"One hundred years before this story begins, it was a time of darkness in Transylvania...a time when Dr. Abraham Van Helsing and a small band of freedom fighters conspired to rid the world of vampires and monsters, and to save mankind from the forces of eternal evil. They blew it!"
Director
Fred Dekker
Cast
Andre Gower - Sean Crenshaw
Robby Kiger- Patrick
Brent Chalem - Horace
Ryan Lambert - Rudy
Ashley Bank - Phoebe Crenshaw
Michael Faustino - Eugene
Leonardo Cimino - Scary German Guy
Duncan Regehr- Count Dracula
Tom Noonan - Frankenstein's Monster
Jonathan Gries - The desperate man/ The Wolfman
Tom Woodruff - Gillman
Michael Reid MacKay - The Mummy
Jack Gwillim - Abraham Van Helsing
The weekend before Halloween, I found a DVD collection of Abbott and Costello's four "meet the monsters" movies. This was a great find for sure. During Halloween week, I wanted to introduce my two oldest kids (six and five years old) to these classics.
I put on Abbott and Costello's second "monster" movie Abbott and Costello Meet the Invisible Man (1951) for us to watch together. Well, it's their third if you want to count Abbott and Costello Meet the Killer, Boris Karloff (1949).
After about 15-minutes, both kids were bored.
As they're well aware of the classic Universal Monsters, and my daughter has a bit of a liking to Frankenstein's Monster mainly from depictions in cartoons and children's books, I asked if they'd rather watch Abbott and Costello Meet Frankenstein (1948).
They nodded and so I put it on.
Both kids, and for the most part, my two-year old, sat and watched the entire movie.
At the end, I asked them if they liked it or not. The oldest said "no" because he didn't like Frankenstein's Monster. Everyone's a critic, I guess. And my daughter just gave some silly answer because, well, that's just how she reacts to all inquiries imposed on her. Silly answers require no commitment later on.
Regardless, they stayed tuned in until the end.
This was their true introduction to a monster movie. More specifically, this was their introduction to the classic Universal Monsters - Dracula, Frankenstein's Monster, and the Wolfman. All three star in Abbott and Costello Meet Frankenstein.
While I first watched Abbott and Costello Meet Frankenstein when I was around 12-years old as my dad had a VHS copy, it wasn't my introduction to the same monsters.
My introduction to those monsters, and to horror in general, came thanks to the 1987 "horror comedy" The Monster Squad from 1987.
Actually, to be honest, I can't say with absolute certainty this was my introduction to the genre as growing up with three older brothers, I had seen bits and pieces of some heavier horror flicks such as A Nightmare on Elm Street part 3: Dream Warriors, Day of the Dead, and Friday the 13th Part ?. They rented movies like these which my innocent eyes had no business seeing at such a young age. But I saw parts, and that was enough. The damage was done. And now I have this blog.
The Monster Squad is a horror movie my parents allowed me to rent back in my youth. And it's one I really liked as a kid. I consider it to be truly my gateway into the genre.
For years I thought I was one of the lucky few who knew about this movie, and appreciated it as I didn't know anyone else growing up that enjoyed it, or much less ever watched it.
It wasn't until I saw horror enthusiast and critic James Rolfe's review of The Monster Squad for his annual 31-day horror review series "Monster Madness" on his site, cinemassacre.com, back in 2007 that I realized this movie developed quite a fanbase since its bleak and abysmal release in 1987.
Since then, I've noticed that its popularity has really peaked, even leading to a 2018 documentary Wolfman's Got Nards, directed by Andre Gower who plays the protagonist Sean in the movie. I watched half of the documentary last week, and I need to finish that.
The movie opens in Transylvania 100 years prior to 1987 where vampire hunter, Dr. Abraham Van Helsing (Jack Gwillim, Clash of the Titans) and a group of vigilantes charge into Count Dracula's castle to put an end to his vampiric reign of evil.
They're met with a female vampire sucking the blood out of a dead animal. Gross!
As they start their attacks, the ground shakes and splits open. Living-dead corpses rise out of the floor to attack.
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| Andre Gower (left) and Robby Kiger. |
In the center of the room is a powerful amulet.
The vampire hunters bring in a young virgin girl to read an incantation that will open a portal to limbo in order to expel Dracula and his evil minions for ever.
The portal opens, but things go wrong.
Cut to present day 1987.
