Monster High (1989) — Triskaidekafiles

MONSTER HIGH

WRITER: Ron Langsdon and John Platt

DIRECTOR: Rudiger Poe

STARRING: Dean Iandoli as Norm Median

Diana Frank as Candice Caine

David Marriott as Mr. Armageddon

Robert M. Lind as Dume

Sean Haines as Glume

D.J. Kerzner as O.D.

Bob Cady as Jon Doe

Susan Smeltzer as Miss Anne Thrope

David Fuhrer as Mel

QUICK CUT: It’s the end of the world as we know it, and this movie is not fine.

THE MORGUE

Norm - An average guy. Painfully average. So average he’s vanilla. And somehow our hero.

Candice - A French exchange student who Norm is sweet on. She seems nice enough.

Mr. Armageddon - A wannabe trickster that just makes Loki and Coyote cry. His only goals are chaos and murder and destruction of all things.

Mel - A poor schmuck who dies repeatedly and wakes back up in bed like it’s Groundhog Day.

OD - The requisite pothead.

Dume and Glume - A pair of nobrained aliens who somehow steal the Armageddon device.

TRISK ANALYSIS: Welcome back, Triskelions! Summer is pretty much over, the kids are going back to school, and as we often do here at Trisk, so are we. With this...movie...called Monster High. Not to be confused with the kids show of recent years, this comes from the 80s and is...it's a thing that exists. Let's just get this over with.

The movie starts off with a typical warning about the movie's content not being suitable for all people then "On the other hand, if you like that sort of thing..." GROAN. Actually no, I take that back, because it gets worse from here.

But the movie proper begins in the distant regions of space, with the 'monster in charge' whom I shall call Monty for short, has discovered the destruction of Earth has been postponed. Whew! That's good to know! That's where I keep all my stuff!

We get told this is because of one Mister Armageddon, who was supposed to be in a 'banishment sphere' but that seems to not be the case. Also, with that name, he sure isn't living up to it, is he? Also, if you wanted the Earth to be destroyed, why are you upset that Armie is loose? That seems like it would work in your favour?

The report on Mr. Armageddon's activities are brought to him by a woman who would be naked save for a pair of panties. Sigh. It's gonna be like that, eh?

And so we learn that *ahem* Dume and Glume stole Armageddon's sphere, and absconded to Earth with it. They crash land on a dog outside of Montgomery Sterling High School... MON. STER. HIGH. GET IT??

Following getting tea bagged by one of the aliens as he crashes to Earth, they release the device, and...it's a basketball. A fact which SHOULD play into the rest of the movie, but it doesn't. Not at all. You'll see.

Well, it’s no Ultimate Nullifier, that’s for sure.

Armageddon freezes Ratchet and Clank in place to come back into play later, and he begins his reign of chaos. His first victim is to transform a statue outside the school into a living, horny, monster.

So Armandhammer disappears into the credits, and we pick up the next day, with...Norm Median arriving for his school day. Norm. Median. Oh fuck this movie.

Oh and there's also Norm's love interest, Candice Caine. ...Oh fuck me. He tries to impress her by tossing a basketball into a trash can, but fails miserably. See what I mean about the basketball motif?

We then meet some of our other players, with Coach Otto Parts oh FUCK THIS MOVIE, Egbert the nerd, and...Paul Smith. How...how did this dude get away with a perfectly normal, non punny name??

But don't worry, Armisticetreaty is lurking around, and starts picking people off alphabetically via the yearbook. Starting with...ugh. Annabel Lee.

He then runs into Todd Uppington Smythe the third and whips out a 'can o' condom' to kill him with. And we cut to Monty who groans over it. Look, when EVEN THE MOVIE ITSELF is groaning over its stupidity...

And this is supposed to be 'funny' because the movie earlier informed us that Todd is more often known to his friends as "Dickhead". Hah. Ha ha ha. GET IT??

Lookit this discount Randall Flagg mothersquawker.

Oh, and this also makes Dickhead an Instant Zombie. And its so instant, the mere act of dying has caused his clothes to start rotting away. (???)

After a class is dismissed, and a pothead plants some weed in a science project, Armpithair does his thing to the plants for a Later Problem, and then we watch as one of the students fantasizes about a teacher but IT WAS ALL A DREAM as he wakes up in bed.

Okay okay, that wasn't REALLY fair...but you are on THIN FUCKING ICE, movie!!

...Which it immediately breaks through by the teacher's head replacing his alarm clock, biting his hand, and he wakes up from ANOTHER DREAM!!

But before Mel can go to the nurse, a creature attacks him from his homework, killing him, and he WAKES UP AGAIN. FUCK THIS.

We sneak in a few more yearbook murders, and let me tell you, this movie is lucky I am adding them to the body count list.

