Shocker (1989)

I remember seeing the trailer and being enamored about this film. How could it be bad? I was 8, of course, this looked amazing. A couple of years later, seeing was believing. Believe that. Mitch Pileggi is in this, and so is Heather Langenkamp (Nancy from Nightmare on Elm Street), and John Tesh. The real draw here is that it’s a Wes Craven film. Fingers crossed.

This opening music is pretty badass. Fucking late 80’s at it’s finest! This song is called “Shocker” and is performed by The Dudes of Wrath. Fantastic. The coach is awesome. I assume his role is small. I think his name is Cooper. He is great. This Jonathan guy pays no attention, ran into the field goal post, and knocked himself silly. His girlfriend is Allison, and she is 80’s hot. His attire, Red jacket, blue button-up shirt, and a yellow T-shirt.  Jonathan has a dream……like you can be surprised by that, and it’s a scary one with Horace Pinker killing somebody. So Jonathan’s dad (foster dad) is the guy leading the investigation on this murderer. Well, his mom and 2 “sisters” got killed. I am sure you are SHOCKED!

Jonathan tells his dad about his dream, and his dad doesn’t wanna hear because he’s a hardass. Jon tells his dad that he can lead him to the killer.  “It’s against procedure son”. This clearly an attempt to make a new Freddy with the dreams. Jon, Dad (Don), and the cops go check out Pinker’s TV repair shop.  One cop is abducted behind a hinged wall. Well, we see a pool of blood, and Pinker dressed like the officer and killed 2 more. Fandango. He then escapes in his van, possibly the same van used in People Under The Stairs. Oh, he killed 4. Don send Jon home.

I don’t know if I wish to call him Horace, or Pinker. I think Horace as I only know of 2 Horace’s, and they were both amazing (Horace Grant of the Bulls and Horace from Monster Squad. Who’s the strumpet in the tub? It is Allison. Her hair looks better. No nudity in the film. Sigh.  Jon gives her this heart necklace before he leaves for practice for her birthday. Horace just attacked and possibly killed Allison. Coach tells him to go home. Awww, Horace wrote happy birthday to Jon and there is soooo much blood. How is there that much blood?

So Jon is getting help from his black teammate whose name I didn’t catch. I am pulling for him though. Jon finds a house where Horace is attacking some bitch. This is all just a dream. This is how he knows where to find Horace.  Haha, oh dammit. This is bad and silly. The cops follow Jon to the apartment from the dream, and there’s Horace. Gets to the rooftop, crosses via a ladder. Jon makes the running leap, hahaha, and he dropkicks Horace in the back.  Horace with a gut-wrench suplex. Now they are just duking it out.  This is a fucking treat of awfulness. The cops finally get up there and apprehend Horace.

At the execution, we get to hear “No More Mr. Nice Guy”!!! That’s a great choice. Apparently his last wish was to have a TV in his cell, and he took it apart, shocked himself, and some entity came and talked to him. He then was dead, but they revived him, so he attacks 2 of the guards. This is so bad. So Horace is Jon’s real dad, and he witnessed Horace murder his mom. He survives the electrocution, and the doctor comes to check, and he shocks her and then there is this big goofy scene, and Horace is gone.  They need to get the doctor to the hospital….duh.  They find his dead body. 2 officers take doctor, and she comes back to like as Horace, twists one’s neck and causes them to crash into a tanker truck.

Another dream, Allison gave him the necklace to help him in his fight.  Anyway, Horace is in an Officer’s body, he is shooting at Jon, then shot this young guy and passed on to him. Oh boy. Now he has transferred to a girl. So everybody walks like him and drags there feet, but he was able to nimbly walk across the ladder early on? WHAT? Oh, and the little girl just said fucker while driving some bulldozer whatever. The girl’s mom is pissed. Jon tosses the necklace onto the girl, so Horace is forced to crawl out and jump into the mom. Now he switches to this construction worker who picked up the necklace with a pickaxe and threw it in the little lake.

Jon is telling Coach about this, and Coach is all pissed.  He ends up in Coach, Coach kills himself, so Horace exits the body. Horace ends up in Don and Don is trying to arrest him, but Jon’s black teammate makes the save. Don is chasing Jon and shooting at him and is a terrible aim.

This has gotten soooo fucking bad. It lost all charm. I mean, this whole premise was silly, but they elongated it at least 20-30 minutes more than needed. “Allison, if you’re in me, give me the power to do this” and then Jon jumps into the TV after Horace, into random TV shows. Is this supposed to be funny?  Well, Jon won using a remote, and it was painful.

End film

Well, what can one say about this exquisite film? It had a decent first 30 minutes. This could have worked as an episode of Tales From The Crypt, but it just dragged on and on and on. I liked the music. There, that’s me being positive. I thought it dragged on too long, I hated that they borrowed way too much from Nightmare without bringing anything cool to the table. The cast, by and large, were duds. I like Mitch, but this wasn’t his finest hour, and it’s probably not his fault. He was working with a shit plot and script. I love Wes, but there’s a reason that this never got a sequel. In theory, a guy who has those powers could have been way better than Leprechaun or Children of the Corn. Oh well. You can’t win them all.

Final rating: 2.2 Based on a neat idea and music

All the pictures used in this blog are for review purposes. They are the property of:

• Alive Films (presents)
• Universal City Studios (copyright holder) (as Universal City Studios, Inc.)
• Carolco International N.V. (copyright holder)

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