Grotesque (1988)

 I guess some who watch this will consider the whole meta approach to this film is clever or funny. That opening of the film, with some narrator going on and on about something that has nothing to do with the majority of the film before a ghoul bites her in her bed, with it proven to be a film watched by makeup artist Stockwell and his film producers, sets up an immediate meta type of pulling open the curtain. There is a dialogue scene between Stockwell and Wilkes about "life is but a dream" and "what is real, and what is illusion" should be kept in mind. The final scene sort of plays off that.

 I guess I felt like I wasted 70 or so minutes of my time when the film melts before our eyes as Hunter, in deformed makeup, smokes his pipe while a soundproof room with two captives scream for help that won't arrive, would often conclude works of this type of exploitation movie. 

Degenerate punks (full of overacting and histrionics) look for this supposed money pot a makeup artist has stashed at his Big Bear, California, cabin. Linda Blair's father is that makeup artist (Guy Stockwell), and Donna Wilkes is Blair's best friend...they go up to the cabin for a vacay, not suspecting the punks will invade their home, terrorize and eventually kill Blair's entire family and Wilkes. Then one of the punks (a wasted spike-headed Robert Z'Dar) releases a deform-faced gentle giant with a hunchback who proceeds to make them pay for killing his family, especially his "papa". Luana Patten is the mom, and Tab Hunter is Blair's Uncle Rod, a plastic surgeon on his way for a visit as well. Hunter realizes the police won't be able to prosecute the last two punk fuckers, Scratch (Brad Wilson) and Donna (Sharon Hughes), so he decides to take them prisoner once they are released and perform surgery on them to make them look physically as ugly as they are as human scum. By 1988, the film market for dirtbag punks terrorizing innocent people was starting to wane, as everything horror was in the late 80s. Wilson, Hughes, giggly Nels Van Patten, Michelle Bensoussan (she fucks Van Patten in Stockwell's "mask display room", even wearing one of the Don West "Halloween III" skull masks!), Billy Frank (who I believe chases Blair for hours and hours, eventually catching up with her somehow), and Bunky Jones (I just watched her recently in "Hide and Go Shriek") really get into their roles, though.

Blair leaps out a window, gets up after the fall, and seems to run for about thirty minutes. Frank chokes her enough that she gets a blood clot (!) and later dies in the hospital. I admit that was a surprise. I just assumed the film would at least let her live. But her death and the subsequent release of the last two punks does allow for the next chapter of Hunter getting his revenge. Oh, and Patrick, the deformed and very strong avenger for his papa, being revealed as Hunter's son, with Hunter removing latex to show Scratch and Donna his actual deformities is right out of left field. But not as left field as Frankenstein and the Wolf Man interfering with the remaining film, as Stockwell, the producers, even Linda Blair herself, get up from their theater seats to see what gives! I didn't even know how to react to this ridiculous addition to what was a seriously disastrous trashfire. The police trying to interrogate the last punks is laughably cringe, if the performances of the punks wasn't enough. Nels Van Patten giggling in mid sentence most of his dialogue competes with Wilson's over-the-top delivery...they seem game to duke it out with each other for top honors in bug-eyed, full-throated lunacy. This will no doubt be of interest to those who look for bad films played to the hilt.

This was just not for me. I do think this is a cult curiosity, though. There are plenty who think Wilkes was a standout but I felt she was wasted in a part that ultimately led to nowhere...a pal to Blair who happens to be at the wrong place at the wrong time. The violence is mostly off screen or shot in a way to avoid special gore effects. 1.5/5

Look for a special advertisement for Burger King when Blair and Wilkes go for drinks through the drive thru!