You know it’s been a slow year for good horror films when you can say a movie with a title like “JACK BROOKS: MONSTER SLAYER” is one of the best films you’ve seen so far this year. Well folks; that is the case here, at least in my opinion. What this film does in all honesty is take us back to a time when CGI didn’t exist and when monsters were created with imagination and style.
JACK BROOKS: MONSTER SLAYER is about a guy named Jack Brooks (Trevor Matthews) whom when he was younger was on a camping trip with his family when a monster came out of the woods and killed his parents and his sister. Jack got away, and years later is working as a plumber. However, Jack’s got issues, anger issues that he just can’t seem to control. He sees a therapist to try to help him out, but the advice does not seem to be helping him. Jack has also started taking science classes at night with his girlfriend Eve (Rachel Skarsten). Eve is a pain in the ass, and Jack rarely hangs out with her as she seems to be up his ass about everything. Professor Crowley (Robert Englund) is their science teacher, and one night after class he asks Jack to stay after, Jack thinks his days in the class are over because of his tardiness. However, Professor Crowley asks Jack if he can come back to his place to fix a plumbing issue. Jack agrees. While there the plumbing goes haywire, and Jack tells the Professor there is a big problem and he’ll have to go and order some parts to fix the mess. After Jack leaves weird things begin to happen and the professor finds himself digging a hole in his yard where he finds a crate with a body in it, and a black heart. The heart begins to take life and the professor finds himself becoming one with the heart. Soon all hell breaks loose as the professor becomes a monster and begins to create monsters of his own out of his students. The only person that can stop him is Jack, with a pipe in one hand and a plumbers wrench in the other.
Early reviews for this monster movie have been mostly positive, and while I agree that it is a really fun monster movie to watch its content is very unoriginal, while it’s story is different. Jack can be compared to the likes of Ash from the EVIL DEAD films. He has witty one liners, can be sort of a wimp and a hard ass when he wants to be, and uses an array of weapons to do damage with. The story takes its roots from the likes of films like MEN IN BLACK, SLITHER, and HELLBOY among many others. You can basically say it’s a bunch of well known horror, sci-fi and fantasy films thrown in a blender with some of the better details of each coming to light. The script is decent, and the characters are pretty well written, especially Jack. the dialogue is very well written as well, and there are plenty of great memorable one liners. The story is a bit all over the place, especially with it’s locations and the pacing of getting the man goal of the story in focus, but once it get’s going, it’s a really fun movie to watch.
The acting in the film is not half bad. I was very surprised by Trevor Matthews performance in the film, you figure a guy who created the story for this movie and produced it would also have a hard time acting in the role. Many people would just say he wrote the role for himself and didn’t want any other actor playing it. I say good for him, because he was probably the best actor this film had. I even found his performance better than veteran horror actor Robert Englund. Not to take anything away from Englund of course, he was good in this film as well, and had a lot more acting and stunts to do in this film than Matthews did, I just felt that this film belonged to Matthews more. But overall, besides the two of them, the rest of the performances were so-so. Nothing good, but nothing half bad either.
The production value for this movie is actually where the film has it’s strength. While we can dismiss it’s easy locations of a school, hardware store, homes and your basic streets and sidewalks. the real major set design that is an eye catcher is Professor Crowley’s home. It has this ADAM FAMILY like spookiness to it. But the real star of this film is the effects, all of which was make-up and puppets. Not one bit of CGI was used to make this film. The effects are really good and give us that great throwback feel to the monsters and creature effects of the movies from the past. BRAIN DEAD is one that comes to mind, and speaking of Peter Jackson films there is even a creature in this movie that looks like an ork from LORD OF THE RINGS. Pretty much in a nutshell this movies make-up effects are what makes it enjoyable to watch.
Overall, I had a blast with this movie, sure it’s low budget and it does have a few minor flaws here and there, and yes it’s not the most original horror film, but it was a lot of fun to watch, and it had some good comedy skits. It’s not over the top scary, as it has more of that B-movie type wackiness to its effects. But it is a fun popcorn movie to watch with friends and have a good time with. It’s one of the better Independent horror movies I’ve seen this year.
– Horror Bob
- Interview with J.R. Bookwalter - January 22, 2015
- Interview with Andrew J. Rausch - January 22, 2015
- Interview with Rick Popko and Dan West - January 22, 2015
- Interview with Director Stevan Mena (Malevolence) - January 22, 2015
- Interview with Screenwriter Jeffery Reddick (Day of the Dead 2007) - January 22, 2015
- Teleconference interview with Mick Garris (Masters of Horror) - January 22, 2015
- A Day at the Morgue with Corri English (Unrest) - January 22, 2015
- Interview with Writer/Director Nacho Cerda (The Abandoned, Aftermath) - January 22, 2015
- Interview with Actress Thora Birch (Dark Corners, The Hole, American Beauty) - January 22, 2015
- Interview with Actor Jason Behr, Plus Skinwalkers Press Coverage - January 22, 2015
