Instead of one Jean-Claude Van Damme, why not have two? It ended up being a trope so popular that the actor would return to it several times — Replicant, Maximum Risk, even Timecop to some degree all involve multiple versions of the action star.
Here, he plays Chad & Alex Wagner. Chad has grown up in Los Angeles as the son of privilege while Alex was raised on Hong Kong, giving him a much rougher edge. Van Damme wanted to play twins to help change his image. “One of them is violent and the other is not, so the audience can see the contrast in my work,” he said. “This picture has comedy, romance, a love story. So it is not all action and fighting. When I fight on screen, I blend dancing and fighting. Grace plus power is very nice.” Of the two, the actor said that he was closer to Chad than Alex, saying, “In real life I am not this cold, quiet guy who goes around kicking butt.”
Years ago, Paul Wagner and Nigel Griffith opened the Hong Kong Victoria Harbour tunnel. On the way home, Paul tells his bodyguard, Frank Avery (Geoffrey Lewis) to go home, but as soon as that happens, the Triads attack. Paul is killed and his wife begs for the lives of her children. “What are you going to do to my babies?” she asked of the evil Moon, played by Bolo Yeung. “You’ll never know,” he responds, blowing her away with a shotgun. You have to love just how evil the bad guys are in a Van Damme movie.
The maid is able to escape with Alex, leaving him in a Hong Kong orphanage whole Frank is able to rescue Chad, bringing him to the United States, where they run a martial arts studio. This leads to a magical scene where Van Damme wows an entire room of women by doing one of his amazing splits in front of them.
Frank takes Chad to Hong Kong to meet his brother so that they can get revenge on Griffith and get their part of the royalties from the tunnel. However, Chad’s girlfriend Danielle Wilde ends up coming between the two, who are as opposite as can be.
Will the brothers get along at the end? Of course, they will. But along the way, they’re going to battle one another as well as an array of bad guys. Beyond Yeung, there’s also Corinna Everson, who was Ms. Olympia for six years in a row. She’s also the sister of Cameo Kneuer, who hosted WBF Body Stars, the TV show that sold Vince McMahon’s ill-fated World Bodybuilding Foundation. She plays the evil Kara, who can’t stop harassing Danielle throughout the film.
Double Impact was made at a time before CGI. That means that a lot of the film was completed with doubles and camera trickery, which is pretty awesome. The making of the film videos on the new MVD collector’s edition blu ray goes into detail on how this was accomplished thanks to Jeff and Jerry Rector, identical twins who doubled for Van Damme.
Like all of MVD’s releases, this blu ray is great. It’s packed with extras, like the two making of docs, never before seen behind the scenes features, trailers and even an enclosed movie poster. They’ve also released Black Eagle and Lionheart in this format. It’s awesome that they were able to get Van Damme to sit down and share his feelings on what it was like to make this movie.
Plus, you get most of the actors and stuntmen to speak about the making of the film, including director Sheldon Lettich, who worked with Van Damme on Bloodsport, Lionheart, The Hard Corps, The Order and Legionnaire. He and JCVD have discussed a sequel to this film, where Chad has become a film producer and Alex is still in trouble with the Triads.
Here’s hoping that MVD releases more Van Damme movies with this level of detail and care. I learned a lot from the documentary, like how Michael Douglas was producing both this film and the Brian Bosworth vehicle Stone Cold, believing that the latter was the movie that had the best chance of success.
We’ve already covered one Australian Linda Blair movie, 1990’s Deep Sleep. Obviously, the next stage in our quest to covered every single movie she’s ever been in would eventually bring us to another Down Under Blair effort. Being a completist is kind of like that.
Joe Martinez is a violent drifter who only really loves his car and getting into fisticuffs. He’s saved from being arrested one night by an American girl named Leonie (Blair) and they’re soon making the kind of love reserved for Cinemax at 2:17 AM. Complicating matters is that Joe might be a serial killer. You know how that happens.
For those interested in the siblings of more famous actors, Mel Gibson’s brother Donal shows up.
