Shocker (1989)Directed by Wes Craven
Wes Craven was known as a master of horror. The guy created classics such as The Last House on the Left, The Hills Have Eyes, A Nightmare on Elm Street, and Scream. Those are all great horror movies that are regarded as milestone accomplishments in film and popular culture. While Craven made those great movies (a few other solid entries as well) he made a good handful of shit. Shocker? Well let’s just say it’s more of the pinky than it is the index or middle finger.
Really this movie has mixed reviews all over the web. Some love it’s story, others believe it is too derivative of A Nightmare on Elm Street. With so many varying opinions on this film I figured I had to check it out for myself, so I spent around $2.50 on amazon for this DVD. I guess that really should have been a precursor of what was to come.
The plot of the film centers around a high school football star Jonathan having premonitions of murders by a man named Horace Pinker. Ok I’m already going to stop here, it’s a movie. Named Shocker, and the killer? His last name is Pinker. Yeah. Onwards! Jonathan’s family is murdered in his dream, so he wakes up and runs to his house only to find his family has been slaughtered. Jonathan with his father Lt. Don Parker go to Pinker’s house? Lair? Hideout? I’m not quite sure, but they go there. Pink then proceeds to kill numerous officers and fight of Don and Jonathan. From then on Pinker seems to have it out for Jonathan and kills his girlfriend. Pinker is arrested and sentenced to death by electrocution. Jonathan asks to be witness and Pinker spouts off some random babble to Jonathan then boom he’s fried in the chair. Pinker develops the ability to move through people’s bodies by electricity. Yeah it is as odd as it sounds. Now Jonathan must fight Pinker and bring his murderous rampage to an end once and for all.
The first thing I noticed about this movie was the soundtrack. It is basically all 80s metal, which I LOVE. Right off the bat we get the titular theme Shocker by Paul Stanley and a supergroup of sorts called “The Dudes of Wrath” lol what a ridiculously cheesy name. The group contained Paul Stanley on vocals (yes!), Desmond Child on vocals as well, Vivian Campbell of Def Leppard/Dio fame with Guy Mann-Dude (whom?) on guitars, Rudy Sarzo (Whitesnake) on bass, and Tommy Lee (Motley Crue) on drums. Along with the Dudes we get Bonfire, Saraya, Megadeth, Dangerous Toys, Iggy Pop, and a band named Dead On which I have never heard of. Keeping with the theme of metal, super buff Alice Cooper guitarist Kane Roberts has a brief camo in the film. When I read that Saraya did a song for this film I instantly got “Love Has Taken its Toll” stuck in my head so I guess that’s a bonus right?
Unfortunately, the soundtrack is the lone highlight in this film for me. The acting is so wooden and hammed up that I laughed during the majority of the film. The laughing soon became eye roll inducing. Peter Berg the actor that played Jonathan has the oddest voice and facial expressions. Sometimes I didn’t know if he was in shock (no pun intended) or if he was having a stroke. Mitch Pileggi played Stinker oops I mean Pinker, and he was beyond evil to the point where it was so unrealistic that it was annoying. The plot seems to be all over the place and I found myself saying “what the fuck is going on” at least 10 times during the film. So much is taken from A Nightmare on Elm Street. Jonathan has dreams of people being killed, when he wakes up they’re dead. During the film he’s visited by a ghost of his girlfriend. Heather Langenkamp was also in this, she was killed by Pinker early on. Damn Freddy, Pinker didn’t fuck around, he killed Nancy and you never could! The special effects? Oh my lord were they dated and horrible! There is a part where Jonathan’s water bed (I know a water bed! Lol Anthony Wilcox, I’m looking at you buddy!) turns into a body of water and he’s tackled into it. The effect looks so bad that I was nearly brought to tears laughing. The blood kind of looks like raspberry jam in this movie and if they threw in bread and peanut butter I would have been all for it! After Pinker is electrocuted he appears outside of people’s bodies as if he was recorded on the worst VHS camera of all time. It is reminiscent to the scene from Reptilicus where the marionette monster eats the farmer. I realize that is a horribly obscure reference that a small portion of you will even understand but that was for me!
My god this movie was just bad. Granted it made me laugh numerous times but not in a good way. It has corny over the top Troma style acting that usually just annoys me. It was obvious that Craven just phoned it in on this movie. I really wish I wouldn’t have bought this movie because now I’m kind of stuck with it. I can’t resell it, because who the hell wants it? I’m definitely not going to watch this again because it wasn’t bad enough for me to enjoy and it is so far from good that it can’t even see it with binoculars. While I hated it a lot, it still isn’t the worst slasher movie I’ve ever seen. I can’t justify giving it the elusive F rating, but really the highest I can rate it is a D. The soundtrack saved it from being a complete waste of time. If you somehow live under a rock and you are still scratching your head about my Shocker references, let my friends from Steel Panther better explain it to you: https://youtu.be/nECac7O4hg8
