Doesn't it just look awesome? I mean, you have Gene and Ozzy right on the cover there! And that badass skull.
Eddie Weinbauer is your typical High School outcast from the 80s. Ripped jeans, mullet, listens to metal, and he's played by "Skippy" from Family Ties for chrissakes, he's got "outcast" written all over him.
Now go on, tell me he wouldn't have been an outcast at your high school?
Tormented daily at school by the cooler kids, he only has two people he can turn to, Sammi Curr, his metal idol, and Gene Simmons, who plays Nuke, a local DJ who wears a cowboy hat. Yes, folks, if for nothing else, see this movie just to see Gene Simmons in a cowboy hat. It's truly hilarious. Anyways, the movie opens with the kid writing a letter to his idol Sammi with scenes showing his badass posters and bitchin Judas Priest calendar, scenes showing him being an outcast loser, scenes showing him getting harassed at school (which is pretty awesome, cause he gets picked on mercilessly, the "bullies" steal and throw something of his into the gymnasium after he gets out of the shower, and as he dives thru the door to catch it, they steal his towel and lock him in the gym...with the girls class playing volleyball. Well those insensitive cunts just laugh at him and take a polaroid picture of his bare ass. Fabulous), and every now and then it shows him writing the letter. After he finishes it, puts it in an envelope and that's when you're treated to the wonderful tidbit that is knowing that not only is this a movie set and filmed in the 80s, not only does it center around 80s metal, not only does it have Ozzy and Gene, but it's also set in Jersey, how brilliant!
Anyways, after he's finished with the letter, )did I mention his super cool metal nickname? He calls himself "ragman" hahaha), he sets about to get some grub. As he's going around making himself a snack, the news is playing in the background talking about his favorite singer, Sammi Curr, of course he's listening to music so he's not paying attention. The newscast is going on and on about how evil his music is and how evil and obscene he is, but all the while they're showing concert footage of him being evil and obscene, gotta love that! Anyways, the kid settles with his snack, looks at the tube and sees Sammi arguing with some politicians,. apparently he's from this kids hometown and was going to play at the town, but the town said no way buster! We're not having your kind here! Anyways, it cuts back to the newscaster and says how Sammi Curr died the prior night, in a hotel fire. The kid freaks, goes into his room and tears down all his lovely posters, even the Judas Priest calendar! He rips everything down, then he gets to the last item, a giant picture of Sammi Curr looking all evil and for some reason, he leaves it.
Yes, folks, this was a "Solid Gold" dancer....evil
Next you get to see one of the things that makes the movie all worth it...Gene Simmons in a cowboy hat! Brilliance! Whoever did the wardrobe for this movie should be given a bonus lump sum of money for that winner right there. So anyways, Eddie, or should I say "Skippy", goes to see ol Gene who plays Nuke, a local Disc Jockey. Apparently they're both huge Sammi Curr fans, and Gene feels the kids pain, but also treats the kid like a bit of whack-a-doo for acting like Sammi is a god or something. But, then Gene makes it all better when he gives "Skippy" the bestest thing ever....the last Sammi Curr recording, never before released. He then tells the kid hes gunna play it at midnight on Halloween, no nothing wrong with that, no sir. Sadly, this is the only time you ever see Gene in the movie, and about 3/4 of the way into the scene he removes the cowboy hat. Boo-urns.
Anywho, the kid heads off and runs into his crush Leslie on his way, she gives him his tape, I guess that's what the bullies threw into the gym for him to "fetch" and the polaroid of his bare ass. Aw that's sweet, at least the priss is nice enough to return the polaroid of humiliation after she and her gal pals had a good laugh over it. She then invites him to swing by the schools pool later, after hours, her friends are having a party. He decides that is good for him and shows up, where he gets confronted by one of the bullies girlfriends for being there, then they gang up on him, drop a weight into his backpack and push him into the pool. Luckily Leslie shows up to save him, but instead of being glad that she saved his neck from drowning, he's pissed cause he thinks she set him up so they could all have another laugh.
"Skippy" storms home and puts on his new Sammi Curr record which is titled, perhaps a little ironically, Songs In The Key of Death. As "Skippy" is listening to the record, he is envisioning the burning hotel room and hears the lyrics playing backwards. He goes to play the actual record backwards and hears a message about how to get revenge on the bullies, using him as the bait. So for some odd reason, "Skippy" actually tries it. I guess when you have no real friends, it's only natural to listen to creepy backwards talking records. What's even better, however, is that the message is spoken by Sammi Curr himself! "Skippy" tries the plan and it works to his surprise, he tells his one school chum about it, who, really, is maybe the only person at his school who is geekier than him, but the cat doesn't believe him when he says it was meant for him.
"Skippy" now thinks it's pretty hot shit and makes a cassette recording of the record (how fun was that!) to listen at school and in his car. The next day he eats his lunch in the wood shop class, cause the record told him too. The bullies come find him and start some shit with him again for the stunt the previous day, ya know, the usual, smack him around, throw him across the room. Then, the head bully ends up getting his head stuck in a lathe of all tools and almost gets "lathed" to death. Is that a real word? Anyway, I greatly dislike how he only ALMOST gets lathed to death, they should have definitely used that as a manner of destruction in this movie, it would have actually made it a really decent movie. But anyway, "Skippy" stops the lathe just as it's about the pierce this kids skull.
Anyways, "Skippy" carries on listening to the "evil" record to get revenge on the bullies. He also makes a "peace offering" tape which he leaves in the lathe bully's locker. Later on, the bully is out in his car with his girlfriend, who had confronted "Skippy" at that pool shindig, and they're making out.
