976-EVIL II (1991)

I'm always torn how to review mediocre horror that is fully, gleefully aware of how mediocre it is.  I know how to deal with terrible that overplays its terrible; you call it shit that doesn't get any better because hurr hurr tongue in cheek.  But how do you deal with something that seems to have been developed solely with the intent of entertaining shut-ins who love them some USA "Up All Night" and Monstervision?  I'm not saying that the people that produced Terrorvision or Slugs or basically anything from Full Moon Productions weren't aware that they were developing stupid, cinematically unimportant movies, but there isn't the same overt pandering to my scene as there was in 976-EVIL 2.  I mean, look at this:

yeah, that's a reference to Corman and Monstervision's Joe Bob Briggs.  I don't even

And while it bugs me, truth be told, I sort of liked this movie.

The original 976-EVIL was notable for two things:

• It was directed by Robert Englund
• It had one of the lamer plot frameworks for what amounted to "evil demon terrorizes people" 

I barely remember the first one, honestly.  All I really recall was its surreal mish-mash of various horror aesthetics, with it completely unclear what kind of horror it wanted to be, trying to push heartstrings with the central conflict between the tough softy biker and his nerdy cousin with some weird revenge fantasy and it's just an enormous goddamned mess.

The sequel, to its quasi-credit, has no problems with this.  It very clearly a Nightmare on Elm Street rip-off awkwardly melded with the distinguishing feature of the first film, an "evil" pay phone service that tells your HORRORSCOPE while slowly turning you evil.

So here's the terrifying title shot.

I can't really stress enough how clumsily shoehorned the whole "evil phone service" concept is.  As in here, every so often when something spooky happens, there is a ringing phone but it rings kind of evil like?  Whatever.

Because this is generic late 80's/early 90's horror, we open with a lady getting naked.  I guess the twist here is that after the initial spook, instead of getting dressed to the boos and jeers of a suitably drunk audience, she instead puts on a slightly trashier version of what Sigourney Weaver wore at the end of Alien.  I should note that despite this really trashy fanservice at the beginning, there's literally nothing in else in the way of nudity for the rest of the film.  So if this film is your only hope on those lonely Friday nights, you better finish quickly unless you've got a fetish for horribad early 90's fashion.

Anyway.  She's menaced not very well by this guy:

This is Rene Assa. I kept thinking I had seen him before, but as far as IMDB was concerned, he was just a bit character actor who had this movie as one of his primary roles.  I'm not really sure what to make of his performance, as while he's not a terrible Freddy Krueger stand-in (to the point that they literally have his face start melting towards the end), there's something forced and kind of sad about forcing a 50-year-old man to fart out endless corny one-lines like "let's put...the pedal to the metal, as they saaaaaay."  Sometimes he seems to be having fun and other times he's just embarrassed to be there.

At any rate, Assa kills the woman via college drama club stalactite (no, really, but it's not as cool as you think), but is arrested.  We find out he's been calling the 976-EVIL hotline, and has the hots for his student assistant, who is also the police commissioner's daughter.  We don't know if these two character traits are connected, as this movie (wisely, as far as I'm concerned) skips the original film's plot about being driven evil by the hotline, so we never know if Assa was just a prick, or if he was corrupted by insane phone fees.  The script doesn't help, as there are a few scenes where Assa is all tender and friendly to his assistant, and other times he's all "gonna eat ur soul lol."

Assa quickly gains REAL ULTIMATE POWER, being able to astral project himself, which in this film means really awkward scene within a scene effects.  One curious part of 976-EVIL II is that really virtually every special effect that isn't an exploding car is something from one frame going into another.  Or whatever you call it.  I'm not Tom Savini.

They really should have called the movie We Bought This Greenscreen, We're Going to Use It Goddamnit.

Unfortunately, there's not alot of kill scenes in this movie.  We have:

1.  Assa killing the drunk janitor who witnessed the murder by holding him in front of a semi (with a fairly satisfying gib explosion)
2. A prosecutor, Monique Gabrielle (that chick that got naked in Bachelor Party and Deathstalker II, but not here, hmmmmmmm) having her car possessed and exploding after a really long sequence of her running into other cars.
3. Some dead policemen.

There's actually one more scene, but god help me, it's probably one of the most creative I've seen in a long time.  Don't worry, no explanation is needed here.

Some notes here (AFTER YOU WATCHED IT DON'T PEEK):

1. The decision to hide the awkward effects via black and white is pretty clever. 
2. The subsequent scene was creepy enough that I didn't even mind that the movie was totally wrong when it had the girl say that the end of the movie had the zombies breaking into the farmhouse and eating everyone.
3. I especially didn't mind when they even included the driving gloves from Barbara's brother on one of the zombies reaching from the door.

I'm bewildered by this scene.  In a movie with almost no competence whatsoever, you get an honest to god clever tribute to a horror classic with almost nothing to complain about.  Unfortunately, it's probably the only thing five minutes in this film worth anyone's time.

Aside from Assa, everyone is just bad.  Main girl is bad.  They actually got the biker dude, Spike, from the first film, but I don't know if he was this awful before or what but it's a damned good thing he basically does nothing useful for ninety minutes aside from wearing alot of leather and sharing a scene with Brigitte Nielsen as an occult specialist, which goes about as you'd expect it to when the actors are wearing stuff like this:

The real kicker is the ending.  Everything culminates with the girl trying to kill Assa while Spike's motorcycle fights Assa's astral projection's semi-truck (with more predictable results).  Both fail, and Assa chases the girl to some rocky seacoast and then Spike's Astral projection appears and knocks Assa over the cliff but then they kiss and Spike turns into space dust.

Dumb, but all right.  All we want is a good twist ending.  You ready?  The police come, and ask the girl who killed Assa.  She says Spike, but her dad says Spike died an hour ago.  Then she's arrested for killing Assa.  As she's loaded onto the ambulance, handcuffed, camera pans right to show a phone booth.  RING RING FUCK YOU AUDIENCE THE END.

I'd probably be alot meaner towards this movie if not for that death scene.  I'm not sure I would have hated it per se even then, since it's not like it's trying to be anything more than horror movie junk, but at the same time, it's trying so hard to be that junk I'm not sure what to think.  Reverse ambition?  Maybe I just need to call a helpline or something.