Hellgate, cité de l'enfer

Master thespian Ron Palillo, who you might remember far more as none other than Arnold Horshack from Welcome Back Kotter fame, stars as a young man embroiled in an urban legend about a ghost town where a man brings back those he kills with a rock crystal. Sure this is a cheapie. Was it a direct to video release? The story is absolute dreck and the performances are just as bad, but the film is not without some bright spots. I really thought the idea of the ghost town was interesting and even enjoyed the expository flashback in the beginning. What really goes wrong in this film is the use of that aforementioned crystal. It is just plain silly, especially when you see it used on a bat with obvious strings, a goldfish in a bowl, and a dead turtle. The acting is so preposterous as a girl, having just seen a horde of dead walk toward her and seeing her boyfriend lose his head, sits calmly in a saloon watching cabaret dancers. Who makes this stuff up? The dialogue is uttered with no conviction at all and is stupid to begin with. The budget may not have been plentiful, but the sets do look rather decent. Lead actor Palillo tries his level best to be affable, but let's face it - it is way beyond his means as an actor. The actress Abigail Wolcott is visually stunning, and it is no coincidence we see lots of her unclad. She is definitely the brightest spot...OK, spots, the film has to offer.

Hellgate(1989) Director: William A. Levey

***out*****

Review

I seem to have to always justify my reasons to people as to how I can watch, buy, and even spend endless hours seeking the most wretchedly awful movies known to man. With eBay receipts reaching the hundreds, I confess I am guilty of that enjoyment. I also Confess that this world we live in doesn't let you choose your daily outcomes, and any honest person will admit that some of those outcomes can leaving feeling depressed, stressed, mad, bored, what have you. After watching some of these movies when in Those emotions, it's very hard to find myself not laughing.

How anybody could take the world and its petty problems serious after viewing a flick Like this seem to be as alien to me as I to them. Sure, there are obnoxiously bad movies That do nothing bet aggravate the senses, those movies reach the pits of banality and surly wont help with anyone's all ready shaky mentality. Then we have the obscure flicks That goes beyond the pits of movie making and seems to reach a point that deserves its own plateau. At the start of this movie ominous music plays, lightning crashes, and we are introduced to 2 females and 1 male all telling ghost stories. The ages of these people is never declared, although at one point a university is mentioned so for the movies sake, instead of 35ish (which indeed they appear to be), we'll call them 20somethings. They Are waiting for another friend, to kill time one female decides to tell of the urban legend of the old ghost town up the road. It seems in the fifties a biker gang kidnapped and killed The mayor or something of the town's daughter, and the mayor vows revenge, and wouldn't you have the mayor (or something) finds a blue crystal which can reanimate the Dead with its fantastical Tron like blue beam that it shoots itself from. We know this from a scene involving a goldfish and a sea turtle (which bites the mayor's face). Well Anyways, it appears the legend is really true and the ghost of the girl (with quite the rack) haunts the roads of the South African outback (although the movie says it's set in California) seeking revenge against the gang who killed her, and strangers in general I Guess. Well the guest drives by her, enters the town, and is seduced by ghoul girl, Revengeful mayor finds out, declares death, guest dude runs away, seeks his friends, And declares to save ghoul girl, which leads the 20somethings to the ghost town, only To fall prey to zombies, slashers, constant one liners, and the suspense of watching a snail move.

I feel compelled by the approach to this material. Is it satire? Black Comedy? An honest approach to horror? Because of this uncertain demeanor the movie Has a certain trashy charm. The writer seems to be inspired by sitcoms or something as the screenplay has these "witty" lines that think this is Seinfeld or something. During the most suspenseful of scenes the characters have no problem taking a break to make a joke. Also the laws of movie logic are also at best, helter skelter. Not only do characters have Scotty beaming them, we also have scenes of zombies or something prowling the town, but it seems the director didn't tell them their purpose as they seem to walk about, stare at the camera and then- that's it! We also have ghoul girl laying in a bed which would seem to be the entire half while enchanting "Matt, Darlin Matt" while her bosom camera mugs. Also the movie breaks the rule of every character having a purpose. Who is the man burning at the end? Why would the mayor (or something) bring back the ghost of the biker gang who started everything in the first place? Is the black waitress a subtle clue to indicate our society's acceptance of BLACK culture (as the fifties flashback indeed shows as an all white establishment) Where exactly do all the "diners" occupants live? And so forth, the movie is so obscure I found myself thinking, thinking, THINKING of all the answers.

