Psycho Cop Returns

(Some Spoilers) Black comedy about a crazed policeman out to enforce the law by crashing a bachelor party at the Stonecipher Building and massacring almost all those in attendance.

At the local donut shop Offcer Vickers, Robert R. Shafer, overhears office workers Larry & Brian, Rod Sweitzer & Milles Dougal, talk about a bachelor party that's to be held that evening at their office with booze and grass and semi-nude women being brought in for adult entertainment.

Vickers a law & order nut and a bit into Satanic practices and sacrifices decides to stop these impending breaches of the law, drinking and having sex on the job, before it happens and to punish those criminals who break it and the only way he knows how is with brutal and deadly force. In the Stonecipher Building everyone is ready and expecting to have a good time with Mr. Stonecipher,John Paxton, their boss being told that their staying over to catch up with their backlog of paperwork. Before you know it the local strippers are let into the building by the night watchman Gus, Al Schuerman, and the drinking and partying starts as office worker Gary, Dave Bean, is given his last fling as a bachelor before he ends up getting hooked. It turns out instead to be Gary's last day alive on earth.

Bloody and in some ways hilarious, with a number of sharp and witty one liners by Officer Vickers, horror flick with Vickers knocking off almost everyone at the party. Vickers starts with Gus who he put a pencil through his brain then works his way up the building finishing off everyone else but Brian & Sharon, Barbara Niven, who survived his rampage. As you would expect Vickers, like almost every villain in these types of films, has superhuman strength and endurance. No matter what happens to him like being pushed down an elevator shaft hit in the midsection ,full force, with an ax and almost having his head burned off with a lighted spray-can he just keeps on going as strong as ever in his crusade to enforce the law that he was sworn to uphold.

The movie has a scene in it that copies the infamous March 1991 Rodney King police beating with Vickers being beaten and kicked by a bunch of outraged citizens, after trying to murder Sharon, with bats sticks and fists as the entire scene is being videotaped by an shocked onlooker,Adam Rifkin. Still Vickers still manages to survive to live and kill another day in another Psycho Cop movie.

This film is magnificent! No it's not, it's crap!

It's both! see it! It's so boring and bad it'll blow you away!!

Adam Rifkin should not have used his 'Rif Coogan' pseudonym on PSYCHO COP 2. If he thinks a supposed A-list release like the unfortunately boring DETROIT ROCK CITY is something to be proud of, he needs to revert back to the mindset he was in while making this fun fest. After a nifty title sequence, PSYCHO COP 2 settles in to tell the tale of an after hours bachelor party at an office building. Various people die when the PSYCHO COP shows up and Julie Strain runs around in chaps. That's the plot.

Now the acting, while amateurish, gains your acceptance because the actors are naturally appealing. The script is fast, funny and never pretends to be something it's not. Sometimes the one liners are groaners but you seem to let it go, because the film's vibe is inviting you to come along, not holding you in contempt for watching this kind of picture. The only problem is all the gore effects have been excised to secure an R rating. The cuts are jumpy and ragged during those deletions and the after effects are too quickly shown. If there could possibly be a director's cut, PSYCHO COP 2 could be a guilty pleasure classic for us horror fans. So listen up, Rifkin! Make it happen. People actually like this film. I'm proud to say I do.

What really elavates Pyscho Cop Returns (aka Psycho Cop 2) is the talent of Adam Rifkin (going under his Rif Coogan alias here) Rifkin completely acts like the first movie never existed which is good considering how bad the original really is, he gives you stuff you want in a movie like this good gore, boobs, sex, and an overall better performance from our killer Bobby Ray Shafer, all things that were missing in the first film. Shafer himself is really good here and it's nice to see his acting and one liners have improved drastically this time around. Penthouse pet and b movie goddess Julie Strain is also along for the ride. It's also nice to see Vingar Syndrome give this thing a great blu ray release, with better picture quality and of course the full uncut version of the film which for years was only available on a super rare VHS tape. Overall, Psycho Cop Returns still isn't as good as its Maniac Cop counterpart, but it's still a fun enjoyable ride in it's own right.

I watched this immediately after the original Psycho Cop and, wow, what a difference a little self-awareness makes! The original incompetently plodded through horrible writing, acting (with the exception of Shafer)and pretty much anything else you could screw up in a movie. For the sequel, they watched the original, expanded on the strengths and actively ridiculed the weaknesses. I almost hate to call Shafer's performance "brilliant" but there it is. Another actor would play the role just for laughs, but Shafer, after delivering a punchline, keeps the character's cheerful psychotic complexity. Did I really write that?

This is just a fun, fun film that does a great job treading the line between the "THIS IS A COMEDY HORROR MOVIE ABOUT BAD COMEDY HORROR MOVIES" and just an enjoyable slasher film.