During the assloads of time I spent in Jersey over the years, it could hardly be considered classified info that the god-awful smell I'd encounter from time to time was due to the inordinate number of toxic waste dumps in the state(your nostrils can try any one of one hundred and eight out for size these days, bound to have you even screaming your way into Cleveland, Ohio for sinus relief...okay, maybe I'm exagerrating slightly).It can now be argued that the putrefying stench hovering over most of the Garden State can mostly be attributed to the 2010 cinematic effort of one Bill Zebub of Clifton, the imaginatively...ahem... titled "Night of the Pumpkin".From the first glance at the colorful dvd box art I'm swept back to eighties VHS racks full of shot on video shlock packed with naked blood-splashed mid-shelf bimbos who can't even die on camera properly, and those obtuse evenings when you threw caution to the wind and grabbed one, knowing full well you'd just lost upwards of eighty minutes of your life forever.I realize first glances can sometimes be deceiving, but trust me, kiddies, this ain't one of 'em.Judging by the country mile of dialogue Zebub replaces most of the cheap gore with, I'm guessing he was shooting for something more than your average retro-eighties slasher here, but the clumsy delivery of a cast comprised mainly of the director's friends(and the director himself, who stars btw) occludes any chance of that happening.It should be noted there is a pretty mint-looking severed head prop(more of this would have helped), ample nudity(Angelina Leigh, a Playboy model/B-movie scream queen, provides the only stare-worthy wares, IMHO), and some decent soundtrack tunes provided by French dark ambient unit, Elend, English doom metallers, My Dying Bride, and Finnish gothic doom outfit, Shape of Despair, among others.Alas, it's not enough to keep the majority of the movie from nose-diving into Nowheresville, which I suspect must be a neighboring town to Manville, NJ.That's a little Jersey-based inside joke right there.Onwards!
Insert your own pumpkins/breasts analogy here, would you, ferchrissakes?
After a pair of bikini-clad beachgoers play a spirited game of "Drop" with a frisbee, they notice some pumpkins washing ashore amidst the rocks.Naturally, the destructive dames stomp the pulp out of the gourds until their lower extremities are covered in a strange red ooze.Cut to a grizzled metalhead named Dave(Bill Zebub)and a female friend at a library discussing a theme for that party, uh, my party tonight.Nevermind, keep rolling.Up traipses a half-dressed blonde who pouts her every line like Marilyn Monroe on a Pentobarbital bender.Cut to a brunette-in-the-grass, naked except for some black stockings(exposed outer labia are a recurring image here).She wakes up as she's being raped by a guy in a latex pumpkin mask, some silk fall leaf roping, a blue flannel jacket, and work gloves(he's referred to as "giant pumpkin" by the characters from here on in), and abruptly slinks off on all fours, jutting her meaty ass into the air like an alleycat on the make, before flopping around in the grass with a neck full of stage blood like a spastic who got into the jam jar.Elyse(Kellyn Lindsay) and Elizabeth(Chelsea O'Toole) have a cellphone convo about the get-together that night which dissolves into a religious debate.Apparently, Elizabeth, the blonde in a sheer black catsuit and bulky metal-esque pendant, is a devout christian.If she's a religious zealot, I'd hate to see the devil worshippers.Soon enough, the banal phone chatter is broken by a cut to another bloody brunette stumbling away from Pumpkin Man in a field that segues into the tail end of some uninspired looking simulated sex between Barbara(Angelina Leigh) and Peter, and while the brunette lathers up in the rainbox(more exposed pussylip shots), her old man is set upon by plastic vines while he obliviously jams to his Discman.She exits in a towel to find his severed head(very choice as far as disembodied heads go) on the floor and Pumpy-kins awaiting her.Naturally, she drops the towel and offers her body to him(more lip).Cut to Dave and Jen(Shoshana McCallum) still arguing about the impending get-together/party."For somebody who's into opera, you're very un-mature.", he scolds.
One minute of good head.If this movie were a first date, I'd have reservations about a second one.
Their argument is interrupted by a phone call from Fred(George Stiso), who's got a naked Barbara on his couch, in shock from Peter's violent end at the gloves of a giant pumpkin.He tells her she's not a good actress.He ain't kidding.Jen slags it all off on Barb's occasional acid usage.Pumpkin Man shows up.Fred shoots him, but Barb, standing directly behind, takes the bullet to the labonza instead(more pussy lip), and Fred is set upon by the plastic vines.Elizabeth shows up at Dave and Jen's place in a Playboy Bunny costume, and before you know it, Dave's in a plastic viking helmet, playing with a Home Shopping Network samurai sword(that's diversity, baby), and three girls are yapping it up on a couch about the origins of Halloween.Some witch next door calls to complain about the noise.Personally, I'd have called about the acting, but that's just me.Pumpkin Man shows up and the girls ward him off with the urgency of a bank account earning interest, while Dave pratfalls around the apartment.The girls sit around and calmly discuss the giant pumpkin's origins and raison d'être(!), even explaining away the reason the pseudopod(!) hand they sword-chopped off is now just a glove full of silk leaves, or rather, a plant that looks like a glove.The unfrightened group ventures out into the night woods(translation:day woods with a filtered lens)and does a lot more talking while Pumpy-kins does some spirited grab-tittin' on the chunky sedated-looking blonde, bound by silk leaves and bareassed(more puss), from earlier in the story.They kill her creepy stalker, who just happens to be dressed exactly like the Pumpkin Man.The real giant pumpkin shows up, and lots of discussion follows(while he stands idly by) until it snaps Dave's neck with its vines, causing him to shoot the naked blonde in the labonza.Elyse and Jen square off against the pumpkin monster in the woods, smashing its head off with a tree branch, and explaining their lack of emotion during the ordeal as a psychological side effect of the trauma that befell them(couldn't be the lack of acting chops, could it).The giant pumpkin ressurects itself with Peter's head on top, braining a running Elyse with the disembodied dome and growing another pumpkin in its place and stomping hers into pulp off-camera.Back at the house, Jen throws on some opera and recites some long winded poetry to the monster, who's moved enough to spare her.We see Jen being roughhoused at the "Clifton Mental Asylum".After all that, they oughta reserve a padded room for me, too.
"Put some clothes on, baby, Michael's is having a half off sale on silk fall leaf roping!"
This review goes out to my compadre, Randy O, who turned me on to this, errrm, gem.There's a retaliatory Andy Milligan marathon with your name on it in the near future, motherfucker.Mind you, I'm not anti-Jersey over here, I've partied it up with some great people, slung fists in some amazing circle pits, and made out with a few choice Jersey chicks in my day.Hell, judging by the soundtrack and some of the movie posters adorning walls in this one, I'd merit a guess that I could even get down on some level with Zebub and his pals, it's just this particular movie that eats it raw, balls n' all.It doesn't succeed as a mindless slasher, and the budgetary confinements and "acting" keep it from being anything more than one.I wouldn't recommend it to you Woprophiles, but you might wanna give it a look anyway if you're into micro-budgeted schlock.What the hell do I know, I'm just one wop, which, coincidentally...
"You're not gonna believe this. He killed sixteen Czechoslovakians. Guy was an interior decorator.", says Paulie Walnuts, lost in the Pine Barrens.
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