The movie has some funny scenes to be sure. Also what is with the director himself? He has a cameo as a head in a fridge, and seems to have a grasp on making banal Indeed banal. Take two murder scenes, one dude has his head chopped off and the body running down the road, or a female, after watching the beheading screams and then calmly sits in a saloon smoking & drinking, while ghost cabaret dancers dance a way, she is then strangled while blood spurts, in the most tackiness of slow motion. They ghost's motivations are a little shaky: Are they all bad? Why some only human while others are rotting? What about the reanimated bat on a string? The box cover has the toggling "From the SFX people who did Hellraiser 1&2", perhaps they quit after day 1 of shooting.

And so forth.

There are plenty of bad movies, even movies that are considered "good", this one seems to go beyond the realms of bad film-making, it's so abysmal that it really made my day, and that's all that should matter right? Enjoy.

A group of college kids travel to the ghost town of Hellgate to find out the truth about a young woman who was murdered by a motorcycle gang in the 1950's.There,they are greeted by ghosts and walking dead."Hellgate" is a cheesy horror flick that will satisfy only the most undemanding fans of horror genre.The acting is terrible and the script is cheesy beyond belief.There is a fair amount of blood and gore including a nice decapitation scene,unfortunately the special effects are lame.The only reasons to see this stinker are a fish on steroids and re-animated turtle plus Abigail Wolcott as a hot zombie girl.4 out of 10.Only for fans of truly mindless zombie flicks.

Yes, this is a horrible movie. But look at all of the *good* things. Gratuitous sex. Random psychopaths. Gratuitous slow-motion action sequences. Similar visual effects as Hellraiser (the really cheesy Hellraiser effects, granted...). Gratuitous exploding things for no particular reason. It's b-horror at its best. Laughed the whole way through it! Though, I have to admit, the final body count was a bit of a disappointment...

I really have to ask myself what I expected from a movie that has Ron Pallilio from Welcome Back Kotter as the male lead sex symbol. Not much, I guess and that's exactly what I got! Not much! When I popped the DVD of Hellgate on I realized less than five minutes into it that I had seen this movie over ten years ago. You don't forget acting this bad! So the movie starts with three friends waiting for their fourth friend Matt (Horseshack!) to show up at their vacation spot. They while away the time telling ghost stories. One girl deadpans the tale of The Legend Of Hellgate, which is apparently the next town over. In a flashback we see an attempted rape gone bad that happened in Hellgate in the '50s. A bunch of no-good-nick bikers are at the malt shop and they decide to grab the big cheese mayor of Hellgate's daughter Josie and drive away with her. None of the town folk try to stop them. They drive Josie to a secluded area and rip her skirt off and Josie runs around in black underwear, bobby socks and sneakers looking like she should be doing an 80s aerobics video. (I swear they hired Abigail Wolcott to play "Josie" because she had nice legs...She even "strikes poses" while being carried away and raped! ) Well, her father - who is a dead ringer for Gomez Addams- comes to rescue her and in the process Josie gets iced.

Later on a guy in a mine finds a strange crystal that has the power to reanimate dead things. Here is where the cheesy special effects ("done by the people who did the effects in Hellraiser and Hellbound " the box trumpets!) debut as we see a very fake looking bat, a very fake looking fish and a very fake looking turtle spring back to murderous mutant life. (The turtle scene is actually pretty funny). Josie's papa goes to Josie's shrine (even her headstone has breast implants!) and reserrects Josie so she can lure people to the ghost town for him to kill. Why? I don't know why! Josie picks up Horseshack on the side of the road and seduces him. The seduction scene is a laugh riot! the music is insane! And I had never realized what a bad actor Horseshack is until I saw this: Even his sex scenes are unconvincing! And he's a pretty small guy. When he's lying in bed with Josie naked he's so small compared to her that he looks like a doll! Hahaha! Matt meets up with his friends and drags THEM to Hellgate . Why? I don't know. But they go. And of course they run afoul some zombie ghost town people who chase them around and try to kill them. Josie falls in love with Matt for reasons unknown and Matt's girlfriend is not amused.

Will Matt stay with the living dead girl or go home with his plain Jane girlfriend? Or will the zombies and John Astin's doppelganger kill him? Hellgate is a terrible film all the way around with bad acting, bad script, bad special effects, etc. but there was something FUNNY about it that kept me watching so if you like bad movies like I do you might actually find some entertainment in watching HELLGATE. I will watch it again one day just to watch Josie strike strange Vogue-like poses, a dead turtle bite someones face off and to see Horseshack in the raw again. Comic gold all three!

Speaking of bad movies, if you are lucky you will get the two disc set that not only has Hellgate but also has The Pit. The Pit is even funnier than Hellgate, a real laugh riot! So check that one out! Peace!