Then we go through a montage of chaos with people being killed, Armoldysandwich bringing more monsters to life, and generally wreaking havoc.

And really, points for the chaos montage, because it's fun and gets things over with so we can get to the ...plot.

Until the statue runs over Mel and he wakes up in bed AGAAAAAIN.

Who is driving? Oh my god, statue is driving! How can that be??

Then we have the kids going on a tour of the basement OH YAY SO MUCH FUN! and slowly being picked off when no one is looking. And the movie is even MORE lucky I am counting THOSE as well.

Once all that remains are the lead actors, they warn each other to not split up...and then proceed to do exactly that. Sigh.

Candy wanders outside and runs into Tango and Cash, who shoot at her immediately. So she naturally runs back into the basement.

They can't seem to figure out how to open the door, so summon down a third alien. Great, now they're Huey, Dewey, and Louie.

Norm stumbles into a room where Armandaleg is waiting, and they have a bit of a chat. "Why are you going to destroy the world?" "WHY NOT??" I...I'm not supposed to be AGREEING with the baddie, am I?

Armysurplus says it's simply TIME for the end of the world, the end of the millennium, but it's only 1989! So he informs us our calendars are all wrong and...he's not wrong. As long as we don't get into any 13/13/13 territory though...

He offers Norm the position of Doomsday prophet, but warns him that if he decides to do the prophet routine, no one will believe him. ... I need a prophet to spread my word, but if you're a prophet, no one will believe you. ASDFGHJKL

Meanwhile, Huey Dewey and Louie run afoul of the mummy, who rips their temp in half down the middle, returning them to just Dumb and Dumber. And they run off.

So, somehow, everyone gets back together, and none of the four have died. They all compare notes about what they saw and realise there's a whole lotta weird going on.

Paul's mummy shows up to try and kill him, and Candice ends the threat with the ol' hairspray and lighter trick.

The only casualties are Paul's shoes, which get soaked when they try and put them out. Paul and OD head to get them dried off, while Norm and Candy get buried in an earthquake

While Norm tries to find his way out, Candy is lured off by Aparkinglot's telepathic powers into the Die Hard edition air ducts.

Norm continues to try and spread the word to the nerds, but they won't believe him, as the doombringer said.

Another minor quake hits, and Norm declares that this is Biblical stuff, not fairy tales...ehhh, same diff…DAMNIT the movie beat me to the joke.

Fortunately, the nerds are soon taken care of when the Egbertron 5000 comes to life and murders them all.

I am as far above monsters as they are above humans!

Norm hears Candice scream and goes running to her, trying to get into the room where Armaretto has her at his mercy. He busts into the room and the doombringer disappears.

Meanwhile, the other two stick Paul's shoes in the microwave, our villain does his thing when no one is looking, and the shoes eat the only person with a normal name.

Yes. Eat him. And then grows a new monster from the fine red paste.

Norm leads the creature to the bathroom, where it runs into Mel, killing him, and OH MY GOD YOU KILLED KENNY…BUT IT WAS ALL A DREAM! And thus, in Mel X’s sixth life, he was killed once again, learning that the only constant was that Armageddon would rise no matter what they did. And this radicalised him.

Our two zeroes make their way to the sex ed classroom, and they have their romantic encounter at long last...while the living statue spies on them.

And on top of that, they slap a big CENSORED screen...and then show naked breasts anyways so...why?

Meanwhile, two teachers, John Doe and Miss Anne Thrope...oh just...just FUUUCK this movie. ANYWAYS, they're running from the killer pot plant.

The weed killer finds OD first, sucks him in, and despite warnings from the others, gets a killer high.

Before Norm and Candice can find the two teachers, Armageddonsickofthesejokes finds them first and belches them to fiery ash.

Wow. Scary Movie totally stole this bit.

Norm and Candice run outside to confront the doombringer and play a little fireball baseball. After a few hits, the bad guy gets bored and gets back to business.

At least, until Norm finally challenges him to a duel of wits!! Ah ha ha, not really, then we'd be really screwed. Instead, he challenges Armagellan to a game of skill. Oh we are SO SCREWED.

The game Norm challenges him to is...basketball. See how it all could have come together here?? But no, that would have been good plotting.

I would do anything for the end of the world, and I won't do that.

For his team, Armchairreferee recruits Turner and Hooch, the Egbot, the horny statue, the shoe creature, and the dickhead zombie. So now we're squawking Space Jam.

They waste no time in killing off the competition, which hardly seems fair. They also have the computational strength of a 286 processor, which somehow gives them a tactical advantage.

Candice has an idea though, and sneaks off with Norm to try and learn computer programming in five minutes so they can defeat the Egbot.

They locate the book, but that's when Zombie Dickhead finds them, and he's packin' heat. Well, that's creative, at least.

Zombie’s got a gun. This whole film’s fuckin’ dumb.

