Abraxas

Scared Stiff should have been a better movie and it probably would have been with a bigger budget. I can see where they were going and they didn't have the proper sets and equipment to make it work.

It is rare that I watch a horror flick and am like aw dang I totally get this and would be into it if this weren't so bargain basement and slapped together by some low paid amateurs.

I also feel like there wasn't enough done with the connection between the slaves introduced in the beginning and the magical powers in the voodoo charm. Some things could have been improved by a more thoughtful execution with what they had, which is why I am still only giving this middling 80s mess five stars.

'80s supernatural horror Scared Stiff is, for the most part, a rather dull affair, but it is lifted somewhat by a final twenty minutes that completely throw logic and sanity out of the window. The lunacy is hinted at in an earlier scene where a young lad's toy cars come to life, engines roaring and wheels spinning, but it's not until the closing act that director Richard Friedman goes all out with the madness, chucking in time travel, a snarling monster, an exploding police car (it's amazing how easy the vehicle blows up), a mouldy corpse smashing through a window (having hung outside for several days unnoticed), a giant floating lampshade in the shape of an Indian, and Ivory Coast natives hurling spears through time and space.

The plot goes something like this: having recovered from a mental breakdown, pop star Kate moves into a new home with her boyfriend (and doctor) David Young (Andrew Stevens), and her seven year old son Jason (Josh Segal), unaware that the place is haunted by the malevolent ghost of a slave merchant. This hokey old set-up is rife with clichés, Friedman's attempts at atmosphere and foreboding fall horribly flat, his cast give uniformly bad performances, and certain scenes are horribly dated (such as the moment when Jason's computer projects a holographic 3D image or when David explains what diskettes are for). If you can, try and stay the distance for the mind-numbingly bonkers ending, which is just about worth the wait, but I wouldn't blame you if you gave up and found something better to do with your time.

2/10, plus a couple more points for the nutty stuff.

Moving into her boyfriends' new house, a former psychiatric patient and her son continue to experience strange events and visions caused by the ruthless former owner of the house and realizing that the haunting has affected him as well they try to discover a way of stopping it from consuming him.

This one wasn't that bad of an effort. One of it's best elements is the fact that the backstory used to set up the haunting manages to work itself out rather well. With the idea of the house being haunted by the ghosts of the past who are looking to settle the score for the treatment inflicted upon them by the cruel slave-owner in the past, which is a fine and worthwhile showing for these kinds of films in order to set up a potential haunting. That the early setups inside the house bring about their early introduction into the supernatural happenings in the house, from finding the secret room filled with pigeons to the discovery of the diary and the strange key on the grounds which all signal the start of the creepy action. That also leads to the film's rather decent and enjoyable haunting scenes. With the first hauntings occurring through her nightmares to the discovery of the bones locked in the attic and then the children's toys coming to life and playing on their own, this builds up rather nicely with a nice series of visions and sequences that further fuel her mental anguish. Since the attacks and visions are based more on her being the main witness to the action and her backstory being his patient as well as the backstory with the house, these come together rather nicely to deliver some pretty fun cheesy moments that move the hauntings into possession that matches the activity in the backstory. Featuring some solid action in this part of the film and really having a lot to like in the finale, these here hold this one up for the most part. There are a few problems here. The main issue is the absolutely troublesome beginning to this one to get the film going as it takes a while to get the storyline setup. The exploits of the doctor at the asylum working with his patients isn't all that interesting, as making his rounds or showing how he cares for the more psychotic inmates doesn't really serve any kind of interesting activities going on, especially with the plotless reasons for staying there as often as we do. That this is countered by the boring scenes of them packing up to move into the house just makes for an overlong and boring setup that takes forever to get going as the lack of horror scenes early on due to this issue is quite noticeable. The other big problem with this one is the absolutely bizarre and chaotic final half that makes no sense whatsoever. The film throws the characters through several alternate timelines and periods of history with various figures from her past thrown together into one random series of hallucinations to torment her and yet none of it makes any sense since nothing comes of these scenes. There's no greater sense of understanding the events of the past or using them to have the upper hand in the big confrontation, and it just ends up going through its scenes in such a random manner as chaotically as it does here just makes for a confusing time that lowers this one significantly. These here are the biggest problems to be had with this one.

Rated R: Graphic Language and Graphic Violence.

Could it be the workman, hanging undiscovered outside a boy's screenless window? He hangs there by his neck for days, perhaps weeks without being found, despite being in clear view from the outside, despite being less than a foot away from the boy's window; shouldn't there be flies? shouldn't the smell be intense?

But no, as you might suspect, it is this movie that stinks - stinks real bad. Whether its Andrew Stevens typical performance as...Andrew Stevens, or the Comic Relief Cop, or the Negroid (!) Slaveowner Werebeast, or the Giant Kitsch Indian Head Lamp, or, or, or...oh man, it's too bad to go on.

Miss it, unless you want to kill some time, and have a few (not many) laughs or groans at this painful wreck.

This movie has a wild variety of practical and early computer effects. It is certainly over the top at times, and some probably laugh at it as a result, but I found it a pleasure to watch. The opening in the slave market sets the tone that we are in for something different. Yes, the male lead is bland as hell but the mom and kid do a pretty good job for a movie of this budget. The final 30 minutes really ramps up and I kept saying "whoa!" out loud as things got wackier and wilder by the minute. I've seen so many crappy movies getting reissued these last few years that it's always refreshing to actually see something that people put a lot of effort into.