Look — if the dude you hooked up with in a bar is being followed by the police for unpaid parking tickets and you find the bodies of any woman that he flirted or cheated on you with, chances are you’re actually Linda Blair and are trapped in a bad Australian movie. I have no idea how to help you. It will get worse when the father of the dead girl starts hunting you and your potential murderer beau. Truly, no actress has played more beaten down, treated like garbage characters than Linda, yet here I am, wishing the best for her as I watch her roles at 5:38 AM.
Jack and Janet Smurl of West Pittston, PA say that a demon was in their house for nearly 15 years between 1974 and 1989, despite the denials of the Catholic Church, psychologists and scientific skeptics. Luckily, they had Ed and Lorraine Warren on their side, who encouraged their beliefs and even helped them write the book that this movie was based on.
Sally Kirkland was nominated for a Golden Globe award for her work in this movie as Janet Smurl. Jack is played by Jeffrey DeMunn, who you may know as Dale from TV’s The Walking Dead. Or if you’re like Becca and never watched that show, you’ll know him as the sheriff from the remake of The Blob.
Louise Latham from Marnie plays the grandmother and George D. Wallace — Commander Cody himself! — is the grandfather, who doesn’t believe any of this is happening but has a great part where he fends off the media on the porch with a rifle.
Joyce Van Patten — the domineering mom from Monkey Shines — shows up as a neighbor, with Stephen Markle and Diane Baker playing the Warrens, way before The Conjuring series of films (I kind of Lorraine also appeared on Road Rules: All-Stars before Hollywood truly came calling). Keep an eye out for the reporter who collapses on the Smurl’s front lawn — that’s Lorraine.
The best part of this movie? The crazy way it visualizes the demonic presence as a black formless bit of nothing that has multiple voices. The funniest? There are numerous moments, but I kind of love that copyright issues meant that when the kids watch Lost In Space, they dubbed over the actor’s voices.
You know how people always complain that Hollywood isn’t doing anything new, constantly churning out CGI-filled remakes and comic book movies? They should really check out this bit of absolute insanity, one of the last all practical effects films, which is literally an auteur moment from the pure id of Dan Aykroyd.
Nothing but Trouble started after producer Robert K. Weiss went to a movie with Dan and Peter Aykroyd. That movie was Hellraiser, as Weiss had a fractured rib and it hurt to laugh. Once the movie started, the three were shocked to see people laughing, which gave them the idea to create a horror comedy.
Peter remembered an event where Dan was pulled over in a small upstate New York town, had to pay $50 and then endure a four-hour cup of tea with the town’s justice of the peace. That started the process, with Dan using dreams — like the giant mutant babies — and the study of the ever-burning town of Centralia, PA.
After John Hughes and John Landis turned it down, Aykroyd decided to direct and play two heavy makeup roles, which only added to his stress once filming began. Most of its $40 million budget secured Chevy Chase — who repeatedly screamed at cast members and would yell that he was more important than Aykroyd — and the movie’s elaborate sets and effects.
That said, it’s been said that Chevy would call up various co-stars at night, after filming, to apologize for what he perceived to be stressed out behavior. If you ask me, that’s the traditional behavior of an abuser. Billy Murray said it best. Medium talent.
Luckily, Aykroyd had a great crew who rallied around him (one crew member even threatened to drop a brick on Chase’s head) to make something really special. Or weird. It depends on your point of view. I actually love this movie, which is completely disgusting and disquieting, two things which I know made audiences hate it. Yet I must remain the champion of the films that are lost and forgotten.
When financial publisher Chris Thorne (Chase) meets lawyer Diane Lightson (Demi Moore), he decides to invite her along on a trip to meet clients in Atlantic City. Joining them are the wealthy and oh so abrasive siblings Fausto and Renalda Squiriniszu (Taylor Negron, who is missed greatly in these parts, and Bertila Damas).
After running a stop sign in the small village of Valkenvania and attempting to leave the scene of the crime, they’re all arrested by officer Dennis Valkenheiser (John Candy, whose star power got this made) and taken before the town’s judge, 106-year-old Alvin Valkenheiser (Aykroyd). After Chris offends the judge — I feel that this role may be the closest Chase came to playing himself outside of Community — he sends them all to jail.
