Review #73: The Monster Squad (1987)

Cast/Notable Credits:
Fred Dekker (Director): Night of the Creeps (1986), RoboCop 3 (1993)

Stephen Macht (Detective Crenshaw): Graveyard Shift (1990), Trancers 3, 4, & 5

Mary Ellen Trainor (Emily Crenshaw): Romancing the Stone (1984), The Goonies (1985), Leathal Weapon 1-4, Die Hard (1988), Scrooged (1988), Action Jackson (1988)

Tom Noonan (Frankenstein): RoboCop 2 (1990), Last Action Hero (1993)

Ryan Lambert (Rudy): Kids Incorporated T.V. series

Leonardo Cimino (Scary German Guy): Amityville Horror 2 (1982), Dune (1984), Waterworld (1995)

Jason Hervey (E.J.): Back to the Future (1985), The Wonder Years T.V. series

Jack Gwillim (Van Helsing): Clash of the Titans (1981), Patton (1970), Jason and the Argonauts (1963)

Trailer:


Plot:

The Monster Squad is a bunch of kids who idolize monsters and monster movies. Their hideout is up in a tree house in their leader's (Sean Crenshaw) back yard. Members of the Monster Squad are: Sean (leader), Patrick (skinny dork), Horace (the fat kid), Eugene (the pip-squeak midget), Rudy (the older, cooler enforcer kid), Phoebe (Sean's younger sister), and the family dog.

Monster Squad Mascot: the Crenshaw's family dog

Membership to get in: passing the monster quiz. Not really hard.

Membership benefits: business cards, and the peep show at Patrick's sister as she constantly changes clothes in front of her bedroom window, conveniently located in camera's view from the tree house. And the right to battle monsters that invade your town.

Sean receives an old book from his parents which happens to be Abraham Van Helsing's personal journal. Unfortunately the diary is in German and not English. In order to find out what the diary says, the squad seeks out the help of the town's scary German guy. And that's the name he is credited with in the movie. Scary German guy, must have been Writer's block. I shall call him SGG for short. Luckily for the squad, SGG translates the journal into English for them.

The journal describes, in great detail, an amulet that is composed of a concentration of good. Whatever that means. And the journal also explains that once every century, the forces of evil and good reach a balance and the amulet can be destroyed thus letting the evil forces rule the world.

And that "once every century" day happens to be:

A. The following day at the stroke of midnight.

B. On Friday the 13th

C. On Saturday the 14th

D. Not for another 20 years or so.

If you answered A, then you're a strong candidate for writing the sequel. And correct. If you answered B, you're watching the wrong movie. If you answered C, then you're still watching the wrong movie. And if you answered D, you're an idiot.

But wait...there's more to the story! Also in the journal, Van Helsing wrote a German passage that can temporary defeat the monsters. A virgin must read the passage out loud to open up a mysterious vortex, called Limbo. Once the vortex is opened, the monsters will be sucked into Limbo. What is Limbo any way? Isn't that a game were you straddle underneath a bar on a Hawaiian tiki fire god's beach or something?
While the squad deciphers the journal, legendary monsters are gathering in the town looking for the amulet themselves. Count Dracula leads the group of "baddies", which also includes, Frankenstein, the wolf man, the mummy, and the Gill-man. They all arrive differently to this unnamed town, the mummy escapes from the local museum. Frankenstein, Dracula, and the Gill-man fall out of the back of an airplane that was transporting them somewhere. And the wolf man...well, he just shows up.

As the "evil-doers" (to quote some other famous guy...don't know who he...I mean "it" is...but I'm sure he's...I mean "it" again...is famous) randomly show up in their own fashion, Dracula sends Frankenstein to search out the Helsing journal. Of course, Frankenstein isn't the sharpest crayon in the box, and he ends up befriending the squad and helping them out.

The "evil-doers" find the amulet first, but cannot get to it because it's surrounded by items of "good". Or something like that. They eventually trick the squad into retrieving it for them, as the squad narrowly escapes and makes a final stand in the town square as that magical hour of midnight approaches. Not to spoil the movie for you, but then the battle of good versus evil begins.


I loved this movie when I was a kid. After going back and watching all these films ten, fifteen, twenty years later, I say to myself, "Man. Was I an idiot or what?" This film was brilliant in it's laziness. K.I.S.S. Keep It Simple Stupid. Also a bad rock band. It's been a while since I've brought them into the picture. Just remember...they drove the young Michael Myers into killing. At least that's how Rob Zombie envisioned it. The film doesn't even try to explain anything. It's like it had seven days to film the thing. Present and idea/event and BOOM! Move on. Don't look back. Keep up the pace. Leave any man behind.

