A HALLOWEEN HAUNTED HOUSE BECOMES ONE GEEK'S WORST NIGHTMARE
★★★☆☆ (Good for One Viewing)
Director: Daniel Erickson
1991
A script that may have been written by typewriter-pecking chickens fooled me into having zero expectations, but don’t mistake my praise for a glowing endorsement. There are just as many head-scratching decisions in Scary Movie as there are amusing ones. For every moment that makes you chuckle, there’s a bad joke; for every neat set design, there’s a flimsy wall that moves. But even the bizarre UPC code that pops up with the title at the beginning of the film is no match for the incredible ending I never saw coming. This subversion of expectations, and the performance by John Hawkes—playing our jittery protagonist with as much dweeb enthusiasm as a Lambda, Lambda, Lambda recruit from Adams College—sets the haunted house slasher flick apart from others. No one told Hawkes that producers would not be submitting this film for an Academy Award, and we’re the better for it; his over-the-top performance straddles perfection and the requirement for a 5150 Hold.
I knew it was going to be good when I saw this.
There are two plots holding up Scary Movie: the escape of a local serial killer, and Warren’s debilitating fear of his rural town’s haunted house set up for Halloween. After having a horrible dream about the Grim Reaper, he joins his friend Brad to stand in line for the diversion, and I’m left scratching my head, wondering how our nervous nerd and James Spader stand-in Brad became friends. It’s as much of a mystery as the attraction a hot babe has for the protagonist. This girl is Barbara, a kleptomaniac Capricorn, and if you have an Aquanet fetish, her damaged lion’s mane fulfills your every fantasy. She says she’s dressed as a “virgin goddess” but really she looks like the bride in a Whitesnake video with a five dollar costume budget. Speaking of thin budgets, the extras in this movie crowding around the haunted house were apparently told to hurry home and dig up what they could for their own sad Halloween attire.
We wait in line with Warren’s group for quite some time as he psych’s himself out. While Brad canoodles with a hot bee and Barbara seductively licks a candied apple, the geek is practically catatonic. When Barbara’s ex, J.J. and his band of greasers show up to start trouble, she only has eyes for Warren, which means as they all step inside the haunted house, he has about a 95% chance of getting laid in there. Unfortunately, his sheer terror is an aphrodisiac for a total of two minutes before she leaves him.
The events of the film also rest on the escape of a serial killer, the result of a van accident that left the driver without teeth or tongue. A killer on the loose in a haunted house, around customers who think everything is a gag, isn’t a new premise, but like I hinted earlier, the ending makes up for all that is wrong.
I love watching movies with bad dialogue using closed captioning—you can really savor the essence of a script, and I recommend that here. This film’s not offensively bad and it’s not bloated. It’s just stupid fun. If you’re looking for something new to watch this Halloween, make it Scary Movie (1991), a film that showcases a promising actor’s performance. Warren looks constipated throughout the whole film, but I really think that John Hawkes (2011 Academy Award Nominee) was just looking for the exit so he could flee the movie set. I’m glad he didn’t.
GENRES: Funny, Psychological
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