Meanwhile, a bunch of drunk drivers are sent to a murderous rollercoaster called Mr. Bonestripper while everyone else is invited to a horrifying dinner of sausages driven around on a model train. Soon, everyone is on the run, trying to escape the denizens of the town, like Alvin’s mute granddaughter Eldona (Candy again) and the deformed Bobo (played by Aykroyd) and Lil’ Debbull. Also: Digital Underground shows up.
Again, for better or worse, this movie is all Aykroyd. The police badges, seen in the revolving frames on the judge’s bench, are actual badges from his personal collection. He’s been a lifelong police supporter, which is interesting given this film’s conspiratorial tone that all of the cops are in on it.
I’m of the belief that this film is a success. It’s not afraid to be completely unhinged and blow through a budget — but it’s all on the screen — using the set of High Noon to create the most lunatic setting for a film I’ve ever seen.
The YouTube series Good Bad Flicks is a big inspiration for a lot of what I write. Check out their amazing breakdown of this film and how it was made for even more.
Just like every Andy Sidaris movie, this one has a new bad guy, but we certainly know the actor playing him. It’s Pat Morita, Mr. Miyagi himself, playing Masakana “Kane” Kaneshiro. He starts the movie by capturing our heroines, Donna Hamilton (the ever dependable and buoyant Dona Spears) and Nicole Justin (Roberta Vasquez). Instead of just killing them off, he announces that he is sending the world’s greatest killers after them. While that’s all happening and they’re good and distracted, he’ll get busy on messing with the stock market.
Six different teams of assassins come after our girls, none with much success. Maybe if evil Miyagi had a computer from the 1990’s instead of the mid 1980’s he could find a better team of killers. That said, if you ever were seeking out a Pat Morita sex scene, I have good news for you. This is where to get all of that sweet, sweet wax on, wax off loving.
Remember the last movie where Erik Estrada was a bad guy? Well, he’s back on the side of the girls here as Richard “Rico” Estevez. This is perhaps the only film I can think of where Ponch kills a hitman with an explosive baseball. And yes, of course he and Donna do the frickle frackle. Get up in them guts. Do a bit of the rip ‘n dip. You know what I’m saying: they take grandma to Applebee’s.
This movie also marks Ava Cadell’s first appearance — as a hit woman — in the Sidaris universe. She’ll keep showing up as a combination DJ/sexologist/communications operative for KSXY Radio in the other films. But here, she’s an evil assassin who threatens to blow off the breasts of our heroines.
I love that in his autobiography, Bullets Bombs and Babes, he referred to “cleaning up their dossiers” for his characters. By that, he meant that if people loved them as bad guys, they’d eventually love them as members of the team. Or maybe they were too busy masturbating to care.
Pandora Peaks, billed as Stephanie Schick, shows up. She starred in Russ Meyers’ last movie, Pandora Peaks, a film with no dialogue, just the actress dressing, undressing and walking for 72 minutes. There’s also a heroic cat named, well, Cat. His real name was Trigger.
By this film, I’ve come to realize that Andy Sidaris may be trying to titillate us, but the truth is that the only lovemaking in his films are initiated by the strong powerful women within. The good men can’t shoot straight and the evil ones can never outdo them. Sure, they have breasts the size of your head, but that doesn’t make them ineffectual or idiots. It’s pretty insane when you consider how subversive these notions are. Who knew the most powerful women in films came from movies made for HBO at 2 AM?
Then again, maybe after watching eight Andy Sidaris movies in a row, I’ve gone completely insane.
Before directing movies like Mr. Holland’s Opus, The Mighty Ducks, the live action 101 Dalmatians, Rock Star and Life or Something Like It, Stephen Herek was behind movies like Critters, Bill and Ted’s Excellent Adventure and this film.
Sue Ellen Crandell (Christina Applegate) is 17 and stuck at home while her mother goes to Australia and her friends go to Europe. Now, she’s in charge of her 16-year-old stoner metalhead brother Kenny, 14-year-old Zach, 13-year-old Melissa (Halloweenfranchise star Danielle Harris) and 11-year-old Walter (Robert Hy Gorman, Sometimes They Come Back and Leprechan).
Her mom hires a babysitter for the summer named Mrs. Sturak, who ends up being mean to everyone until she dies from a heart attack. So they do what anyone else would: they put her in a trunk and send her to a funeral home.
