Jack-O (1995)

Yesterday I was talking about low budget direct-to-video films ripping off big budget action flicks, but, in truth, a film doesn't have to be a blockbuster to get ripped off.  I recently watched Jack-O (1995), for instance, which has often been accused of ripping off the better known, but still low budget, Pumpkinhead (1988). For sure, both feature a pumpkin-headed supernatural monster on a mission of vengeance and share a small-town/backwoods setting, but, in truth, the plot details of the two movies vary considerably.  At best, one might say that Jack-O was inspired by Pumpkinhead, rather than being a direct knock off of the earlier film.  Jack-O's budget is clearly, even by low budget standards well, low.  This is evidenced in the fact that the director's son plays the main juvenile lead and many of the interiors were shot in the director's house.  The director himself actually appears, playing a cable TV installer, (who appears to be working in the middle of the night - I remember when I had NTL you couldn't get their engineers out in daylight hours, let alone any other time).  Moreover, many of the optical effects are pretty basic and the night time cinematography murky.  Yet it remains a surprisingly enjoyable film.  Not only does it muster a reasonable-looking monster, but it also features appearances from a number of low-budget icons, most prominent of whom is Linnea Quigley.  The makers could only afford her for three days of shooting and a lot of that time looks like it was spent on her first appearance - a totally gratuitous shower scene. Don't get me wrong - it was very enjoyable, but the scene has no relevance whatsoever to the rest of the film.  Quigley is far and away the most likeable character in the film and looks to be shaping up to be a Laurie Strode-type babysitting heroine.  Unfortunately, her short shooting schedule means that she vanishes for long periods and, most crucially, is absent for the climactic fight with the monster.

Also appearing are John Carradine, (in footage shot seven years earlier, presumably for a different project), and Cameron Mitchell, who appears as a horror host the young hero watches on TV.  Both would be dead by the time the film debuted.  Jack-O, unusually for such a low-budget production, also features a sub-text about tolerance and extremism.  This is mostly manifested via the ultra-conservative couple who spend their time berating trick-or-treating kids for 'wanting something for nothing' and watching a Rush Limbaugh-type extreme right wing commentator on TV, who advocates extreme violence against 'liberals'.   Clearly, we are meant to draw a parallel between their intolerance of difference and different belief systems and the historic persecution and hanging of an alleged witch which resulted in the creation of the film's monster.  The monster has been accidentally resurrected in the present, (due to the regulation graveyard antics of a bunch of teenagers early in the movie), and now seeks to fulfil a curse placed on the descendants of the witch persecutors by the long dead John Carradine.  The film eventually resolves into the usual series of chases as various characters try to evade the monster.  The Halloween setting is used to good effect, with the creature initially dismissed as just another costumed kid out trick-or-treating.  One of the film's fundamental problems, though, is that most of those actually killed by the monster are peripheral characters, with no particular connection to its main targets.  Not only does this considerably reduce the tension by meaning that the main characters never really seem to be in peril most of the time, but most of the actual victims of the monster are simply too lightly sketched in for the audience to care about them.  Nonetheless, despite its limitations, the movie is an entertaining watch, maintaining a sense of fun and keeping its tongue firmly in its cheek.