Wolfman's Got Nards!

After watching Goosebumps around noon today with my family in the theater, I thought a couple of 80s flicks featuring werewolves was the right close to the evening. I wanted to introduce my kids to The Monster Squad (1987), a significant monster mashup that was important in my early development as a horror fan. I did watch this on HBO and video tape as a kid so it certainly maintains an attachment, and others of my generation feel similarly. It is an affectionate homage to Universal monsters but Stan Winston’s workshop updated their designs slightly but not enough to not completely alter their familiarity to the creatures we hold near and dear to our hearts. The 80s was a decade dedicated to taking horror characters and tropes from the past and integrating them into the modern of that time. Kids talk like the Goonies, and that “suburban school friends go on an adventure and confront potential dangers” story idea so synonymous with this period in films of that particular time is articulated in The Monster Squad. 

I think you can see The Goonies or Stand by Me all over The Monster Squad, but included is Dracula, the Frankenstein’s Monster, Werewolf, Mummy, and Gillman. An amulet that can be used to open a vortex to a dimension that forever holds those pulled into it, but it can also be used by Dracula (the ringleader) as a weapon that unleashes evil on the world. 

There’s this great moment in the film when Fred Dekker is able to gather all the monsters together in a swamp region as the Monster’s hand reaches from its “cargo box coffin”; getting all the gang together was never done in the glory days of Universal horror. Maybe this is an updated monsters club, but I think it was quite a cool moment that must have been a thrill by those involved in the making of this film. 

I was surprised to learn years later that The Monster Squad wasn’t a hit upon release…I think this is a story of a film that functions much like The Thing in that it never truly dies. It lives in the hearts of those who watched it over and over on VHS or cable like me. Ryan Lambert is the kid with the leather jacket, slick black hair, and pack of smokes who gets to pack a crossbow and kill some vampire brides. His brilliant idea in the back of the truck to get rid of the Mummy by “unwinding it” is a gas! Oh, and the Mummy design by Winston and company is killer! LOVE the Gillman, too! 

Tom Noonan is so delightful as the Monster (Bogus!), he takes what could have been a nothing part and gives it pathos similarly to that of Boris Karloff himself! It was a joy to watch Noonan work in that character…it is a soft side you hardly ever get to see from Noonan so well versed in creeps and human scum. Brent Chalem is saddled with the “chubby kid” role where his weight was a source of his mistreatment. He, much like the other kid in The Goonies (more so, really), is endearing in his ability to find a way for you to like him as his misfortune of being a bullied kid ultimately allows him to take down the Gillman late in the film while those that tormented him (Jason Hervey; The Wonder Years; he’s always a bullying bastard). Andre Gower is the lead kid of the Monster Squad, putting the pieces together that there are monsters in town. Robby Kiger is his monster-loving sidekick with a hot sister often spied on through the clubhouse window by Lambert as she is in various states of undress. Ashley Bank is Gower’s little sister who befriends the Monster and their friendship, I have to admit, is so charming. It could be viewed as sickly sweet, but Noonan is so good, he is able to convince you to care. It also finally gets Banks access to the club with her brother who has graffiti of No Girls Allowed painted on the door to the treehouse. Michael Faustino is the poor kid who keeps meeting monsters but can’t seem to convince others of his sightings. Like the Gillman taking his twinkie or telling his pops that a monster was in his closet (the Mummy; an inspired sight gag that could be considered quite terrifying if in a movie where the tone wasn’t light). Mary Ellen Trainor, I just now found out, passed away in May of this year! She’s the mom of our leader of kid heroes (and was the mother in Donner’s The Goonies, as well), and wife to Stephen Macht (the marriage is in a state of disrepair due to his job as a cop in the town). So sad. I liked her. She doesn’t have a lot in these mother parts but manages to make something out of them just the same. Macht was actually kind of likeable in this movie. It is nice to see him as someone who isn’t morally dubious for a change. His being a hero is rather odd. I like his father-son scenes with Gower, particularly on the roof while the kid watches a film through binoculars (drive in nearby; just further has me pining for these days). 

Duncan Regehr as Dracula gives him all the attributes we’d associate with him absent any romantic or humanistic traits. He isn’t about love or desire but about causing horror to one and all. He wants to rule and unleash untold terror. This Dracula has a scene where he commands the Monster to find Van Helsing’s diary (in possession of Gower) and if any of the kids get in the way to kill them (which it has no intention of doing; its heart is completely different that Dracula’s). The amulet is also just out of Dracula’s reach and the kids get a hold of it to before they can be hurt by him…you won’t see garlic pizza used a lot as a weapon against ole Dracula! 

The werewolf (Jon Gries, a good character actor who also appears as a man beast in Fright Night 2) is also a sympathetic monster much like Frankenstein’s Monster, a man tormented by the beast within. He begs the cops to lock him up but they fail to do so. When his werewolf is dynamited into bits and pieces, he reforms! It is awesome. Lambert gets to save the day in the instance of the werewolf as well, with the silver bullet landing right on cue when harm seems imminent. I dug Winston and company’s wolf designs, and while transformations are kept at a minimum, this werewolf is still head and shoulders better that many of the CGI hairy monsters since put on screen in horror movies. 

And Noonan gets a really good makeup job that honors the Frankenstein Monster of old. He humanizes the creature where he is never a menace, something Lon Chaney failed miserably at and Glenn Strange never had a chance to do. 

The production values are quite good, with the opening sequence in Dracula’s castle being visited by Van Helsing and his vampire hunters who fail in their mission (“They blew it”) to use the “limbo vortex” to get rid of the vampire count complete with a bride eating from a possum and skeletal corpses rising from the broken concrete ground. You get Dracula bombing the kids’ treehouse and blowing up a cop car with Macht’s partner in it. The dialogue is ripe with the cops discussing the nutty nights they are having with a museum mummy missing, and the crazy guy claiming to be a werewolf. The way this film takes the monsters and plants them in the everyday lives of regular folks in a small town is what especially appealed to me. This is so fast-moving and paced, it is over in a flash. I never realized as a kid how quick this movie actually was. Tonight, it just flew by. This is a October must for 80s horror fans. If you like films like The Goonies or The Lost Boys, then this should fit nicely in a marathon during the month, I think.