But then, all of a sudden, lathe bully has to pee, so he leaves his girl in the car and wanders off to take a leak. She decides within seconds that she's bored and is going to listen to his walkman. She finds the "peace offering" tape and puts it in. Ya know, for someone who picks on or at least encourages picking on the metal head kid, she sure does get into it. Anyways, cheesy effects depict a green ghostly glow coming from the headphones and basically molesting her. It's probably the most "out there" scene in the movie. "It" unbuttons her shirt, has her remove her bra, basically just touches her in the "good" spots and she's digging it, until she opens her eyes and sees an evil hideous monster and screams her head off. At which point lathe bully comes back to find her unconcious, partially nude, and with the headphones melted to her ears....or was it really her ears melted to the headphones? Anyways, I just love how he doesn't question the now ample nudity of his girl. He examines the walkman and discovers that it was the tape "Skippy" made him that she was listening to...oooer suspense!
Shortly thereafter, Lathe bully goes to see "Skippy" to confront him and he tells him that his girlfriend is in the hospital after listening to that tape "Skippy" made him, he goes to approach him and, from what I can tell, goes to kick his ass, but "Skippy" raises his hands and that apparently makes the flames in the pumpkins on his front porch jump higher. Neat trick. Anyways, this also apparently freaks out the lathe bully who just stumbles back a bit and tells "Skippy" to just stay away from him.
The next day, "Skippy" freaks out and tells his friend to go get the tape from lathe bullys car, cause he obviously can't go near the car. So we are treated to an amusing scene of his nerdy friend dressed up in cat burglar gear, in broad daylight, trying to break into an already unlocked car. Beautiful. "Skippy" also told his friend that once he got the tape, he was to destroy it. Needless to say, his friend doesn't destroy it, but instead listens to it. Stupid stupid man.
At one point, Skippy is listening to the record, talking to it actually, telling it that it went too far and the record talks back to him, playing itself forwards and backwards as it pleases. You think at this point that the kid would just smash the damned thing, but no. He keeps arguing with it when it says the name Leslie, and he freaks cause Leslie is his true love crush! At some point in this scene, the stereo itself starts to freak out, a pepsi falls onto it, and creates a surge of electricity which provides enough energy for Sammi Curr to emerge into the real world. Cause who just wants to travel via electrical current? That's just messed up. Anyways, this is the first time we're treated to seeing ex "Solid Gold" dancer Sammi Curr (you think I'm making that shit up? Go IMDB it fuckers!). Anywho, You are definitely not going to question that it is Sammi Curr, especially because he shows you one side of his face, then the other in a glorious "looking over the shoulder" pose, and you clearly see one side is all burned and gross looking. But yet not gross enough to destroy his boyish good looks. Haha. Anyways, at this point, he disappears and I guess he apparently then manifests himself at "Skippy's" pal's house and tells the kid to bring the cassette tape to the school dance. And the kid agrees, hrm! Lookit that.
Ah yes, but "Skippy" has freaked out and starts smashing his stereo with a baseball bat, and doesn't expect his mom to find this disturbing at all.
At the school dance, "Skippy's" pal tries to play the tape, but the other kids won't let him play the full thing, they hate it! But apparently it was enough time for Sammi to manifest himself in the schools electrical wiring. The school principal, played by director Charles Martin Smith , introduces the band for the dance, Kicker (Which looks like a total jab at a Bon Jovi style band by the by hahaha). Anyway, as the singer is setting his shit up with his guitar amp, Sammi blows the guy up and manifests himself in the crispy charred flesh, ok only half crispy and charred, and sings a rockin number entitled Trick or Treat. I should take this moment, to point out a couple of things for those who are unable to figure this out: 1) That so is not him singing. He's obviously lip syncing, and while I first thought it was the singer from Ratt singing, it was, in fact the band Fastway that did all the Sammi Curr music for the movie. Fun fact.....if you're wondering where the singer of Flogging Molly comes in, this is it. Dave King, the current Flogging Molly singer, is the singer for Fastway. Hilarious, no? And 2) Apparently the whole school LOVES it, yes, the ones who pick on "Skippy" and wouldn't let "Skippy's" lame pal play the tape are eating this shit right up.
OK then, as the song is going on, Sammi picks up a guitar and starts blowing people up. Which would be fantastic, but it's just sparks and NO BLOOD. Now I'm sorry, maybe I'm just a gorehound, but c'mon, no blood? Ah I guess I'll over look it considering the glorious cheese that is this movie. So now that Sammi is on the loose and is destroying everyone, it's up to "Skippy", his lame friend, and Leslie to stop him.
I won't spoil the ending for you, it's pretty fluffed out though, not the kind of ending I'd like to see. But, I did forget the best reason to EVER see this movie:
Ozzy Osbourne. Yes, that's right folks, the Prince of Darkness himself plays a rock and roll hating TV reverend. Not only is it hilariously great to see Ozzy with his hair slicked back to look like a respectable do', and to see him in a dress shirt and tie, but you get to hear him outright condem Rock and Roll and talk about its wickedness. Now if that isn't fantastic, I don't know what is. And the people responsible for this movie must have thought so too since they close the movie out with another clip of Ozzy talking about how evil Rock and Roll is.
Seriously, the gore in this flick is for shit, but it redeems itself because of the fact that it has "Skippy", Gene in a cowboy hat, Ozzy talking down about Rock and Roll, a "Solid Gold" dancer and the singer from Flogging Molly. Oh yea and you get to see boobs for a bit too. I have seen a lot of cheesy ass 80s horror movies, probably more than I'll ever need to, but this one definitely takes the cake for me.
Every day I am thankful for FEARnet on demand huzzah!
To hear that bitchin song "Trick or Treat" head on over to the myspace page at Myspace.com/TrickorTreat86
Oh yea, I should also mention that the bully who gets trapped in the lathe, he's now Tom Scavo on Desperate Housewives, interesting? Nah not really.
Posts