A group of pre-teens who share a love of monsters and monster movies have a small club, "The Monster Squad," with Sean Crenshaw (Andre Gower) as their club leader. He's the biggest fan out of them all.
Sean has a six-year old sister Phoebe (Ashley Bank) who desperately wants to join her brother's club.
Otherwise, the club is just Sean and his standard token friends. There's the overweight and often teased kid, Horace (Brent Chalem), Sean's second-in-command, Patrick (Robby Kiger), the little kid and club side-kick, Eugene (Michael Faustino) and the tough older kid, Rudy (Ryan Lambert). Rudy is kind of a weird character. I'll get to him later.
Sean's mom, Emily (Mary Ellen Trainor), gives him a book she finds at a garage sale. It turns out to be the diary of Van Helsing. Lucky find!
Unfortunately for Sean, it's written in German.
The only German-speaking person he knows in town is a reclusive old man who lives alone in Sean's neighborhood.
The kids in town refer to him as "scary German guy" (Leonardo Cimino).
But Jack is determined to get the contents of Van Helsing's diary translated. And much to his surprise, "scary German guy" isn't actually scary at all. He's a friendly German guy who's more than willing to assist Sean and his club. It's also subtly revealed that he's a survivor of the Nazi concentration camps, so he knows a thing or two about horrifying monsters.
Meanwhile, Dracula (Duncan Regehr) steals Frankenstein's monster while it's being flown in a B-52 Mitchell.
He also summons his monster cohorts - the Wolfman, Gillman (aka the Creature from the Black Lagoon), and the Mummy.
They meet up at the lagoon where the Gillman dwells, and Dracula brings Frankenstein's monster (Tom Noonan) back to life.
The Wolfman, played by Jon Gries (Napoleon Dynamite), is not the faithful follower Dracula assumes he is. When he's not transformed into a werewolf, he calls the police to warn them of Dracula's plans of bloodshed and world domination. Of course, they don't believe him.
Dracula is seeking the amulet he once possessed 100-years ago in order to take control of the world.
Van Helsing's fighters had taken the amulet and hidden it out of Dracula's reach.
He finds it buried in the wall of a the stone basement within an abandoned house in town. It's the same secret room were Van Helsing's diary was also found. Dracula takes up residence right there and turns it into his abode.
Crucifixes surround the amulet along with words inscribed throughout preventing Dracula from simply taking it.
The Monster Squad break into the house, and take the amulet, barely escaping Dracula's grasp.
This royally pisses off the Count. With the help of his monster cohorts, along with three school girls whom he transforms into vampires, Dracula sets out the get back the amulet at any cost.
He commands Frankenstein's monster to kill the children who took it, and get it back.
But the monster isn't necessarily keen to follow those orders.
It becomes a race against time for the Monster Squad to find a virgin to recite the incantation to open the portal and suck the monsters into Limbo.
Dracula is a very intimidating presence on the screen thanks to Regehr's portrayal. Being a classically trained Shakespearean actor, I'm sure that has something to do with his performance.
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| Duncan Regehr as Count Dracula resurrects Frankenstein's monster (Tom Noonan) in The Monster Squad. |
Regehr throws all that gentleness out. While dawning the classic Dracula look with the traditional black cape, old school tuxedo, slicked back hair and hissing, Regehr makes him a real badass. He's pure evil and Regehr doesn't hold back to let it show. I truly believe his Dracula should be on a pedestal leveled with other notable portrayals - Lugosi, Max Schreck from Nosferatu, and Christopher Lee in the Hammer Horror films. I mean, Regehr's Dracula straight up calls little Phoebe a "bitch" to her face. Not even Pennywise the child-eating clown did that!
In the documentary about the making and fandom of The Monster Squad, Ashley Bank who plays young Phoebe in the movie, says she was terrified of Regehr while on set.
Andre Gower mentions that on the first take of the scene in which Dracula picks Phoebe up by the chin and demands she give him the amulet, little Phoebe was so scared that she lost her breath and couldn't scream. Dekker needed her to throw out a long scream, which she did in the second take. And that's the take used in the film.
There are some weird continuity moments in the movie. For instance, when Dracula recovers the crate with Frankenstein's Monster submerged in the swamp, and the other creatures gather around him, including the Mummy, the scene then switches to young Eugene's room (the kid wearing the Confederate cap for some reason). Eugene tells his dad there's a monster in his closet. Of course, his dad doesn't believe him and mockingly humors his son by opening the closet door to show his son nothing is in there. But he doesn't see the Mummy standing inside.