They screwed up in one major way: the old lady’s body had all the money. Sue Ellen tries to work at Clown Dog and falls for Bryan, but quits because of the manager. She then makes a fake resume for a job at General Apparel West, where she works as an executive assistant, for Rose Lindsey (Joanna Cassidy, The Glove, Who Framed Roger Rabbit?).
This pisses off Carolyn and Bruce (David Duchovny), two young workers who hate that she’s jumped ahead of them. Of course, this being a teen movie, Carolyn and Bryan end up being brother and sister.
There’s so much going on in this movie: drugs, kids falling off the roof, car stealing drag queens and a fashion show. Of course, everything works out fine. It’s a teen comedy. That’s how it works.
Production was nearly shut down to the actor who played Zach — Christopher Pettiet — having issues with drugs. They cut his scenes down so that they could finish the film. Sadly, he died nine years later of an accidental drug overdose.
Keith Coogan, who played Kenny, ended up being in two movies where parents were nowhere to be found. That’s because he’s also in Adventures in Babysitting.
My wife loves this movie. Seeing as how she’s probably one of its biggest fans, I felt that I should interview her.
Sam: Why do you like this movie so much?
Becca: Mostly because of her clothes. That’s why I watched it so many times when I was little. I looked up to her. And she smoked.
Sam: How many times have you seen it?
Becca: Thousands. At least.
Sam: Did you rent it every time?
Becca: In the beginning, but then I recorded it off HBO.
Sam: What’s your favorite part of this movie?
Becca: The fashion show at the end. And I thought that boy was cute.
Sam: The boy who worked at Clown Dog?
Becca: His name is Bryan. Yes.
Sam: Is it strange that Danielle Harris is in so many movies that you love?
Becca: Yeah but that’s what you get for being a kid actor. She was in a bunch of things. She was a mean kid here, but she played nice kids too.
Sam: Was this movie true to your 1980’s childhood?
Becca: Not really. My parents would have had ten kids, if they would have done that, maybe. Our house was always clean and my mom wouldn’t let anyone babysit us. So no.
Sam: Does your brother remind of Kenny?
Becca: Back then, no. But now more than ever. He’s more like Hell Hound, the slower one of Kenny’s friends.
Sam: Did you like a young David Duchovny?
Becca: Not with that hair. He had like a bob pulled into a ponytail. His name is Bruce. He’s head inventory clerk.
Sam: What else would you like to add?
Becca: I think Sue Ellen should have stayed working for GAW and not gone to college. General Apparel West if you must know. Because Rose loved her and I would have loved to have had a boss like that.
Made before Scream, There’s Nothing Out There satirizes the same horror movie cliches but goes even further, presenting a story where some of the characters are aware that they’re in a movie, even using a boom mic to swing away from the movie’s amphibian monster.
Seven teens head up to a cabin on the lake for spring break — a typical horror movie scenario. One of them, Mike, has studied every horror movie that’s ever been released on video. He knows the warning signs and calls them out to the others, but they dismiss him as a goof who has watched too many films.
In truth — something is out there. The teens all fall into the tropes of typical horror movies and are killed off one by one by an evil frog creature that can possess them and make them fire lasers from their eyes. There’s gore, tons of nudity and faces that literally melt. Also — the main creature is as ridiculous as anything in horror and I’m including The Killer Shrews.
This movie was written and directed by Rolfe Kanefsky, the son of Victor, who edited Ganja & Hess and Bloodsucking Freaks, a movie that we rented nearly every day in our teen years, using it as a torture test for unsuspecting friends.
If you had HBO (Hey, Beastmaster’s On) or TBS (The Beastmaster Station) in the 1990’s, then you’re probably excited to read this. The Beastmaster series of three films ran pretty much non-stop on those channels, even if the first movie wasn’t a success.
Just like Phantasm, Beastmaster came from the mind of Don Coscarelli. While he was only involved with the first movie, he set up the character of Dar (Marc Singer). Well, when I say came from the mind, Coscarelli loosely based his original story off of the novel The Beast Master by Andre Norton. In her book, the hero is a Navajo named Hosteen Storm and the story takes place in the future. Unhappy with the changes from page to screen, Norton asked for her name to be removed from the film’s credits.