Oh, and Mel is there too, having slept through most of the attack until Norm gets defenestrated. But he thinks he's in another dream, so challenges the zombie to attack him.

Norm climbs back in the window, since they were on the first floor, and plunges a handy flagpole straight into the zombie's head.

Not surprisingly, Mel got bit, and becomes a zombie, which leads to a first for me; watching a woman slap fight a zombie.

Once again, the fate of the world lies in the hands of a 3.5" floppy disc.

They take the disc, run back to the gym, and with one player left alive, they sub in Norm so he can end this movie.

Norm inserts the disc, and now the robot will put the ball into the other team's basket, tying up the score for the big finale before I die.

With a few seconds left, Norm gets the ball, tosses it into the hoop and...okay. We’ve all seen that bit in a sports movie where the ball wobbles on the edge of the hoop for a second in a will it/won’t it way, for a second. This movie? This movie does it for a couple minutes. And I kinda love it.

Because of COURSE the game is tied at that score.

But eventually it DOES go in, and Norm has saved the world...for now. The end of the world has been postponed for 1000 years. So, someone mark that down on the calendar, yes?

And at the last second, OD comes back in, and he DIDN'T die, instead he smoked the weed to death. Again...Scary Movie totally stole that joke.

So the containment sphere is returned to Monty, where he blows it up, and... Wait so...Monster in Charge was pissed that Earth's demise was postponed. But the only reason it was happening today is because Armageddon was stolen. Which he was upset over, and not planned, and logic??

Why am I even bothering??

But the movie hits us with one final insult at the end of the credits where Mel wakes up and IT WAS ALL A DREAM!!

You know what? Fair. That’s fair. This is the ONE AND ONLY TIME I will accept this outcome.

TRISK ASSESSMENT

Video: Hey, it doesn’t look half bad, to be fair. A little dull, a little grainy, but for the nature of this beast, it’s probably as good as it gets.

Audio: Pretty standard stuff, but the voice modulation on Armageddon is intolerable at times.

Sound Bite: "Known affectionately to his friends as dickhead"

Body Count: For a movie that’s more of a comedy, it does not shy away from the murder. Even without all the off camera kills, it’s still quite a lot!

1 - Puppy gets squished by Armageddon's crate 4 minutes in

2 - Mr. Armageddon kills Annabel Lee

3 - Smythe becomes an instant zombie after death by condom.

4 - Betty Bruz is killed

5 - Barbara Bolimia is killed

6 - Beatrice Bedlam is killed

7 - Dickhead zombie kills a girl

8 - Little kid gets zapped by the aliens.

9 - Student gets killed by plants.

10 - Edgar gets turned into the roboNurse from Superman 3

11 - Abraham Ashe goes missing

12 - Then Beatrice.

13 - Then Emilia

14 - The mummy rips Louie in two.

15 - Candice flambes the mummy

16 - Paul gets turned into fine red paste by his shoes.

17, 18, 19 - Compubot zaps the three nerds.

20 - Mr. Armageddon toasts Anne

21 - And then Mr. Doe.

22 - Heckler gets killed by Armageddon

23 - Basketball player gets killed

24 - Zombie Dickhead dies again

25 - Another basketball player dies

26 - Mel gets zombitten and then killed for good.

27 - Another basketball players gets zapped by Gloom

28 - Armageddon gets killed by the Monster in Charge

Best Corpse: Paul’s death tops the charts, because anything that sprays that much red everywhere…

Blood Type - B-: Most of those points go to the above scene. There’s some other bits of blood, but overall, it’s pretty light, and the effects are adequate.

Sex Appeal: Gratutitous breasts sprinkled throughout.

Drink Up! Every time you roll your eyes.

Video Nasties: Welp, I guess it’s gotta be that death of Paul again…

Movie Review: Hssss. This…movie…manages to be put together fairly well at least. The acting isn’t horrible, even if there’s a lot of scenery chewing. But it just tries so AGGRESSIVELY HARD to be funny. Every moment has to go for a joke. All the punny names. It’s just…wait. WAS THIS A GARBAGE PAIL KIDS MOVIE THAT DIDN’T PASS MUSTER BUT THE WRITER WENT AND MADE IT ANYWAYS?? Did…I think I just cracked the code. That makes SO MUCH SENSE, it has that same sense of humour. The plot is okayish, if confounding in the necessary logic. It’s just…such a grueling trip. Two out of five banishment spheres.

Entertainment Value: I spent 90 minutes bashing my head on the desk. This movie is face punchingly bad, but not quite as much as Reign of Man, at least. There is very little joy to find here. The camp is fun at times, but it needs to take things down to like…a seven.. I am entertained but for all the WRONG reasons, as I watch this fascinating train wreck. Two out of five cans o’ condom.