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Master of the B movie Richard Elfman brings us a tale of 3 kids out to avenge their own deaths and put an end to a neighborhood gang of hoodlums. Sounds like a typical plot...but there's a twist: They have no bodies!
For those of you who were waiting for Richard Elfman (the director of the brilliant Forbidden Zone) to return to the cinema and finally follow up his masterpiece, this movie might not be what you expect. Elfman is known for outrageous characters and chaotic nonsense warped into something that actually makes sense. Besides the shrunken heads flying around with no bodies, Shrunken Heads takes a more subtle approach. But make no mistake, Richard Elfman's twisted handprints are all over this movie!
Like it's predecessor The Forbidden Zone, Shrunken Heads takes us to a world of its own liking where there are only reflections of a time or era that we might be familiar with. This might make some viewers feel uncomfortable. For me, it only expands the possibilities and exercises the imagination. Tim Burton (an obvious influence-ie of Elfman) captured a similar world in Edward Scissorhands.
Critics may not like Shrunken Heads for the same reasons they don't like other Full Moon movies. It does not fit into the intellectual box that most critics have constructed around cinema as far as pacing and originality are concerned. My advice to the viewer of this movie: if you don't over-analyze it, you will find its compelling qualities. I am not a qualified movie critic (obviously), but I like horror movies, and I thoroughly enjoyed this one.
score 10/10
mopedcecil 1 April 2003
Reprint: https://www.imdb.com/review/rw0349656/ |
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22-2-2021 12:06:02