While working in a funeral home together, a family of embalmers blessed with supernatural powers tries to use them to fit in and right the wrongs of those who come into their sphere, and when a fellow practitioner of the dark arts threatens their existence gathers their friends to put a stop to them.
This was a pretty enjoyable genre effort. One of the better elements here is the fantastic build-up about the demented and deviant nature of the group which is quite a fun watch. The first half of this one dealing with the family at the facility, teasing each other for their foibles, the general sketchiness of how they operate the business, and the little bits that go on around all that provide the context necessary for what kind of family they are. That they're still fun to be around as we see the happy-go-lucky nature of everything despite what they're actually doing knocking people out, drugging, and torturing them all combined together to let us know their deranged state quite clearly to set up what's happening later on. This setup turns their interactions and confrontations later on into far more devious scenarios and adds a fine layer to everything. Introducing their use of black magic to discover dark secrets about their victims and bringing them back to a conscious state so they're aware of being tortured is a truly grim idea that has a lot to work with here. That allows for the sense of relief to come about here as they uncover a revelation about redemption and doing this gruesome activity for the purpose of good when they realize that they're needed to stop a fellow disciple like them who has let the power corrupt them, turning into a wild and over-the-top finale putting the storylines together quite nicely. Combined with the right amount of comedic undertones, there's a lot to like here. There isn't much to really dislike with this one. Among its only issues is the film's lack of dread or urgency when dealing with the final act of things where all of the storylines come to the forefront and the truth about them is revealed. Even though there'd been a sense of hero-worship before then, there would still be the idea of them going around killing people and almost getting caught which is thrown out the window for the final half as their hero status is confirmed. It also leads to too many figures surviving the film as the stakes are barely there and it's hard to feel any sense of dread for what's happening. In addition to this, there's also the ever-present and obvious indie budget here which might put some viewers off just as much as the other features here that bring it down.
Rated Unrated/R: Graphic Language, Violence, and children-in-jeopardy.
