are used as props, oddly enough. The two best scenes have spinning blades to thank, the first being a nicely-done trick of having a loud vent fan drown out the main girl's cries for helps as her family walks through the outside carnival grounds. Second, a hump-session for our hideous monster that downgrades into murder and one hell of a back itch. Hands down the movie's best scene:



So much more could've been done with The Funhouse. Though, I am appreciative that the script didn't go for an obvious "room of wall-to-wall mirrors" sequence. The father/son relationship between the park's owner and the freak should've never left the screenplay's "first draft" phase. Should've stuck with a straightforward monster-with-no-backstory-on-the-loose approach, and delivered more treats along the lines of that above ventilation scene. Sure, it'd be just another '80s slasher flick in essence, but Hooper proves his skills when handling slasher scenarios here, however minimal. An entire flick for him to fully show and prove this gift for slash could've been something legit.

Not this shit.