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Hooray! It's another Full Moon movie! Doing this whole Consciousness Stream thing has really engendered in me a love for this particular B-movie cheese factory. They've got just the right magic mix of embarrassingly bad production values, totally incoherent plots, and legitimate effort put in to make great MST3k fodder. Anyway, at the moment, we've got Lurking Fear, which is... KINDA based on an H.P. Lovecraft story. It's by the same guy as From Beyond, so, it's bound to be more accurate to the original story than that one was, right? Also, as is often the case with cheesy Lovecraft movies, Jeffery Combs is in here, so yay.
We start out with a couple girls tucking in a baby in and preparing for a gun fight of some sort. Eventually it turns out that they were getting ready to fire this here pistol on the off chance that the freaky monster person living in the wall managed to rig up some sort of improvised hook to haul the crib over and steal the baby. They just barely manage to prevent that from happening since, well, they really aren't paying that much attention. Then some really bad editing leaves Mom getting hauled through herself in gory fashion. Then we've got the opening credits that go on for kind of a while, with some funny names in there that are like one letter off from John Manatee and Chimpanzee. Well, Jim Panzi is really 4 letters off, but still. They also make a really big deal of getting Vincent Schiavelli for this. Who you ask? OK, remember the movie Ghost? And there was that one scary bum ghost? And you see him in a lot of stuff and kinda have to wonder who he is? Yeah, that guy. Getting him right after Ghost for your cheesy B-movie is, I suppose, kind of a big deal. He's kinda low on my personal list of groovy "hey, it's that guy!" character actors though, mainly because there's this other character actor who looks almost just like him, so, half the time it isn't That Guy, it's That Other Guy, and low their strengths are diminished.
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Anyway, we're back into the movie now. Our actual main character, who I'm just going to call Wolverine because he has that same sorta generic scruffy 90s anti-hero look going, just got out of jail, having been arrested on general principle, seriously. He goes to see Bum Ghost at the funeral home to compile halves of their treasure map that leads to the huge wad of money hidden inside Wolverine's dad's corpse... which is kind of a really weird place to hide your treasure. Apparently Dad was a thief or something and worked something out with Bum Ghost to hide it for his son later. Meanwhile, some girl is burying dynamite in a cemetery, possibly after this treasure, but we immediately meanwhile agin over to the office of Dr. Haggis, which is an awesome enough name for me to use. Seriously, there's a sign out front that just says "Dr. L Haggis M.D." on it. Dr. Haggis is played by Jeffery Combs, so any time he's on screen we've just kinda got some B-movie acting gold.
So... apparently, those two girls from the beginning are hanging out with him to get their monster claw wounds treated, and get the rest of their dynamite ready. Did I mention this movie kinda has some confusing editing going on? Oh yeah, I said it was by Full Moon, so it goes without saying. So... they're off to blow up corpses I guess, while Bum Ghost hits on some random girl and apparently gets muscled in on by the uh... British Mafia? Seriously, they're acting all mobstery, but they're talking all "Wot's all this then?" and look like extras from a Sherlock Holmes movie. They're muscling in on his hiding contraband in corpses business it seems. Oh, and then we cut real quick to Wolverine doing some pathetic inner monologuing while driving past some random girl hobbling along with a weird monster-claw-damaged face or something. Anyway, Bum Ghost spills the beans on where the treasure is, so apparently we now have 3 different parties after it, one of which has no real explanation of why they know where to look that I know of. Also, they kill Bum Ghost. Presumably this leaves him restless and angry and in love with the subway, but for now he just takes a shotgun blast to the stomach and conveniently falls into an open coffin.
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Aha! Dr. Haggis and the girls aren't treasure hunting, they're just going down to the local church to lay the smack down on the local monster people. So they're arguing with the priest who isn't big on taking a bunch of guns and dynamite and going to go fight monsters, but there's also this random other guy just kinda sitting around in the background. He's also got a clawed up face. It's kind of a local trend. Meanwhile, Wolverine pulls into town, sees this weird plastic face looking kid kicking a blackened skull around, and tries to ask for directions. Also, now I'm getting confused with characters. OK, the mom from before? I'm going to call her dead. Her sister, who was there with her, she's Gun Haver. Then this other girl? Uh... she's some random other girl? Who might be pregnant? So yeah, Gun Haver, Preggo, Dr. Haggis, and Random Guy are in this group.
Oh, and now we cut to the priest staring at some candles and giving some exposition which it's really hard to pay attention to because a monster is in the window behind him making silly faces. Well, OK, it has a distinct lack of facial mobility, but it looks kinda goofy and is pointing slowly, so, close enough. And oh hey, someone's approaching the church! Let's kill him says Gun Haver! Well, at least, let's point our Gun we Have at him and interrogate him some. This is observed from a distance by the British Mafia. Also, did I mention that Dr. Haggis is not at all Scottish? So yeah, everyone goes inside to try and fix the big gaping hole in the floor monsters tend to burst out of, which is pretty pointless. Then the monsters start banging on it, so Gun Haver goes to set off the big dynamite trap, but just then the British Mafia bursts in to kill Random Guy and hold everyone else hostage. Yay, now everyone's in one room and we won't have confusing jumpy editing for a while! ... and the second I type they we briefly cut away to the monster under the floor. Of course.