The Beastmaster (1982)
Welcome to Aruk, where the prophecy of a witch reveals that the evil priest Maax (Rip Torn!) reveals that the son of King Zed (Rod Loomis, who was Freud in Bill and Ted’s Excellent Adventure) will eventually kill him. Although Zed exiles the villain, one of Maax’s witches transfers the baby who will become Dar the Beastmaster from his mother’s womb into a cow’s. Yes, I just wrote that. I’m still amazed that this happens.
Dar is rescued by a villager who raises him as her own son inthe village of Emur. This being a sword and sorcery movie, that whole town is destroyed by the Juns, barbarians under Maax’s command. Of course, Dar has been taught since childhood to fight and telepathically communicate with animals. As you do, you know?
Dar eventually puts together his animal familiar army of Sharak the eagle, Kodo and Podo the ferrets and a black tiger named Ruh. He also teams up with Kiri (Tanya Roberts), a slave girl, and even spends time wander amongst a half-bird, half-human race who let him go when they realize that he can speak to an eagle.
What follows are battles with Maax, an appearance by Good Times star John Amos, ferrets bravely sacrificing themselves, baby ferrets being born, Dar learning of his royal blood and birdmen battling barbarians.
Coscarelli didn’t have a good time making this, as he fought with the producers over editing and casting, such as his choice of Demi Moore over Tanya Roberts. Even sadder, Klaus Kinski was the original choice to play Maax!
Beastmaster 2: Through the Portal of Time (1991)
Sylvio Tabet produced the original Beastmaster film, as well as Evilspeakand Fade to Black. This is the one and only film that he ever directed.
This time around, Dar learns that he has a half-brother named Arkon (the amazing Wings Hauser) who is working alongside Lyranna (Sarah Douglas, who was Queen Taramis in Conan the Destroyer and Ursa in the Superman movies) to take over, well, everything. They are almost captured by our hero until they create a portal that brings them to modern day Los Angeles.
Dar, Ruh, Kodo and Sharak follow and battle them over a neutron bomb. Obviouslt, Arklon has seen Ator 2: The Blade Master. Luckily, our hero gets to work alongside rich girl Jackie Trent (Kari Wuhrer) and Lieutenant Coberly (James Avery from The Fresh Prince of Bel-Air, continuing the lineage of black friends of the Beastmaster coming from sitcoms). Robert Z’Dar also shows up, which is always nice.
Jim Wynorski (Sorceress, Chopping Mall) was originally going to direct and wrote a screenplay before Tabet decided to direct. Luckily for Wynorski, he lawyered up and got to keep his name on the movie and make some money.
This movie completely ignores that Kodo died. And Dar’s mark of the beast switches hands from the last movie. Basically, if you’re into continuity, perhaps the Beastmaster movies aren’t for you.
Beastmaster III: The Eye of Braxus (1996)
Dar is back one more time, this time trying to rescue his brother, King Tal (finally grown up but now played by Casper Van Dien from Starship Troopers). He’s joined by Tal’s bodyguard Seth (no longer John Amos, but now Tony Todd, which make me audibly shout at 3 AM and wake up my entire house), a warrior woman named Shada (Sandra Hess, Mortal Kombat Annihilation), an acrobat named Bey and Seth’s ex-girlfriend, a sorceress named Morgana (Lesley Anne-Down of all people!).
They’re battling the slumming David Warner as Lord Agon, who has been sacrificing youngsters to shave years off his life. You know, the older I get, the more this seems like a great idea, because most kids I meet today are clueless. He’s also trying to release the dark god Braxus, who looks like a human dinosaur.
This one’s directed by Gabrielle Beaumont, whose was also behind the movie The Godsend and the Jamie Lee Curtis-starring TV movie about Dorothy Stratten, Death of a Centerfold. It was written David Wise, who was one of the main writers on the Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles cartoon, so that may account for this one being the most family-friendly of the three films.
Three years after this movie, a syndicated series called Beastmaster lasted for three seasons and 66 episodes. It changes Dar’s story a bit and features Daniel Goddard instead of Marc Singer.
