Spookies (1986) Twisted Souls Inc./Horror RT: 85 minutes Rated R (violence, gore, language, suggestive material) Director: Eugenie Joseph, Thomas Doran and Brendan Faulkner Screenplay: Thomas Doran, Brendan Faulkner, Frank Farel and Ann Burgund Music: James Calabrese and Kenneth Higgins Cinematography: Ken Kelsch and Robert Chappel Release date: January 1987 (US) Cast: Felix Ward, Maria Pechukas, Dan Scott, Alec Nemser, A.J. Lowenthal, Pat Wesley Bryan, Peter Dain, Nick Gionta, Lisa Friede, Joan Ellen Delaney, Peter Iasillo Jr., Kim Merrill, Charlotte Seeley, Anthony Valbrio, Soo Paek, Al Magliochetti, James M. Glenn, Gabriel Bartalos, Peter Delynn, John Beatty, Robert Epstein. Box Office: $17,785 (US)
Rating: ***
The independent horror movie Spookies is one of the many titles I remember from my days and nights of haunting the local video stores in the late 80s. I never really considered renting it because I figured it was yet another cheapie in the vein of Ghoulies, Critters and Munchies. I actually forgot all about it until recently when a friend turned me on to it. I figured it couldn’t hurt to give it a shot. Besides, my fan base seems to love it when I review horror movies from the 80s. You know what, Spookies is actually pretty good.
Spookies began life in 1984 as a low-budget horror flick called Twisted Souls. Directors Thomas Doran and Brendan Faulkner were in the process of editing it when legal issues between the producers and financial backers brought all work to a halt. The following year, Eugenie Joseph was brought in to direct additional footage which was pieced together with the pre-existing material to create what we now know as Spookies. Now let me break it down so you know what’s what. Doran and Faulkner did all the stuff involving the group of travelers and the monsters they encounter in the old mansion while Joseph did the wrap-around story involving the warlock Kreon (Ward) and his coffin-bound girlfriend Isabelle (Pechukas). This explains why the two sets of characters never appear on-screen at the same time.
There’s actually a third subplot that opens the movie and amounts to absolutely nothing. It involves a 13YO runaway named Billy (Nemser) who’s sore at his parents for forgetting his birthday. After a creepy encounter with a drifter (Bryan) – aka Victim #1- he happens upon the mansion where he finds what he believes to be a surprise party arranged by his parents. Why he thinks this defies all rational thought. This kid is clearly beyond dumb. After opening a present containing a severed head, Billy runs off only to be attacked, slashed and buried alive by the werecat. So endeth this plotline.
For the past 70 years, Kreon has kept Isabelle alive in a coffin in hopes that she will fall in love with him. He needs human victims to do whatever he’s doing. He has a werecat (Scott) to do his violent bidding and a young, blue-skinned son (Lowenthal). One night, a large group of people looking for a party arrives in their cars. They are the most random bunch of people I’ve ever seen. One couple, Peter (Dain) and Meegan (Merrill), appear to be a married suburban couple in their 30s. Duke (Gionta), your stereotypical Italian guido, and his girlfriend Linda (Delaney) are either horny teens or twenty-somethings. One goofy fellow, Rich (Iasillo), has a hand puppet. There’s also a wimp named Dave (Valbiro) and his bitchy, Brit-accented girlfriend Adrienne (Seeley). Let’s not forget Lewis (Magliochetti) and Carol (Friede). He exits early and she gets possessed Evil Dead-style.
ANYWAY, the gang decides to set up party camp in the seemingly abandoned mansion. They have no idea that they’ve landed in deep, deep doo-doo. They find a Ouija board (for some reason, it looks like a Trivial Pursuit board) and naturally decide to play with it. This is when (1) Carol gets possessed and (2) monsters appear to pick off the dim characters. Over the course of the terrifying night, they encounter small, reptile-like demons, “Muck-Men” in the basement, spider women (minus William Hurt and Raul Julia), a Grim Reaper statue come to life, a creature with electric tentacles and zombies galore.
Meanwhile, Isabelle has made it crystal clear that she is repulsed by her evil warlock admirer and wants nothing to do with him. While he sits there at his chessboard doing the voodoo he does so well, she plots to escape from him and the mansion.
As I’ve said countless times, bad movies from back in the day are far, FAR more entertaining than a majority of the mediocre-to-pretty good movies of today. I’d much rather watch a cheap movie like Spookies than some studio-manufactured POC like The Turning or Brahms: The Boy II. Amidst the beyond terrible acting, slapped-together storyline and bargain basement special effects, there’s some fun to be had. Yes, Spookies looks like it was made for a budget that doesn’t exceed a couple months’ pay from a job at a convenience store. The cast has to be friends of the directors; there’s no way they can be actors. That the movie has multiple directors is the biggest tell that the narrative is a mess. If I didn’t look at the credits beforehand, I’d swear that Spookies was made by Empire Pictures, the C-level studio responsible for Ghoulies, Troll and TerrorVision. It doesn’t matter. I enjoyed this movie immensely.
The best part of Spookies is the middle portion where the characters meet their grisly fates at the hands of monsters conjured up by Kreon through evil Carol. She’s my favorite character in the picture because of the whole Evil Dead thing. Tell me she doesn’t remind you of Cheryl from Sam Raimi’s cult classic and I’ll try to sell you this bridge in Brooklyn. The other great part of Spookies is the climax where Isabelle is chased through the graveyard on the mansion’s property by a huge horde of zombies rising from the ground. What can I say, I LOVE stuff like that.
I regret not renting Spookies back in the day. It’s such great bad movie fun. Where else will you find coffins made of rubberized concrete? Or goofball dialogue like “A sorcerer’s son must learn to use death to control the force of life”? Or a grown man who thinks hand puppets will get him laid? Spookies is one crazy-ass horror movie. I can’t put it better than that.
