Movies
Sledgehammer
“This film is currently reaching crazy cult status thanks to Mondo Tees releasing it on VHS. I recommend it to everyone if you can get your hands on it.”
Remember that old story Rob Schneider told Howard Stern about a friend of his meeting with Steven Seagal?
Steven Seagal: I just read the greatest script I’ve ever read in my life.
Friend: Really? Who wrote it?
Steven Seagal: I did.
Well, folks, I think I just watched the greatest film I’ve ever watched in my life.
Sadly, I’m just writing the review.
Sledgehammer, shot on video in 1983, is the story of a poor young boy, locked in a closet so his mom can have an affair. While mom is getting it on, she and her lover are murdered with a…Sledgehammer! Ten years later, a group of young adults (are they teenagers or thirty?) come to stay in the same remote farmhouse for a wild party weekend.
Chugging and crushing Budweiser cans with their impressive, tight polo shirts, feathered mullets and ‘staches, the group starts a food fight – which should lead to a shower scene. Sorry boys, that is cut short. Later, they have a séance, telling the tale of the boy from 10 years ago.
Bad idea.
But, how could they know something still lurks in the house?
What should have been a great getaway turns into a fight for their lives as the young adults get picked off one by one by the mysterious killer.
Writer and director David A. Prior is my new hero. His attention to detail is phenomenal. The excessive, painfully long, slo-mo sequences, matched with either pleasant muzakesque sounds or ominous synthesizers, are impressive and dominate the film. The acting by Ted Prior, Linda McGill and John Eastman alone top other actors in films I’ve reviewed here. And did I mention this movie was shot on video?
There were literally moments where I thought the dvd had started to skip somehow, but no, they were just long drawn out shots. For 1983, and with a budget that had to be next to nothing, the video and special effects are radical. The killer is downright creepy, rivaling Leatherface. The entire mix is something lacking in horror films today. And I LOVE it.
This film is currently reaching crazy cult status thanks to Mondo Tees releasing it on VHS. I recommend it to everyone if you can get your hands on it.
Much like the Power Glove (which actually debuted 6 years later), I love Sledgehammer.
It’s so bad.
10/10 Sledgehammers!
A contemporary reimagining of H.P. Lovecraft’s short story Herbert West: Reanimator is on the way, and Deadline has unveiled the first look at the new Herbert West and the pathologist drawn to his orbit.
Adam Simon (The Haunting in Connecticut, “Salem”) and Tim Metcalfe (The Haunting in Connecticut, Kalifornia) penned the script. The original screenplay and storyline come from Jade Sandberg Wallace.
Michael Grossman (“The Originals”, “Pretty Little Liars”) directs.
The new images introduce star Joseph Morgan (“Vampire Diaries“), who plays “brilliant surgeon and scientist Herbert West, who is obsessed with creating a serum to reanimate the dead.” Katie Cassidy (Speed Demon) stars opposite as the pathologist with a troubled past who joins his efforts.
Together, they prove that conquering death may be the ultimate sin against life itself.
The film’s official synopsis: “As a child, Herbert West watches his father Peter reanimate his dead mother Judith in a secret basement lab — only for Judith to mortally wound Peter and nearly kill Herbert before Peter shoots her. The trauma leaves its mark on Herbert, but so does one final image: his mother’s finger, twitching after death. Thirty years later, Herbert West is a brilliant, secretive surgeon still chasing his father’s obsession.
“Pathologist Kate Locke arrives in town and is drawn into his orbit — first through a spark at a hospital fundraiser, then through his secret lab, where he reveals a serum capable of reanimating severed tissue. Kate, hiding a dark past of her own, is thrilled rather than horrified, and moves into West’s mansion to work alongside him. Their early experiments on a cadaver succeed only briefly. West concludes that dead tissue is the problem — they need something fresher.”
Supporting cast includes Scott Aiello, Ira J Amyx, Randall Newsome, Emma Reinagal, James D. Bryce, Kathryn A Bentley, Jack Lancaster, Amy Holland Pennell, John Pierson, Mindy Shaw, Eric Dean White, Tristan Wilder Hallet, Adrienne Lamping, Aaron Crippen, and Drew Patterson.
Makeup artist Jeff Lewis (“Star Trek: Voyager,” “Star Trek: Enterprise”) and cousin Roger Lewis are heading the production via their newly established Woodlake Entertainment.
Lovecraft’s short story, first serialized in Home Brew magazine in 1922, is the first among his works to mention the fictional Miskatonic University. It was most famously adapted into a 1985 horror movie from Stuart Gordon, starring Jeffrey Combs as Herbert West.
Herbert West: Reanimator is set in Alton, Illinois, where production is now underway.
Herbert West: Reanimator. Photo credit: Matt Lief Anderson
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