So, the way the scene comes across is that the Mummy participated in resurrecting Frankenstein's Monster, and then shuffles off to hide in a random seven-year old's bedroom closet.
When his dad leaves, we see the Mummy having just crawled back out through the bedroom window and walking away. Why the hell did he bother to hide in there in the first place? He was in the closet. Did nothing except scare Eugene - accidentally, no doubt. And then left.
While at the swamp with Dracula and the rest of the monsters, did he think to himself, "After this, I'll go find a kid's closet to hide in, hang out there for a bit,"?
The movies biggest problem is its writing.
For instance, only a virgin can read the words that'll open the portal. But the Monster Squad assumes the virgin must be female. These young boys struggle to find a virgin when, obviously, they're virgins themselves. No where in Van Helsing's diary does it specify the gender of said virgin. I don't recall that detail, anyways. I know it's a cliché in old horror movies that any needed virgins always seem to be female. Why? I suppose it's sexier that way, I guess?
Also, inside the Squad's treehouse, they have a camera pointed towards Patrick's older sister Lisa's room so they can watch her as she changes.
Rudy accidentally takes a picture of Lisa in her underwear while watching her through the zoom lens. He decides to use the photo of her as blackmail, as she claims she's a virgin, by posting copies around the school in order to get her to recite the words necessary to open the portal. So now the Squad is lacking in moral or ethical code just like Dracula. Aside from fighting monsters, now there;'s less for young audiences to aspire to when watching this squad that aims to do good. One of them is willing to blackmail his own sister in the worst possible way just to accomplish their goal. That's pretty evil.
And Rudy, who's the token cool guy with his slick black hair, leather coat, sunglasses, and cigarettes is clearly much older than the rest of the kids. They're in junior high while he's obviously in high school. Yet, he eagerly wants to be a part of their Monster Squad. It strikes me as awkward that a junior in high school like Rudy would be so eager to join a "monster club" made up of seventh or eighth graders.
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| Ashley Bank as Phoebe with Tom Noonan as Frankenstein's Monster. |
Otherwise, considering the classic monster atmosphere, monster movie clichés are needed to maintain that classic tone. The classic monster movies gave birth to all those standards used in The Monster Squad. If the writers used monsters they made up themselves, then those same clichés would make the movie unimaginative and dull. Otherwise, impressively, they fit in well here. While watching these classic villains, those classic elements are expected.
The actors give their all in this movie, especially Jonathan Gries, Tom Noonan, Duncan Regehr, and the child actors, especially Ashley Bank.
Mary Ellen Trainor, who plays Sean's mom, is an actress seen in a generous handful of 1980s movies such as The Goonies, Ghostbusters II, Lethal Weapon, Die Hard, Romancing the Stone and Back to the Future II. She is the quintessential movie mom. Trainor sadly passed away in 2015.
For a movie aimed at kids, it doesn't hold back. That accounts for the PG-13 rating.
And the look of the Gillman is fantastic and superb. Great love and care went into paying the proper homage to these Universal Monsters through their depictions. It's like a small love note to the golden years of horror.
Monster movie fans, and those nostalgic at heart, will find The Monster Squad fun and enjoyable despite its flaws. The love for classic monster movies still shines through.
I think this is my last nostalgic horror rental for the year.
This is the movie that did for me. I didn't know it then, but I know it now - The Monster Squad was my introduction to Hollywood's foundational monsters, Dracula, the Mummy, the Wolfman, Gillman, and especially Frankenstein's monster.
The Monster Squad has a Scooby Doo style to it with all the kids chasing monsters. Kids and teenage protagonists were all the trend in the 1980s in movies. So The Monster Squad certainly has a spot among such teen adventure sci-fi and/or horror movies like The Goonies, Gremlins, Back to the Future, Bill &Ted's Excellent Adventure, and Teen Wolf.
Maybe I should have made this movie my first review on this blog. I'm happy with my decision to put it in a place of honor that is my 100th horror movie review.
My set deadline for this post was Oct. 31. But broken deadlines help build anticipation. So, you're welcome!
And I never forgot that Wolfmans' got nards! Thanks to The Monster Squad, his junk is now canon.
And I never forgot that Wolfmans' got nards! Thanks to The Monster Squad, his junk is now canon.
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