Amazingly, none of the Beastmaster films are available on blu ray in the U.S., although the Australian based Umbrella did release the first film in June of 2018. The disk claims it’s region B, but I’ve heard that it works on American blu ray players.
If you’re looking for allthreefilms, VHSPS has them available on their site, transferred directly from video store copies.
BONUS: Listen to Becca and I discuss the second Beastmaster movie, one of her favorites ever, on our podcast:
Those Canadians — they’ve made four Prom Night films, starting with, well, Prom Night, where Jamie Lee Curtis confronts disco dancing and a murder in the past. Then there’s the utterly insane Prom Night 2: Hello Mary Lou, where a former prom queen comes back to tempt and murder the children of her classmates. And then there’s Prom Night III: The Last Kiss, which is a comedy continuation of Mary Lou’s story. Finally, we have Prom Night IV: Deliver Us From Evil and it’s the craziest one of them all.
Hamilton High School. 1957. Lisa and Brad leave Lisa’s date behind to go heels to Jesus in Brad’s car, but are distracted by someone putting candles all over the hood. That’s when Lisa gets killed by a metal crucifix to the throat and Brad gets stabbed in the chest, his car set ablaze. That’s when we meet Father Jonas, who has been abused by multiple priests (keep in mind this was made in 1991) and now is showing signs of stigmata. Those priests now believe that he is possessed, so they jail him inside St. George Church.
33 years later, that’s where Father Colin is told by one of those priests that he won’t be going to Africa for missionary work. No, he’s going to stay right here and be Jonas’s new guardian, keeping him in a drug-induced coma. The problem is that Colin gets a mind of his own after Father Jaeger dies and he decides to stop drugging Jonas. Within hours, the evil priest kills the young man and makes his way to his old home. Cardinal Tourette is sent by the church to clean up matters, staging Colin’s murder as a suicide and hunting down Jonas.
Meanwhile, the old St. Basil Seminary is now Mark’s (J. H. Wyman, who would go on to create TV’s Fringe and Almost Human) family’s summer home, where he’s taking his girlfriend Meagan (Nicole de Boer, Cube), Laura (Joy Tanner, who is the voice of Candy Kong from Donkey Kong Country) and Jeff (Alle Ghadban, who would go on to be part of Extreme Makeover: Home Edition) to celebrate their graduation and skip prom.
There are some issues — Meagan was in love with the now deceased Father Colin. She’s also a virgin who is finally going to give up her modesty to Mark. And everyone wants to have sex with her, even Laura (yes, this is a scummy exploitation film, so these things happen). Also, all the of the electronics and applicances in the house have been stolen and Jonas is already living inside the house, claiming Mark’s younger brother Jonathan as his first victim.
Somehow — don’t ask me how — Jonas starts making obscene phone calls when he’s not killing off people. Just to show what a maniac he is, he walks around with Laura’s scalp after offing her and then crushes Jeff’s head with just his bare hands. Then he crucifies the young lovers’ bodies and sets them on fire because, well, why not?
Jonas then kills Mark and chases Meagan all over the grounds, only being stopped by bug spray (yes, I was amazed by this as you are reading it) and even uses his priest powers to interrupt phone calls to the police. Magical priest powers! She finds Mark’s gun and shoots the priest dead, only to have him come back and try and kill her as she prays for forgiveness. The dude has the Holy Water scepter from church, but it shoots out flames instead of water, which is perhaps the most awesome thing I’ve ever seen in a movie. Megan isn’t so impressed, as she beats him to death again with a shovel, then runs outside and blows a shed up real good.
The next morning, Meagan is placed in an ambulance while Jonas’ body is placed in another surrounded by the Cardinals of the church. He opens his eyes at the same time she does, tickling me with the feather of a promise that there would be a sequel to this.
If it doesn’t come through, I loved this movie. It’s total slasher ridiculousness a decade after everyone decided to stop making them. I love that when the kids drink to skipping the prom, they say, “Cheers Jamie Lee Curtis!” And with his role as Father Colin, Brock Simpson has been in every single Prom Night.
Killer abused priests with stigmata that can make prank phone calls with their mind and set up candles on cars before they kill. You can’t get that anywhere else, you know?
