Simon Says - Gioca o muori!

I like to call this Scooby-Do Meets The OC "The Case of the Spooky Twins". In the Mystery Machine, Shaggy(Zack), Fred(Riff), Velma (Ashley) Daphne(Vicky) and Lonnie(Fred's Groupie), are fishing for gold in an abandoned, um Ghosttown. They soon meet the Gravediggers who tell them of the dangers of the place they are about to visit! Some people get offed in some mildly inventive ways (and even Scrappy-Do get's in on the action, poor pup) We even meet some characters that we weren't even introduced to that help fight the Ghost but... I won't spoil it but You may see this episode play over and over again! I like Crispin Glove from Back to the Future to his really off the wall things. His portrayal as twins is not far fetched seeing as how he had always seemed to have dual personalities. The supporting cast including the whole Liveley Family (love Red Head Robyn) are mildly entertaining but background to this plot. It could have been Freddy or Jason, But the pick axes set them aside and would have love to have seen this in a 3D style!

A thoroughly bizarre horror movie in which a deranged Crispin Glover (is there any other kind) boobytraps a stretch of woodland with 1001 flying pickaxes and waits for a bunch of irritating teens to stumble onto the scene. I've never really understood the logic of populating a movie with completely unlikeable characters. It makes for pretty tedious viewing when the only reason for watching is not the hope that the characters survive, but that they will die sooner, rather than later. And the teens here, played by the usual bunch of pretty twenty-somethings, are some of the most irritating in horror history. Luckily, 'Simon Says' benefits from the presence of Crispin Glover, who is hilarious camping it up with a bizarre high-pitched accent that seems like a cross between English aristocracy and Louisiana Creole. He's clearly acting in a completely different movie that exists only in his own head and thank God for it. The kills are pretty creative and grizzly with a lot of messy dismemberment, but veteran writer/director Bill Dear has little interest in originality or developing any suspense or real fear. For fans of Glover's unique style, this is an often very funny must-see movie. For everybody else it's a pretty average teen slasher.

The story of "Simon says" is nothing new. Some teenagers in the wood get hunted down by some sicko. So, I didn't expect much anyway in that regard. Still, the movie disappointed me. The teenagers are just your basic clichés for this kind of movie, which is not necessarily bad, but the main problem is the main character, Simon. In my opinion he's just way overdone. The acting is almost like a caricature. So, what should be a threatening character ends up being a (sadly bad) joke. The kills are good, but that's about it. Everything else in this movie just is below par, even for the genre.

Still, with a better Simon this movie could be fun. With that guy it's more a pain to watch than anything else. Avoid this movie.

First of all I saw this movie dubbed in German and German dubs of horror movies most of the time are ridiculous. In this case it somehow fit the plot and the characters. You get you basic horror movie setting... a bunch of teenagers go out to camp in the woods (Good one: "You know a romantic place at the river? Something dark and creepy where serial killers walk around?"). After the characters are introduced... funny stoner guy, hunky football guy, horny annoying chick, naive chick and the smart chick that is supposed to save the day... they stop for fuel and meet Sicko Stanley played by Crispin Glover. Crispin plays the two brothers Stanley and Simon who are the same person after all because Stanley turns out to be schizophrenic and playing the role of his dead brother Simon (whom he obviously killed like everyone else). So when they get to the camping site the usual serial killer story unfolds. That is packed with as many clichés as the opening of the movie. Girls fall down when fleeing the killer, stoner guy walks into a freezer with corpses, hunk guy gets mixed up between two girls and Stanley walks around, killing people with his crazy pickaxe catapult, stomping dogs, stabbing people, building funny dwarfs out of corpses and having a relaxing dinner with his dead rotting parents. A lot of this stuff is absolutely ridiculous, Stanley seems to have supernatural powers when pinning people to trees with pickaxes and making a human shishkebab. Some party made me laugh and reminded me of the Freddy Krueger Horror-Fun like when stoner guy is killed with a giant spliff and then set aflame. Anyway, the acting of all involved is pretty medium and the movie is not horrifying at all, although there really is some gory stuff in there. To me it came across like an extremely clichéd horror comedy that in many scenes made no sense at all (for example the dead horse woman pointing somewhere) and was stolen from loads of movies you know anyway.

What I find funny is the slasher style horror movie. The movie was already shot as a horror-comedy. However, especially the lead actor and absurd actions made the movie even more entertaining. I think the lead actor was wasted in the movie industry. Especially in strange psychological roles and absurd works, he could be a celebrity like Joaquin Phoenix. In fact, if a second Joker character is going to be created, Crispin Glover should play him.

The movie, like all slasher style movies, is about a group of spastic young people going to a campsite in the woods and a schizophrenic killer destroying these young people for the benefit of society.

There is sexuality and nudity in the movie.