A cantankerous old man (Hy Pyke) is the leader of some nondescript cult that offers sacrifices during Halloween. His life goal seems to be getting his creepy grandson/actual son (we're not sure) Tommy (Gregory Scott Cummins as an adult, Bryson Gerard as a child) to join the world's most generic sect. Will he join? Will he stand up to his weirdo grandpappy? Most importantly, will you care?
This one came out in 1988, the time when the 80's slashers from the early part of the decade began to morph into dime a dozen, watered down versions of the classics--Hack-O-Lantern is an oddity that both fits this mold, but also brings enough of the absolutely bizarre to stand out a bit. The movies has what you expect from 1980's slashers, but the ratio of what you get is not the standard formula, as the blood is fairly minimal, while the amount of nudity is much more than in most similar movies. The acting is bad...really bad. Pyke is less sinister and more fingernails on a chalkboard irritating, and it doesn't get a lot better from there. There's not a lot in the form of scares with this movie either, and several parts of the film include scenes straight out of left field. At one point, adult Tommy dreams of being in a music video with the band D.C. Lacroix (credited as D.C. La Croix)--if this isn't weird enough, the video includes the other band members being zapped away by laser beams from the obligatory glam-metal "hot chick" of the video, and it ends with the same model beheading Tommy. If that's not enough, there is also a scene of a stripper at a Halloween party, and another dancer with a snake--there seems no reason for either to be there, but we do see the stripper as a different (?) character in another scene. Still not enough? How about a random stand-up comedy routine just outside the party? I'm not making this up, I promise. Finally, to put a bow on all the unusualness, Massacre Video, who own the rights to the movie, sued a YouTube user for streaming the movie illegally...and took it to People's Court...in 2021! I had no idea that television show even made it into the 21st Century! If you're curios, the Plaintiffs won.
The climax includes hilariously bad fight scenes, a bit of a twist, and a cheeky final few seconds. Is Hack-O-Lantern a good horror film? No, it certainly isn't. However, if you are into complete acts of randomness, you may want to hunt this movie down...legally, of course.
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