A young boy named Sean
Kelly (Ryan Latshaw) is told by a
neighbor that one hundred years ago in a
small town called Oakmoor Crossing, the
locals put to death a mysterious man who
claimed he was a warlock.
But before they could hang him, he
brought forth a demonic, pumpkin-headed
being to wreak havoc on the town.
Several people died valiantly before they
managed to bury the creature forever or,
so they thought but he swore vengeance on
the townsfolk people, particularly Arthur
Kelly's family and was told that Arthur's
son David looks just like him.
This spooks Sean a little and at one
point falls into a sleep and goes through
time in his dream of what happened there
and continues to have them.
Some teens decide to hang out and drink
beer at a graveyard and explores some
tombstone's including Arthur's which
awakens the pumpkin headed demon named
the Mr. Jack.
Mr. Jack goes back to his old village on
Halloween night which is in the same
neighborhood as Sean's is.
On the same night Sean is being babysat
by a sexy woman named Carolyn (Linnea
Quigley) as the two of them are trick or
treating and must find a way to survive
Hallows Eve since many of the neighbors
are being slaughtered by the evil Mr.
Jack.
Sean becomes the final target for him due
to his ancestory background as his family
is cursed.
We spot a prologue involving a cheesy
tale with Jim by talking about the legend of
Mr. Jack towards David Kelly in
which this setting was supposed to look
spooky instead it looked terribly
amateurish. There's a nice shot on Jim later on looking through his blinds in
his room and spotting Mr. Jack approaching
through the mist towards the window.
There's some cheesy shots between
Arthur Kelly using a wooden crucifix by trying to
battle Mr. Jack and planning a
burial ground for him.
During present day the film doesn't pick up the pace with Sean walking home with other two kids walking home from school having a
conversation about a neighbor being a
witch and about the legend of Mr. Jack.
It doesn't look at all realistic on kids
being kids. But wait! There's another
lacking moment when one of them brawls it out with Sean. Sloppy
wasn't the word for this.
Another uninspired scene which
involved Linda and David as parents talking to him on what they bought for their Halloween
house trying to act charming for the
Halloween spirit which falls flat.
There however is a nice shot on an ancestor falling to the ground
and then a shot looking up on Mr. Jack looking down on him and bringing his hand
towards the camera as if he's ready to
attack.
There's some neat shots on teenagers in the forest
partying out even if it looked set up and
obvious plus there's shots on tombstones
which looked like obvious props the way
it was set out. There's is a nice cheesy
shot on Mr. Jack crawling out of
his grave. Plus there's a nice shot on one of the teenage girls kneeling down towards Mr. Jack with
him slashing her throat with his blade.
There's a nice shot on many dream
sequences involving Sean as
well as his parents with
some creepy shots on Dr. Cadaver .
Most of this looked effective for a no
budgeter like this one.
There's a nice moment with Carolyn Miller talking on the phone about
her babysitting job as well as her acting
sarcastic about her sister helping out
saying that she's reliable.
There's many good discussions with Carolyn acting happy to see Sean which looked natural for a friend of the
family type of thing.
There's alot of fun shots on Sean and David watching TV on
Halloween events with a good cheesy
effect shot on the TV showing special
appearances by b-film actors strutting their stuff on the TV screen as
it looked entertainingly fun in a cheesy
fashion.
There's many fun touches on David and Linda preparing their
haunted house for trick or treaters as
well as them trying to figure out some
problems on stuff too.
We also spot two snobby neighbors Richard and Amanda Watson watching
TV. Although it looked lacking still these moments made it look interesting at the same
time. There's also a nice shot on Bill acting nasty towards Mr. Jack with
a nice glowing shot on him in the mist
and then stabbing this nasty neighbor with his
blade which looked quite brutal. There's
also a nice dark effects shot on Amanda getting electrocuted which was probably
the most descent effects you'll ever spot
in this film.
We spot a nice shot on Julie Miller holding a decapitated head looking scared
in the mist with Mr. Jack walking towards
her and then a good shot on her screaming
and running away.
There's a moment with Carolyn and Sean in a playground at
night with Mr. Jack appraoching and
about to attack which didn't look the
least bit convicning and the shots on
this looked very amateurish as it was
supposed to be dark and creepy.
We spot a cheesy shot on Sean banging on the door with crying to get in and
the camera luring in on him which looked
terribly trashy as well.