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So yeah, much like me, the mobsters are confused by the premise that not everyone here is after the treasure, assuming all these other dudes to be in cahoots with Wolverine. And... commercial break! Seriously, someone just said something kinda dramatic, we faded to black, and came back to the same scene. There is no reasonable explanation for this besides making a nice place to put a commercial. Or maybe the camera ran out of tape and this was them trying to cover up the switch. So... people get roughed up, and carted outside to dig up treasure, first having to remove the dynamite strapped to the headstone of Wolverine's Grandmother. Seriously. So yeah, dig up his corpse! Pull out his tongue! Or cut back to inside I guess, where Preach, Doc, and Preggo are tied up and guarded by Female Mobster. Doc is briefly set free because Preggo is possibly having her baby. Femobster asks who the dad is, and after getting a vague answer and figuring he's some deadbeat, helpfully offers to hunt him down and kill him.
Back outside, I'm sorry but the treasure is in another castl- er, corpse. ÊA fight ensues, and Wolverine is suddenly dragged into a secret underground tunnel by a monster. He kicks the monster in the face a couple times, then runs off to eventually climb back into the church via floor hole. ÊCommercial time again! So... now everyone is apparently clued in that there's monsters, which is weird, because I don't see how anyone besides Wolverine really got a proper demonstration of the fact. Suddenly the pace of things slows way down. Priesty offers to hand over the burial records and let the mobsters kill him if they let everyone else go. Meanwhile the 3 girls have this really really weird conversation which I guess is KIND OF intended to foreshadow how that's so totally obviously some sorta monster baby. Seriously though, it's like "So anyway, yeah, you're pregnant!" "Leave her alone! I'll deal with her horrible problem!"
Apparently, Priest is willing to play ball because he's sick of the whole town being under the thumb of Wolverine's family. Which is odd because his dad's been dead a while and he's been in jail and never has been to this town. Apparently he's referring to the rest of his family, who I'm going to guess are the monsters. So... we're working towards a war between the British mob and the underground ghoul mob it seems. And... here's a point scored for the ghoulies on that one. Someone had the bad survival instincts to stand near a window you see. They toss a molotov at ghoulie post-kill, he flees and we uh... try for a POV thing of him digging his way back underground into a nice save grave, but in practice, we've got a camera being knocked around by big handfuls of dirt flying into it, and can't really see squat.
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So... Gun Haver drives off to get a uh... bus from the gas station? Meanwhile inside, the tables have turned, some how, and it's the mobsters who are all tied up. Oh, OK, it's not a bus, it's a fuel tanker. That makes much more sense. Because the whole dynamite trap was all disabled with the corpse exhuming and all. Oh, and here's Ghoulie coming into the back room to chat with Father Death Wish. They have pretty much the same exact conversation he had with the mobsters, but it's really hard to make out what Ghoulie is saying, and well, Priesty's not especially coherent either. Ghoulie may be Wolverine's dad though, and Priesty explains that this whole "hey, could you kill me and let everyone else go?" deal of his is because martyrs totally get a Get Out of Hell Free card. His heart is then rather unceremoniously ripped out. Oh, and the mobsters get free, so now Femobster and Gun Haver are outside uh, mud wrestling. ÊGun Haver though, lest we forget, Has Gun, and shoots some nearby dynamite, triggering a whole bunch of exploding tombstones. This does not so much accomplish anything meaningful as just be something pretty to look at. Inside, Dr. Haggis has been mauled by a monster and... OK, did I accidentally hit the scene skip button or something? No. Looks like the movie did. OK, you know how this whole time we've been cutting around to show what everyone is doing at any given time? Well apparently during that whole mud wrestling/explosions bit, there was plot going on inside that we just didn't get to see. Dr. Haggis is mauled and now presumably dead, Gun Haver has been yanked underground, Wolverine and Mobster are down there somewhere else in the tunnels, and have now fallen down into the Morlock Rumpus Room. Oh hey, and look, it's Preggo! So yeah. They are indeed the Underground Ghoul Mafia. They are indeed Wolverine's family, they have the money corpse, and are planning to kill and eat everyone. Wolverine grabs a torch and scares them off enough to rescue the two girls (happening across Gun Haver on the way out, since it's not like these tunnels branch).
So they go out and get the hose from the gas truck, unceremoniously dragging it across the exposed organs of Dr. Haggis, and, you know, blow everything up. Because that's just what you do.So yeah. The church explodes. And then the church explodes. And then? The church explodes. And then the tunnels full of fleeing Morlocks explode. This goes on for a while. And... OK, I assume Preggo just said "My God..." but it sounded more like "My gun!" Then Wolverine makes another failed attempt at dramatic inner monologue. Then credits. That was uh... actually surprisingly straight-forward and boring for a Full Moon movie. It's vastly overshadowed by the DVD menu screen which, this being "Full Moon Classics Volume II: Lurking Fear" has this totally Boss montage image of a big spooky house in the background, then, a girl in a cave man bikini sitting on the back of a Godzilla knockoff, which is fighting a robot scorpion shooting lasers out of its tail, next to a big robot/power armor/undead orcish space marine with his helmet on thing, and... some guy in a wheelchair. How great would it be if those were all actually in THIS movie?
