Evil Altar

Evil Altar stars gravelly-voiced tough guy William Smith (The Ultimate Warrior) and the mighty-chinned hulk that is Robert Z'Dar (Maniac Cop 1, 2 & 3), but even these B-movie legends cannot save this dreadful mess of a movie.

Smith plays warlock Reed Weller, who needs to sacrifice 103 children in order to achieve full power; to this end, he sends an immortal 'collector' (Pepper Martin) to kidnap youngsters. When his son Troy (Marcus Chong) is abducted by the collector, big city lawyer Daley Long (Tal Armstrong) contacts Sheriff O'Connell (Z'Dar), unaware that the cop is in league with Weller.

The script for Evil Altar is full of hokey clichés and terrible dialogue, and director James Winburn handles matters with very little zest or innovation. The one scene that does display some energy is utterly ridiculous, as a young girl, Teri (Theresa Cooney), is menaced in her bedroom by a floating baseball - if there was more of this kind of totally inept lunacy, Evil Altar would be a lot of camp horror fun, but the majority of the film is just tired, predictable and boring, with both Smith and Z'Dar going through the motions for a paycheck.

2.5/10, rounded down to 2 for the really lame sex scene (blink and you'll miss it side-boob from hot blonde Connie Woods) and a missed opportunity for a splattery exploding head effect (when Daley puts his undead son out of his misery).

Ok, so this movie is crap, but it's my kind of crap and I've seen much worse. Much worse where, you ask? Well, try turning on the TV or take a look at what is playing in the theaters for starters. This piece of junk is high art by comparison, at least by my standards. Slow, plodding, unimpressive gore, and only a dusky, side-boob glance at Connie Woods' hearty chest meat makes for some tedious viewing for a lot of folks to be sure, but it's passable 80's shlock by my criteria. These types of movies take me back to a better time and provide enjoyment on a level that I suppose doesn't come across to some folks. William Smith and Robert Z'Dar? Hell, why even bother having a script at all? Those guys are entertaining in and of themselves. Not really as bad as some of these other guys are saying but, yeah, not exactly top shelf.

EVIL ALTAR has very little going for it except for the story, which in more capable hands could have been compelling, in an epic and gruesome sorta way. But as it is now, the whole production is almost amateurish. I've never seen so many continuity errors or truly bad framing. The camera's positions were often at the wrong spots, which created a confusing sense of placement. The acting was nonexistent. The characters were nearly all awful. Only Robert D'Zar was sorta convincing as the evil sheriff, and the evil man himself was well cast but his acting was, for the most part, lazy (which is understandable. He must have known this flick wasn't worth it). The dialogue was totally pitiful. You could see the microphone bobbing up and down at the top of the picture. And the horror elements of the story were, for the most part, unintentionally funny. A floating killer baseball? One has to see the scene to believe it. Who would have imagined that anyone would have ever conceived the idea that a floating ball would be terrifying or scary?!?! Certainly in the way it was made in the movie. Then there's the whole bit with the collector appearing on TV and killing the reporter. I really laughed out loud then. The "Freddy Kruger-inspired" scene doesn't make any sense and is ineptly done, making it golden in my book of really bad cinematic moments.

I like watching horror movies. The more obscure, the better. Unfortunately, there's very little to recommend of EVIL ALTAR. As bad as a lot of it was, there were simply too many boring moments for the movie to be entertaining on a continuous basis with its sheer ineptness. I recommend this only for horror completists. Others should steer clear from this crap.

An evil Satanic occultist keeps the denizens and law enforcement of a small U.S. community in a stranglehold with his supernatural powers. He also regularly dispatches his hulking indentured drudge to abduct children so that they may be used as barter with the Devil.

A man and his son stop at a fuel station in said town, and quickly find themselves sucked into the mysterious local quandary. A search for the missing soon commences as the clock ticks away toward a scheduled blood rite...the sacrifice which will bestow the warlock with eternal life.

A barely commensurate product, EVIL ALTAR's base material is dull in the first place, and worse yet, it's given a stolid, roustabout production which lacks imagination and tenacity. This is cookie-cutter stuff which may be of menial interest to only the most cursive B-horror zealots.

3.5/10

Trying to rule the earth with dark powers never seemed quite popular. Not as awful as I thought it would be, but it still stinks! Crummy, cheap-jack and totally muddled covers the bases of this dank supernatural / occult 80's horror film starring the beefy, square-jaw Robert Z'Dar. No surprises. Its routine stuff (the usual small town secret) and the premise holds a nasty side to it, but director Jim Winburn's incompetently lazy and laboured handling brings it down. Atmosphere is non-existent, and suspense follows the same course that we're left with weak thrills coming off mostly droll. While it can be unintentionally funny, there wasn't enough of it to cover it. Special effects are little, but are gaudily executed. The lousy story doesn't come together, or even tie in that well with an endlessly moronic script of terrible dialogues and choppy editing with awful continuity. The high-strung music score telegraphs everything. There are actually one or two decent moments, and the grimy look works to its favour, as these things could make for campy fun, but it all comes off rather boring and worthless to care much.