What I mean is that, there are many random things that happens and the film doesn't even bother explaining them. Like, the journal. Sean's parents just happen to give him this journal. Where'd it come from? Film: who cares? Present the scene and move on. BOOM! Move on! Leave all questions for the weak. It's brillant. They don't waste the effort on explaining things. And yes, the movie is full of plot holes, but after awhile, you just come to accept it. Like the movie itself points out, "How does the dog get up here?" Lazy script writing. Or George Lucas's cop-out: "Will of the force."

Examples of lazy writing/not explaining anything/random crap:

1. Lack of character's names. The SGG (Scary German Guy) who goes on to play an important role of the film. You seriously can't think of any German surname to give him? He's just referred as the SGG.

Another...Patrick's sister (actress Lisa Fuller). The "virgin" of the film. Can't even give her a name like Sally, Jennifer, Tiffany or something like that. Nope. Just Patrick's sister. Fortunately for the actress, all she has to identify herself as is the girl that says when questioned about her virginity, "Well, Steve...but he doesn't count." Everyone knows that girl. Wow...Tiffany Amber Thiesen came up during a google search for the name, "Tiffany". So why tease? Here she is.

Another...the town's name. Can't even come up with a generic name. Let's just identify it as Springfield. Works for me.

2. The before mentioned, Van Helsing's Journal. How'd it end up in the town. And then pawned off on Sean. Who happens to discover it's usefulness. Just a random unexplained event. Important to the film's plot, but the orgin...well who cares? Right. Hit the hole and move on! That's what the movie does.

3. Wolfman. He just shows up at the police station asking to be arrested. Was he the crazy town local? Just passing through? Did he even have a name? Poof! He's there.

4. The house with the amulet. So the bad guys needed a place to hide out, and happened to shack up at the house with the amulet hidden in the basement. The writer's explain this by saying, "Helsing's deciples didn't do a very good job hiding the amulet." Really? That's the best you can do?

Speaking of the amulet, I think I understood more about it when I was a little kid. Dracula finds the amulet in a hidden stone room in the basement of the house. Inside the amulet was surrounded by crucifixes, and other forces of "good" items. When I was a kid, I knew that he couldn't get to the amulet because of those items and later tricks Sean into retrieving it. When I was watching, I was waiting for a dumb line about why they couldn't get the amulet. But there wasn't one. I guess I was smart as a kid assuming why they couldn't get the amulet.

5. SGG's tattoo. After SGG translates the journal to the kids, he walks him out of the house and at the last second the camera zooms in on his left arm and we see a numbered tattoo. Everyone who has seen the film has basically assumed that it's from a Nazi concentration camp. Who knows, maybe it's like from the Terminator: The Sarah Connor Chronicles T.V. show. Resistance soldiers from the future have those tattoos on their arms. Maybe SGG was sent back through time to help the squad or to protect them. "Come with me if you want to live." Hmm. I think I'm on to something. Probably not, but yet another unexplained random event from the film.

Those are just five examples of lazing writing, I could go on, but it sounds like I'm bashing the film. I'm not. Honestly. I'm just pointing out the brillance of introducing something, rolling with it, and moving on. I bought it as a kid. And kind of bought it as an adult. The devil's in the details. Not in this film. They left the devil out.

On a side note, I do have to mention that the Rudy character is played by Ryan Lambert. Rudy gives us the worst line from the movie, "See ya later, band-aid breath." Why? Lambert's previous credits include the kid's television show, Kids Incorporated. Here are a few alumni from the show.
Eric Balfour - Texas Chainsaw Massacre remake
Stacy Ferguson - Fergie! and Planet Terror
Jennifer Love Hewitt - IKWYDLS

Also gives me reason to post the two pictures up. If you can't decipher who's who in the photos, then your life is wasted. You may need to get out more.

I do have to bash the film for under-utilizing the Gill-man. The dude's hardly in the film and then dies like a b*tch and the hands of the fat kid. We see him in the swamp sequence, and then...at the final battle. Whoop-dee-do. At least he had a movie of his own. Matter of fact, we need more Gill-man. There's a million vampire, werewolf, Frankenstein and at least three bad Brendan Frasier Mummy movies, but Gill-man...nope...shut out. A lost creature cause. Moved to the back burner of monsters. Playing second fiddle to Jeckel and Hyde. Hollywood's new replacement for Gill-man. And that just sucks. Need more Gill-man.

Misc. Movie Trivia:
-Film opened on August 14, 1987 and made $3.76 million at the Box Office
-Liam Neeson was considered for the Dracula role
-Dustin Diamond (Saved by the Bell!) had a small role which was cut from the film