Shadow of Death

Lyle Alzado is...The Destroyer. The box to this movie claims it to be an action/thriller. Nope, it's a slasher flick. It's also an April Fool's Day reunion for Clayton Rohner and Debra Foreman. The late, great NFL monster Alzado is a psychotic rapist and murderer who is executed minutes before a prison riot breaks out. After the riots are over, the prison is forced to close and Alzado's body is never found. Years later, Foreman, Rohner (sporting one of his famous haircuts), and Anthony "Psycho" Perkins are filmmakers shooting a movie in the famed prison. It all makes for an odd little slasher entry. I wouldn't say Destroyer's great, but it does have its moments of hilarity. It's just fun to watch Alzado go to work on people with an over-sized jackhammer...or to hear Perkins say the words "shower scene."

This horror movie is very similar to others of the time such as Prison (1987), The Chair (1988) and The Horror Show (1989) but this is much more fun.

A movie titled "Death House Dollies" begins filming in what the crew believes to be a deserted prison unaware that a former inmate, Ivan Moser- who raped and murdered 23 men and women, had survied the electic chair years earlier and is still in the prison and he is very angry!

There's plenty of humour, decent kills and gore and there is an entertaining scene from the film within the film showing a group of girls fighting naked in a shower.

Stand out performances go to Lyle Alzado as the demented Ivan Moser and legendary actor Anthony Perkins as the direstor of the tashy "Death House Dollies".

At first glance, Destroyer looks like a very promising film for horror fans on paper. In an era where the slasher flick was in its prime, it looks as if this film sets itself apart from the rest. It features a human enemy who seems to be more of a genetic freak than an indestructible demon who does not target teenagers, as the bad guy usually does in recent entries of the genre. However, all the positive points end there and what we're left with is another excessively gratuitous gorefest that most horror fans won't take seriously.

Beyond Anthony Perkins, there are no seriously notable names in the movie. It's too bad that such the horror icon did not have a notable body of work after his defining performance in "Psycho", making several mediocre "Psycho" sequels and b-movies like this. Nevertheless, he plays his role as skin flick director to a T. Other than the two heroes, everyone else in the movie is either there to get killed or say a few lines. And the heroes aren't even of note either. The only difference they have with everyone else in the movie and in the number of lines they have. There is never any development of their characters, so you don't know what special qualities they possess that make them the good guys in the end other than mere coincidence and serendipity.

If there's one thing the movie has going for it, it's the way some of the characters get dispensed. There's a nice scene with a blowtorch and the movie's best part, involving a huge drilling device (as seen on the video box). However, as the movie goes on, the scenes become a little less graphic though we are treated to some body parts strewn around and some wax-museum quality bodies. Credit must be given to Lyle Alzado, who looks VERY menacing as the main bad guy. He shows a bit of acting ability in this movie. Throughout his brief career acting after football, which was cut short after he sadly succumbed to brain cancer, he was thoroughly underused as a main villain in movies.

In short, the Destroyer is a decent weekend b-movie. Its partly refreshing perspective on the slasher genre and its almost humorously over-gory scenes make it a fun movie to watch and laugh at with a few friends. Look for some nice (if inadvertent) homages to horror classics the Shining (with the blood on the wall sequence) and Friday the 13th (with the gotcha! end of the movie). Finally, be sure to sit through the credits for a very weird name for one of the movie's songs. The laughs are definitely worth a cheap rental.

Destroyer is a prime piece of forgettable 80's horror schlock. Lyle Alzado (YES!) stars as a brutal inmate who somehow survives his execution, Shocker style, and mysteriously disappears. Soon after, the prison closes and a while later, the place becomes the shooting location for a women-in-prison (WIP) film, directed by none other than a lively Anthony Perkins. (Yes, they do shoot a shower scene.) Of course, slasher horror hilarity ensues. Yeah, I knew what I was getting into…the cover shows a buff, gleaming Alzado holding a big jackhammer with a mounted scope! Memorable line: "Could you hang on a second, Officer Callahan? I gotta peepee."

In DESTROYER, a movie is being made in an abandoned prison, where a riot had killed dozens of guards and inmates a few months prior. Said riot had started after the execution of enormous, musclebound serial murderer, Ivan Moser (Lyle Alzado). Now, as the film crew gets rolling, the real, hideous deaths begin.

Has Moser returned from his gargantuan grave?

This is one of those cheap, cheeezey movies that would have played well on the drive-in circuit of its era. It takes a while for this one to get going, and even then it sort of drags along like a tranquilized turtle. By the time we actually get to see Mr. Alzado's character, it's half over. This is a shame, since he's the only dynamic aspect about this entire project!

On a positive note, Anthony Perkins is rather humorous as the Director of the ill-fated movie being made.

Extra Points For: The aforementioned Mr. Alzado, whose cackling maniac character almost saves this film from its own dullness. Almost...