When someone asked me to write about a
horror flick, there was only one that came to mind. CREEPSHOW. If
you've never seen this movie, we cannot be friends ... until you see
it … and love it. This movie is my absolute favorite film ever.
EVER. It's fucking perfect. George A. Romero directing, Stephen King
writing, Tom Savini for special effects, and a slew of amazing actors
including (well known in the world of horror) Tom Atkins and Adrienne
Barbeau. Not to mention one of the best cinematic scores in all of
creation. All that fantastic shit tied together with kick ass comic
book style animated transitions illustrated by Bernie Wrightson makes
it the most perfect goddamned horror flick on Earth. If you disagree,
may you die a horrible death. Kidding. ::Winky Face:: Not kidding.
The wrap-around story is about a boy
(Stephen King's actual son! ::GASP!::) who gets caught with a
CREEPSHOW comic book by his father, Tom Atkins (an apparent smut
ogler). Poor Billy loses his comic to the trash. A great injustice.
Enter The Creep, a lovable skeleton in a cloak who visits Billy's
window like a magical terrifying godmother to grant him the wish of
offing his father for him. BUT, not before sharing with the audience
just what the CREEPSHOW comic contains that is so very sinful and
disgusting that it belongs in the garbage. “The freakin' garbage!”
to be exact.
The first tale is titled “Father's
Day.” This story features a snob family having a Father's Day
dinner together....sans father. A young couple, a brother, and a aunt
await the arrival of Great Aunt Bedelia. The brother sets it up: Aunt
Bedelia is well know for being tormented all her life by her father,
Nathan. At some point after he turns 184, Bedelia bashes his head in
to halt his constant bitching. “Where's my Father's Day cake?!”
Aw....that's nice. And although Nathan was clearly a mean old bastard
from Hell, Bedelia is consumed with greed. Offing Daddy will do that
to a girl. Bedelia visits his grave which is inexplicably close to
the home, only to get strangled by a newly awakened, less than fresh,
Nathan. All this happens while the family sits comfortably in the
house and Ron Howard does possibly the most awkward on screen dancing
to disco music ever. Don't worry, Nathan will kill him too. In fact,
it's implied that Nathan gets the entire family on this evening and
even makes Aunt Sylvia's head into his Father's Day cake, complete
with candles. Hooray!
The second tale is titled “The
Lonesome Death of Jordy Verrill.” Do you have goosebumps yet?!
Jordy Verrill is a simpleton living in a shitty farm house in the
middle of no where. Also he is played by Stephen Fucking King. Ah,
yes...there are the goosebumps. On this night a bright glowing ball
falls from the sky to which Jordy exclaims “Holy ol' Jesus!”
Jordy'll be dipped in shit if that ain't a meteor. He proceeds to
“cool the sumbitch off” with a bucket of water which causes it to
break in half spilling a mysterious ooze that Jordy names “Meteor
Shit.” The dialog alone makes this segment fantastic. Poor Jordy
Verill spends the evening with hallucinations and what appears to be
a plant like substance growing in places that come in contact with
the meteor shit. ALL places. Yes, even there. At the end of the
evening his land, home, belongings, and body are completely covered
in moss and grass. This proves to be unbearable and Jordy opts for
washing his mouth out with buckshot. A moment of silence...
The third tale is titled “Something
to Tide You Over.” This story is about a man and another man and
also a woman. Oh, there's the conflict: A woman. One man, Leslie
Nielsen, wants to kill the other, Ted Danson, for sleeping with his
wife, some broad. The chosen method for killing him and the broad?
Burying them up to their necks in the sand and waiting for the tide
to come in and drown them. He doesn't wait for the tide though. He
has fancy-ass equipment to record it all so he can watch from his
hoity-toity beach house, the rich bastard. The tide comes in and all
is well! Whore wife and boyfriend, both dead. Good times are to be
had in the shower. Or not. Instead, the whore wife and boyfriend come
back from the dead and raid Leslie's beach house. What assholes!
Bullets don't stop them either. In the end, we find poor Leslie
buried on the beach. No worries, though. He can hold his breath “for
a loooooong time.” No, not really. He gon' die.
The fourth tale is titled “The
Crate.” This is my favorite. Henry is a man, barely. His mouthy,
alcoholic wife, Wilma (call her “Billie”, everyone does) has made
his life a living Hell. Henry regularly envisions killing Billie. Ah,
the bliss of killing Billie. Henry works at a college which is in its
off season. A janitor there has found a mysterious (say it with me)
CRATE under the stairway. This crate has been nailed shut, surely for
no important reason. The janitor is hot to see what's inside so he
calls Henry's intellectual friend, Dexter, to help him investigate
it. They find Fluffy inside. Fluffy is some sort of man-eating beast
made of nightmares, teeth and the terrified tears of children. He
eats the janitor, you know, because he's not important. Dexter runs
to get help. He finds a wandering student, we'll call him “Meal
#2”. Dexter then runs home to find Henry. And Henry figures
“Janitor, random student, well....someone important to this plot
has to be eaten at some point. Que Billie. Henry invites Billie to
the college via hand-written note left next to her bourbon and milk.
Ew. Billie falls right into Henry's trap. We rejoice and cheer for
Fluffy. As Fluffy retreats to his crate for the evening, Henry
manages to chain the crate shut and take Fluffy for a drive. He drops
Fluffy at the bottom of a water filled quarry. Don't worry, he's
fine. Not sure how, but he is.
The fifth and final tale is titled
“They're Creeping Up On You.” It's about a mean old codger who
subsides in a $3200 a month penthouse apartment that is supposedly
germ proof. However, we needn't worry about germs. Upson Pratt hates
bugs. Especially cockroaches. So, what should happen to suddenly and
overwhelmingly inhabit his apartment? Fucking cockroaches. Thousands
of them. Mr. Pratt is wonderful at being a total asshole to his
employees via intercom phone calls and even goes so far as to make
fun of a grief-stricken widow who's husband blew his brains out when
Pratt bought his company. He also establishes himself as a racist
dick. It's safe to say that by the time the bugs have inexplicably
filled his apartment, we're ready to see the bastard croak. And he
does. Quite graphically. Huzzah!
We return to the wrap-around story of
Billy and his asshole father. As the garbage men show up to take the
freakin' garbage, one of them (Tom Goddamned Savini) notices that an
ad for a voo-doll has been clipped and mailed away from the comic
book. Billy's father didn't sleep worth a damn and as he's bitching
about his neck, his wife notices a piece of his pajamas missing. It
cuts to Billy holding a voodoo doll clad in Dad's PJ's. Billy has a
grand time repeatedly stabbing his father in the throat while his
father writhes in pain downstairs in the kitchen.
I'll end this with a note on all the
things that are not perfect about this film. …..............
Enjoy.
