After a very Beast of Yucca Flats -esque (meaning sentence fragments that don’t make a damn lick of sense being mumbled by a narrator who was apparently playing chubby bunny at the time of his voiceover recording) introduction about Comanche war councils battling the evil white man (which would continue hundreds of years later at the roulette table), we’re shown a bunch of characters with no names in a rather spazzy flashback sequence with spears and ooze and explosions and a very brief glimpse of a large, doglike monster. I fear the spazziness does not fade with time.
Mance (seriously, Mance?), his wife Emily, and their infant daughter April have just moved into a house sold very reluctantly to them by an old drunkard named T.C. somewhere in the American southwest. Moving some furniture in the kitchen, they discover behind a cabinet a heavy wooden door, barred securely and covered with Native American charms. Now, I know this question has been asked more than a few times before, but what is it about large, important-looking doors barred tightly shut and covered by powerful magic charms that speaks to the heart of the common man, saying, “Hey, dumbass, crack this bad boy open and see what’s down here! C’mon, it’s really cool! There might be a case of beeee-eeeerrr!” Except it’s never beer, is it? Or a stash of old titty magazines? No, it’s always THE FUCKING DEVIL! You’d think race memory would kick in at this point.
Not long after they move in, Mance’s son from his first marriage, Willy, comes to visit. The first night in the new house, something tries to force its way up through the floor of Willy’s bedroom. Mance and Emily, assuming the boy has an overactive imagination (apparently Willy‘s imagination pushed the floorboards out of place, huh?), ignore his warnings that there’s something living under the house. Willy befriends T.C., who tells him a story explaining the flashback from the beginning of the movie. T.C.’s father built the house, and the run-down oil well at the edge of the property. One night a seemingly sentient ooze came up out of the ground and ate T.C.’s dogs. When his father went to investigate, something dragged him down into the oil well and caused an explosion that turned the oil rig into a sinkhole.
Sam John (oooh, how ethnic - “Me workum at 7-11“), a Native American medicine man who’s been hanging around in the background chanting for most of the movie, confronts Mance, warning him about the danger his family is in. The Comanche war council that was muttered about at the beginning apparently contracted his great-grandfather, an extremely powerful medicine man, to conjure a beast that would rid the West of the white man’s influence. However, the creature was made too savage. It began killing the Comanche as well, and had to be put down in the earth with good medicine. The first time it woke up again, T.C.’s father drilled his oil rig through its burial ground. Now Mance has removed the Comanche charms from his ground, and the creature is up and about. Not only will it kill his family, but it can secrete a telekinetic slime that will strip the flesh from April and claim her soul because she is still an infant and her soul isn’t connected to her body yet. Later that week, the creature sends a flock of crows to drive T.C. off the road in his truck and kill him, and tunnels up under Sam John’s house to eat him in person.
This whole time, Willy has been trying to get his father to believe that there is something dangerous living under the house, and has confronted it several times, setting bear traps in the basement and trying to take pictures of it. When it eats Mance’s boss’s son and the sheriff blames Mance, who was recently fired, Mance flips out on Willy, blaming him and yelling at him to stop living in his imaginary world. At this point, Mance (who has spent the entire movie worrying that since he only gets to see Willy once a year in the summer, they’re not close enough and Willy doesn’t love him) becomes a different person, with about as much charm as, well, any of the characters from Varsity Blues. He locks Willy in the kitchen, nailing the cellar door open to make him face the fact that there’s nothing in the dark. Except there is, and it comes charging up out of the cellar to attack Willy and April (who dick cheese Mance also locked in the kitchen in his anger). Mance, having an immediate change of heart, comes charging back in with a shotgun, driving the monster back into is lair. Willy, grabbing some explosives he earlier stole from Mance’s boss, straps them to his radio-controlled truck and blows the holy bejeezus out of the monster. Then he and Mance hug and everything is fine.
Here’s where you lost me, movie. If I were Willy, confronting the motherfucker who has not only ignored my warnings the entire movie, but just ten minutes ago locked me and my baby sister in a room with a ravening Comanche hellhound, I sure as shit would not SMILE AND TELL HIM I LOVED HIM! I’d have kicked that fuckstain in the crotch and thrown him down the stairs to the hellhound!
Aside from the fact that the guy we’re supposed to be rooting for is about as lovable as a hemorrhoid, the movie can’t hold damn still. Any scenes with people not involving the creature seem like they’re just scattered into the mix in the hopes of sparking some accidental character development (I’ll give you three guesses as to whether or not it works, and the first two don’t count). There are even a couple of scenes that end so abruptly they nearly cut the last syllable off the final line of dialogue. Just because you can edit, doesn’t mean you should.
All that aside, I can’t totally condemn the flick, because the monster is goddamn cool. Even though it’s clearly a guy in a suit crawling around in the dirt, the thing’s face is the nastiest, most evil-looking hellhound mug I’ve seen in a long time. I can forgive a lot of shit for a good monster. But don’t think you’re off the hook, Kevin S. Tenney. I’m watching you. You’ve pulled this crap before with Fistula, and it didn’t fool him, and it doesn’t fool me. You suck, and should not be allowed near movie equipment.
The Moral of the Story: For Cthulhu’s sake, you’d think it would be obvious, wouldn’t you? Do I really have to spell it out? Fine. DON’T TOUCH THE BIG FUCKING DOOR TO HELL. There are no titty mags down there, no matter how badly you want there to be.
FEEDBACK
All materials found within this review are the intellectual properties and opinions of the original writer. The Tomb of Anubis claims no responsibility for the views expressed in this review, but we do lay a copyright claim on it beeyotch, so don't steal from this shit or we'll have to go all Farmer Vincent on your silly asses. © March 5th 2006 and beyond, not to be reproduced in any way without the express written consent of the reviewer and the Tomb of Anubis or pain of a physical and legal nature will follow. Touch not lest ye be touched.
-----------------------------------------------------------------