In our last post, we got into the origin of the Nightmare on Elm Street films. Now, sadly, we start to discover why — and when — the series started to go downhill.
A Nightmare on Elm Street 5: The Dream Child – 1989
What can you say about a movie where the director, Stephen Hopkins (Predator2, Judgement Night), says “What started out as an OK film with a few good bits turned into a total embarrassment. I can’t even watch it anymore.”?
A year after the last film, the returning Alice (Lisa Wilcox) and Dan (Danny Hassel) have been dating and seen no sign of Freddy until a shower turns into Alice going back in time to witness the creation of Freddy by the maniacs of the asylum. She tries to forget the dream as she’s graduating high school the next day, along with comic book lover Mark, model Greta (Erika Anderson, Twin Peaks) and aspiring nurse Yvonne (Kelly Jo Minter, Maria, the video store clerk from The Lost Boys).
The dreams don’t go away, with Alice witnessing the birth of a Freddy baby that makes its way to the church from the last film. He tells her he’s learned how to come back to life, just at the moment that he kills Dan. At the same time, she also learns that she’s pregnant with her dead boyfriend’s child.
No one believes that Freddy is after Alice, but Greta soon is killed by being forced to overeat in her dreams. Oh yeah — Alice is also seeing a fully grown boy she calls Jacob who she believes is her future son. Freddy is feeding his victims to her unborn baby — who yes, is also Jacob — to make him evil.
There is an imaginative scene where Freddy kills Mark within a comic book world, as well as the world that Freddy lives in now. But the ending, where Amanda Krueger seals away Freddy and Jacob decides to stay with his mother amidst strange puppet heads gets a little ridiculous. Actually, this entire movie is, supposing that teens we’d want to watch a movie about the terrors of teen pregnancy mixed with the terrors of being an Elm Street teenager.
Supposedly, there’s an uncut version of this movie that’s never been released that would change a lot of people’s opinions on the film. I’ll watch it again if that ever comes out. Yes, I know there was an unrate VHS release but supposedly there’s even more missing.
Maybe it’d be a better film if New Line had given the director more than four weeks to work on it. And get this — the poster was released before the producers had a clear idea what the movie was going to be about, other than the idea that Freddy would be a fetus and the title would be The Dream Child.
Somewhere between the fourth and fifth movies, Freddy’s Nightmares began airing on syndicated TV. The pilot episode, which tells Freddy’s origin story in great detail was directed by Tobe Hooper. After this, every episode would tell two stories about the city of Springwood, Ohio. The second tale in each episode would usually expand upon a character from the first story. Freddy may or may not be directly involved, but he’d appear in the beginning and end to do a wraparound sequence.
Directors like Tom McLoughlin (Jason Lives: Friday the 13th Part VI ), Mick Garris (Sleepwalkers), Ken Wiederhorn (Shock Waves), John Lafia (writer of Child’s Play and director of Child’s Play 2), Dwight H. Little, who delighted my wife’s childhood with the fourth and part of the fifth segments of Halloweenas well as Murder at 1600 and even Englund himself (he’s Freddy in every episode and let’s not forget that he directed 976-EVIL).
Let’s face it — Freddy was entering massive saturation, being on TV every week, appearing in a black and white Marvel comic book written by Howard the Duck creator Steve Gerber that was pulled after two issues due to internal concerns with its violent content, a video game from LJN (of course) and a line of toys that caused great controversy.
The Maxx FX line is one of sadness. Conceived by Mel Birnkrant, the creator and designer of toy lines like Outer Space Men and Baby Face.
Maxx FX was to be toys that had a special effects creator action figure as well as all of the costumes to make him into different monsters, from Universal classics to the Alien, Jason and Freddy. Check out the article on the creator’s site — where the videos and image above were taken — to learn more. I have the Freddy Maxx FX in storage, having found it for only $10 at a closeout store a year after it was to be released.
Thanks for indulging me on that trip to the memory lane section of the toy aisle. Let’s get back to the movies!