There's a moment with Sean crawling into a burial with Mr. Jack trying to bury him which wasn't at all
believeable and totally planned out as
you can tell. However there is a nice
approach by Vivian towards Mr. Jack and then a good shot on him stabbing her
with a blade
but there's a shot on him lifting her up
as you can tell the shot on the stabbed
victim was a dummy.
Bottom line is that this film was a
corny and cheesy, no budgeter but still
alot of Halloween type fun. It's not the least bit scary as you can
easily consider it a Goosebumps
type show but for grown ups only with the
nudity and some of the gore. It also
borrows alot from the Pumpkinhead
flick except that one was by far better
made.
It's worth a try to watch close to
Halloween but don't expect it to be a
high profile show cause it's not even
close to that. The outfit of Mr. Jack
looks funky though. At the time time the
props and effects you could tell were
extremely fake and amateurish looking
too. There wasn't a huge effort at all
with any of this. There was barely any
money put into this flick as you can tell
but it's not as bad comapred to the
extremely cheap indie horror flicks you
spot these days that are filmed on cheap
camcorders and at least this one had a
fairly descent one.
I enjoyed the film for what it was but
it's only worth watching when Halloween
is just around the corner. Basically this
is a movie that's so bad it's good
The acting is very
wooden and totally amateurish as it seems
like most of the cast were performed by
family or friends of the filmmaker. Rebecca Wicks (Linda Kelly) as the mother and wife
in the film really triwed to bring alot
of wit and character to her role as she
really tried her best but she doesn't do
the trick and you can tell that she
seriously needed some acting lessons. For example we spot a scene with her by trying to tell two onscreen parents about their curse of their ancestors on
Mr. Jack which was supposed to look
powerfully acted out and convincing but it
misses by a longshot and
it looked terribly wooden.
Gary Doles (David Kelly) tried to have a bubbly
attitude as the father and husband of the
film and could almost get away with being
considered average with what he did but
again he fails.
Ryan Latshaw (Sean/David Kelly) was supposed to play
the charming child of the family and was
supposed to get attention to the audience
watching but he doesn't make any effort
at all and just says his lines. He's the
son of the director which is obvious and
proves he's very inexperienced and only
got the part cause he was family. His energy
was totally low on him crying to get in while banging on a front door of a home.
Catherine Walsh (Vivian Machen) tried her best as an
eccentric neighbor showing good facial
expressions and had the perfect looks as
someone that was rumored a witch but yet
she didn't have much energy with her
lines and again was wooden like I
mentioned with most of the acting.
Her reactions
suffocating to death at the end of her performance was fairly passable. However, if she continued to work in the
acting industry she can really improve.
B-film horror icon Linnea Quigley
(Carolyn Miller) however was the best out of the cast as
she tried to bring alot of spunk in the
film as the babysitter. She showed some
descent energy but yet didn't stand out
with her performance along with the rest
of the cast but did show a bit of
character to her part nonetheless. A good moment with her screaming towards her fellow actor to run which looked energetic. She
was the most expreienced actress out of
the whole cast.
Rachel Carter (Julie Miller) was another actress
who was a bit better than the most too as
the flakey sister who loved to party and
seemed to do well by acting rebellious
and having an attitude. Plus she looked
perfect for that type of role too.
Sexpot/scream
queen Linnea Quigley's first
appearance in the movie is her taking a
long shower rubbing soap all over her
body so I think you'd get the picture.
Rachel Carter's character takes
off her top and exposes her breasts to
her boyfriend.
Mr Jack doesn't
know how to make a convincing brutal
murder but here we go.
Throats are slit.
A grumpy neighbor is stabbed in the
stomach as he also spits out blood caused
by Mr Jack's blade and the neighbors wife
is electrocuted burning her skin into a
dead corpse.
Mr Jack also beheads a biker with his
blade and you can tell the head looks
like a dummy.
A woman is also stabbed in the stomach.
The music is extremely
cheesy and cheaply done on a keyboard
composed by Jeffrey Walton whom
has worked with Steve Latshaw in
his other films too as well as with other
cheesy b-film directors like Fred
Olen Ray and David DeCoteau.
However there's the odd windy type of
sound effects mainly used during a moment
in the family's funhouse with Mr. Jack
wandering around which sounded nicely
done. |
