SHOCKER (1989)
Tagline: 100 thousand volts of terror!
(Horror, Comedy, Edison’s Medicine) [R]
I've heard of audience participation shows, but this is ridiculous.
In this one, Lt. Parker’s wife son, and daughter are killed by a TV repairman named Horace Pinker. Lt. Parker’s other son Jonathan for some reason knows when Horace Pinker is about to kill next so his information eventually leads to Pinker’s capture several murders later. Pinker is executed, but Jonathon isn’t convinced he’s dead. As it turns out Pinker has used black magic to come back to life as electricity. Pinker now has the ability to take over any person’s body until he uses their power up and they die. Can Jonathon stop Pinker’s murder spree before everyone he loves is killed?
First off, this movie definitely starts out like a darker slasher flick. I would say we really don’t get any humor in this film at all until the last 45 minutes or so. Maybe even just the last 35 minutes. One thing that I definitely remember about this movie is the soundtrack. It’s not mind-blowing, but it features bands like “Dangerous Toys”, “Megadeth”,” and Bonfire”, so it definitely stands out. The pacing is kind of weird and there are some decisions made in this that I really couldn’t stand, but the cast was really solid.
Acting-wise we get Peter Berg (BATTLESHIP) who is a good lead and does well in his role as Jonathon. Camille Cooper plays Alison and does a good job too. She stopped acting in 1996 but also appeared in LAWNMOWER MAN 2: BEYOND CYBERSPACE. Michael Murphy is solid as Lt. Don Parker. He had a long career in Hollywood but is probably best known for playing the Mayor in BATMAN RETURNS. You can file this one under “I wish the killer wasn’t just some dude”, but Mitch Pileggi (TRANSFORMERS: THE LAST KNIGHT) is fine in the role of Horace Pinker. Rounding out the main cast we get Sam Scarber who plays Cooper. I liked him a lot in this, but he is probably most famous for OVER THE TOP.
As far as the box office goes, this movie actually made 3 times what it cost to make which is a decent measure for success to say it made money. However, the planned series was scrapped because it was critically met with a lukewarm response. To be honest as interesting as this movie's premise was, I don’t know if I would have run to the theaters for more of the silliness that happened when Horace Pinker goes “full electric”.
Overall my reception to this was lukewarm as well. I actually saw this in theaters when it came out and remember not being impressed with the first hour or so, but the last 45 minutes or so aside from the goofy “run into TV shows” portion was actually pretty good. I also remember not liking how they handled Alison and I still don’t. While this is considered a bit of a gem in the horror community it’s probably more for the fact that it was directed by Wes Craven (A NIGHTMARE ON ELM STREET) than the actual movie.
SHOCKER gets a 4 out of 7.
GRAPHICS ARE THE PROPERTY OF UNIVERSAL CITY STUDIOS AND ARE USED FOR REVIEW PURPOSES ONLY.
Comments
Post a Comment