Skullduggery

For the record, that was a rhetorical question. I don't know, and deep down, I don't wanna know. All I know is that recently, I experienced the single most dull 90 minutes of my life. You understand, this isn't "so bad it's good" (Criminally Insane), or even "so bad it's mind-blowing" (Troll 2). I'm talking about head-ache-inducing boredom. I don't care how far into the B-movie universe you've gone. You're not ready for this. Please, for the love of God, let this one be.

I sat there and observed the entire duration of this film. Looking closely for something, anything which might resemble entertainment value. But nothing ever happened. Not a thing. I mean, stuff happened. Conversations were had, people got killed. But why? Who were they? Did they deserve it? I just don't understand. Was I not supposed to? My questions are endless. But you know something? There are a lot of bizarre films out there that people joke about the director being on acid, or something similar (Horror House On Highway 5), but really, this is probably it. If someone was heavily into such a drug, and they just happened to get the idea that making a movie would be a swell idea, then I would imagine that their first attempt at art would turn out something like... you guessed it. Skullduggery!!

Just kidding. I'm pretty sure acid isn't to blame for this travesty. With that said, Let this be a valuable lesson to any Dungeons & Dragons geeks out there, who may get any ideas. Stay out of the world of B-cinema. You don't get it, and you never will. Just continue doing what you're doing, and don't try and be cute, by attempting to educate the world about you're favorite thing. I cannot specify enough that we are not talking about something so bad it's good. Skullduggery ain't ahead of its time, nor is it too deep to grasp. it's like watching Nascar, or C-SPAN. And really, how typical is it that this movie would be released on DVD by Substance. And what, may I ask, is up with Substance, anyway? How does a company that only acquires the most unwatchable obscurities go about staying in business? Skullduggery, I was warned about you. Every review I ever read turned out to be a warning, in one form or another. It was foolish of me for wanting you to be apart of my collection of obscure Horror. And now, I'm stuck with you. I realize that I'm the one to blame for my own misfortunes. But I won't let that stop me from despising you until my dying day. Hopefully, someday, I will learn to leave well enough alone when it comes to the unwatchables, but you will always be Skullduggery, and nothing will ever change that. And believe me when I say that I will forever warn other over-confident B-movie enthusiasts of your mind-numbing worthlessness. 1/10

I don't even know where to begin. The Scooby-like music. The frumpy male lead who, apparently, was Johnny Depp before there was Johnny Depp. The stiff, wooden females. The guy making the puzzle (I mean, what the heck does that prove?) This movie makes me want to puke whenever I see it and for some reason I see it often. You have to wonder why it is that every woman in town is unaccountably attracted to Adam. The edges of this guy's mouth are turned down so far, that even when he smiles it looks like he's frowning. But what can I say? The theme song is very catchy. It sticks to you like painful, prickly brambles. Basically, the whole movie is like a bad high school play, and obviously had the budget of one. All in all, I recommend this movie to fans of truly horrible cinema. Like me.

No, seriously. It makes no sense. It's just a bunch of random nothing thrown together in as senseless as way possible. Pick up stock footage, assemble it at random, and release it as a feature film, and you'll have something easily better than this.

So bad, it's not even funny. The only thing funny is that I watched it, and you can laugh at that.

This movie is pure, concentrated evil.

I acquired my copy from the dusty back bins of a video store which was going out of business back in 1987. Just to put things in perspectrive, it was on Beta--I had to dub it over to VHS. As a gamer, I tend to collect movies in the "Roleplayer Goes Crazy" genre. Most of them are pretty bad...but this one has them all beat, in terms of sheer deep hurting.

Nevermind the blatant anachronisms--such as the opening scene, set in 14th century England in an 18th century manor house where a 16th century nobleman is killed by a guy in a cheesy 1980's wizard costume. Nevermind the fact that the lead actor looks for all the world like he's dead, and was animated by black magic just for this movie. Nevermind the fact that the best actor in the entire movie is a puppet who just hangs there and doesn't do anything. Even without all of those factors, the movie would just be painful.

And yet, it holds a kind of sick fascination, not unlike a car wreck---you want to look away, but you can't. This movie has spawned an unwholesome and degenerate cult (at least two of the other comments on this list are from members.) Beware--this movie is CONCENTRATED schlock of the worst kind. Do not, do not, do NOT watch this movie and Mazes and Monsters back to back. The last person who did that wound up in the hospital a few hours later with an acute gall bladder attack. I kid you not.

There's a lot of thins in this movie that could have come straight out of a David Lynch project- constant shots of a creepy puppet, a mysterious man putting together a puzzle, the director walking through dressed as some sort of a technician with a tic-tac-toe board on his bak.... all really interesting imagery. I think that most of the comments on here are negative because no one even bothers to try and figure out what the hell is going on in this strange film. I really liked it; although my taste runs toward the b-grade genre. The acting is really not great, but there's always something interesting to look at (try to figure out how the tic-tac-toe game is being played) and despite what others have said, the music is great. I won't bother going into the plot here (not sure how well one could sum it up anyway) but I must stress that this is definately worth seeing if you get the chance. If you do watch it, I urge you to take your time and actually try to figure the imagery out; there's a good bit of symbolism at work here and I don't think one should simply write this movie off as awfull without at least thinking it over for a while. I picked it up as an ex-rental for $2 so I can hardly complain. This would actually be nice as a DVD. Seriously.