Runtime: 91 minutes
Directed by: Wes Craven
Starring: Matthew Labyorteaux, Kristy Swanson, Michael Sharrett, Anne Twomey, Anne Ramsey
From: Warner Bros.
Yes, this is an appropriate movie to watch after a few beers.
Of course, for years I've known of this infamous Wes Craven effort, something that unfortunately was meddled with by Warner Brothers and resulted in no one being happy w/ what was released. Before last night I only knew that fact... and I had viewed “the basketball scene”, which is not something you can ever forget. Earlier in the month it was recorded off of TCM... not TCM Underground-which has shown it before-but regular-ass TCM actually played the movie for some reason one late afternoon. After having experienced this in full... what a mess, albeit an entertaining one.
Originally this was supposed to be a PG sci-fi thriller; that's what Craven wanted to do as he wanted to be more than just “a horror director.” However, test audiences DID want another Nightmare on Elm Street so they weren't happy. Thus there were reshoots that had gory moments and OF COURSE they had to add in a few random nightmare sequences... no wonder this is so disjointed. After all, it's about a tech genius teen on the level of Elon Musk or Steve Jobs who moves with his mom to California, along with his totally 80's robot that is like Johnny-5's more dimwitted cousin and usually speaks gibberish. He falls in love w/ next door neighbor Kristy Swanson but she has an abusive father who actually kills her by accident.
As the abusive father angle was in the original cut, who knows if that version would have been considered “great” by most people... if that wasn't peculiar enough, that OG creation also had Paul be even more problematic than someone like Elon Musk or Steve Jobs! He goes way over the line in installing a computer chip in his girlfriend-including drugging his own mother so she's knocked out for a bit! Deadly Friend does not entirely demonize him for his behavior, either-thank goodness there's at least Paul's friend Tom that serves as both an audience surrogate and a voice of reason in telling his buddy, “WTF are you doing?”
Between wacky moments like the 80's robot (named BB... BB-8 it ain't) grabbing biker bullies by the balls are gruesome death scenes, Anne Ramsey in exactly the sort of role you'd expect her in, and Swanson literally acting like a robot, which does come across as silly due to no fault of Kristy's performance. The entire endeavor as is just comes across as daffy and misguided; that said, it was also perversely entertaining so if you like out-there films like Malignant or the bonkers cinema that appears once at an all-night horror marathon at the New Beverly Cinema, then this could be for you. Heaven knows, the coupe de grace was the finale that is REALLY bizarre-allegedly it was an idea from the executive vice president of Warner Brothers so I guess you can't reject his “suggestion”... then there's an end credits “song” which brought down the house w/ laughter.
The original was supposed to be a more light-hearted affair with the message that “the humans are the real monsters”; all that deleted footage likely rotted away in some landfill decades ago, so instead someone can howl with laughter at this misguided final product, if they so desire.
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