Freddy’s Dead: The Final Nightmare – 1991
Look, any horror movie that starts off with a Goo Goo Dolls song is just going to inspire my ire. But let’s try to be objective and not consider some of the better ideas for this sequel, including Jacob coming back to lead the Dream Warriors and a Peter Jackon screenplay where Freddy would stop being a threat and have the Elm Street kids even taking sleeping pills to screw with him.
Instead, this one starts ten years after where we left off, with Freddy having killed every single child from Springwood except for one teenager, John Doe. Waking up outside the city, he has no memories of why he’s there or even who he is.
He’s taken to a youth shelter, where he meets Spencer (Breckin Meyer), Carlos and Tracy (Lezlie Deane, 976-EVIL), who want to skip town. Part of Dr. Maggie Burroughs’ (Lisa Zane, sister of Billy) treatment is to take John to Springwood to cure his amnesia. The other kids all hide in the van and we’re off to the home of Freddy, just in time for John to have a nightmare and the van to wreck.
The abandoned house that the teens find turns into Freddy’s former home on 1428 Elm Street and we soon learn that Freddy has a child. After spending most of the film thinking John is the hero, he’s killed by Freddy, who reveals that he has a daughter.
Around here, Yaphet Kotto shows up and explains that he can control his dreams and how to defeat Freddy — drag him into the real world. If you’re screaming at your TV because this didn’t really work in the first film, you aren’t alone. And if Maggie being Freddy’s kid doesn’t hit you over the head with the sledgehammer of subtlety, then you just aren’t paying attention.
The last ten minutes of this movie — where Maggie goes into Freddy’s dimension to battle the dream demons that power him — were shot for 3D. Freddy gets blown up real good after Maggie gets off a kiss off line, saying “Happy Father’s Day!” Actually, no one feels good about this movie or this ending. Then again, the original theatrical version ran for 100 minutes while every home video release has run for 88, so obviously, big chunks were edited out of the film.
In the place of a decent tale, we’re given cameos by Johnny Depp, Tom Arnold, Roseanne Barr, Elinor Donahue and Alice Cooper as Freddy’s abusive father. That makes two 80’s slasher franchises that Alice has been involved with now.
This is the only Elm Street film to feature a female director — Rachel Talalay — and no female victims. Talalay would go on to direct episodes of Sherlock and Dr. Who, as well as Tank Girl.
Where can you take Freddy after all of these trials and tribulations? How can you make him more relevant? You have three choices, really. Go outside of the canon, a crossover or a remake. In the next chapter, we’ll discover how the Elm Street series would eventually do all three.
BTW — I figure this is a good place as any to mention some songs inspired by Freddy Krueger. Join me, why don’t you?
Also released on their album “Back for the Attack,” Dokken’s “Dream Warriors” is one catchy song and the entire reason I wanted to watch the third film. Don’t get me started or I’ll be singing it all day.
Prince Markie Dee of the Fat Boys Uncle Frederick has died and a lawyer claims that he has to spend one night in his haunted house to get his inheritance. If you ever wanted to hear Robert Englund rap, well, here you go.
Tracey Knight didn’t just star in The Dream Master, she’s also fond of singing this little ditty, which opens the movie.
Before Will Smith was a huge star, New Line actually sued him and his partner DJ Jazzy Jeff over this song and a planned music video, forcing a sticker onto all copies of their album “He’s the DJ, I’m the Rapper” stating that this “[This song] is not part of the soundtrack…and is not authorized, licensed, or affiliated with the Nightmare on Elm Street films.”
Stormtroopers of Death was a group made up of Anthrax’s Scott Ian and Charlie Benante along with former bandmate Danny Lilker and Billy Milano, who likes Freddy so much that his next band, M.O.D. would record “Man of Your Dreams.”
Former KISS guitarist Vinnie Vincent got into the Freddy action with this song and video from the fourth film. Man, how about the days when bands got budgets like this to produce music videos?
An album packed with dream related songs, both originals and covers, this also has Robert Englund doing intros to every song. They’re all redone by studio musicians, the Elm Street Group.
Finally, one more PS — the image for today’s Elm Street series comes from Sungold’s line of bootleg Monster toys. Their version of Freddy has an even better name: Sharp Hand Joe! You can even get a t-shirt of this from the awesome folks at Pizza Party Printing!
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