POPCORN (1991)

Studio:       Synapse Films
Director:    Mark Herrier, Alan Ormsby
Writer:       Tod Hackett
Producer:  Torben Johnke, Gary Goch, Ashok Amritraj
Stars:     Jill Schoelen, Tom Villard, Dee Wallace, Derek Rydall, Tony Roberts, Ray Walston, Kelly Jo Minter

Review Score:

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Summary:

A college film club stages a horror movie marathon, but they are stalked by a figure that might be a mysterious cult leader who died in a theater fire many years ago.

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Synopsis:     Show/Hide Spoilers

Film student Maggie has a disturbing dream where she is a little girl named Sarah running from a fire and tormented by a strange man. Maggie’s mother Suzanne receives a threatening phone call. She then asks her daughter about the dreams and the name Sarah.

Maggie speaks with her boyfriend Mark on the way to film class with fellow students Bud, Leon, Cheryl, Tina, and Joannie. Instructor Mr. Davis announces to everyone that their classmate Toby has come up with a horror movie marathon as a fundraiser. Their plan is to show William Castle-style gimmick movies. The lineup includes “Mosquito” in 3D Project-o-Vision, “The Stench” in Aroma-Rama, and “The Attack of the Amazing Electrified Man” in Shock-o-Scope.

The class arrives at the Dreamland Theater for preparations. The theater is scheduled to be torn down in three weeks. Movie memorabilia man Dr. M lends them the equipment needed to transform the theater. While setting up, the class discovers an old movie reel that they decide to play.

Maggie passes out while watching the film, as it resembles her dream. When she recovers, Mr. Davis explains that the movie is called “The Possessor” and was made by a man named Lanyard Gates. Gates led a film cult in the 60’s that dropped acid and made avant-garde movies. Mr. Davis was briefly a follower. After being laughed at, Gates shot all of “The Possessor” except for the last scene. At the screening, the last scene was played live for the audience. On stage, Gates murdered his family and set fire to the theater and locked the doors. Later, Maggie asks her mother about Lanyard Gates and Suzanne denies knowing who he is. She asks Maggie to quit the festival and go on a trip with her. Maggie refuses to run away.

Suzanne receives another threatening phone call and goes to the theater with a gun. Outside the theater, the marquee letters fly off and “The Possessor” appears in their place as the title. She explores the theater while the movie plays but arms reach out and pull her into the darkness.

Maggie is working the festival box office when Mark shows up with a girl named Joy. A strange man buys a ticket and mentions “The Possessor” to Maggie while calling her Sarah. Maggie searches for the man among the audience. Mark leaves Joy to buy popcorn when the first feature starts.

In the projection booth, Maggie tells Toby she saw Lanyard Gates. Toby goes looking for Gates and ends up locked outside. A large man takes Mark’s seat next to Joy. Mark startles Maggie in the projection booth. During the movie, Mr. Davis launches a giant mosquito prop over the audience, but gloved hands on another remote assume control. The prop turns around and races back to its starting point, where Mr. Davis is impaled by the stinger. The killer drags the body to a lab where he manufactures synthetic skin masks. Maggie tells Mark that she believes Gates thinks she is his daughter. Toby returns to the booth and Maggie returns to the box office.

The second feature begins. Mark returns to his seat but is punched out by the man now sitting with Joy. Tina looks backstage for Mr. Davis. Maggie listens to voice notes on her tape recorder and finds a message from Gates, but accidentally smashes it against a door when she opens it on Mark. Tina finds Mr. Davis and starts kissing him, but pulls away the skin on his face and reveals that he is the deformed killer. He kills her and uses her body like a puppet to fool Mark and Maggie. The killer dresses as Tina and electrocutes Bud as he operates the seat buzzers, which causes a power outage. The students put a reggae band onstage to pacify the audience. Maggie looks for Bud and the killer confronts her. As she runs away, she has memory flashbacks revealing that she survived the theater fire and is actually Gates’ daughter. Maggie finds Toby and tells him about her memories. Suzanne is really her aunt and is the one who saved Sarah/Maggie on the night of the fire. Joy sees Maggie and Toby together. Toby leads Maggie to the basement where she is suddenly confronted by figures of her dead classmates. Power is restored and the third film begins.

Maggie is now strapped to a chair. Toby reveals that he is the deformed killer and has been using his masks and electronic voice harmonics to impersonate other people. His mother was in Gates’ film cult. He and his mother were in the front row 15 years ago at the theater fire. She died and he was left physically and mentally scarred.

Joy finds Mark in the lobby and tells him that she saw Maggie leave with Toby. Cheryl beats up the bully who punched Mark and throws him out along with Joy. Mark goes to Toby’s house to look for Maggie. Toby reveals that Suzanne is still alive and is encased in a mobile body cast like a statue. Leon goes to the bathroom. Dressed as Leon’s double, Toby traps Leon in a stall and explodes the toilet. He then goes to kill Joannie, but runs off in frustration when she reveals that she has a crush on Toby.

Toby starts preparing the stage for a grand display. Mark realizes Toby is a lunatic when he visits his apartment and discovers Toby’s obsession with Lanyard Gates and the theater fire. He finds pictures of Maggie as well and runs back to the theater. Toby interrupts the film to play “The Possessor.” The audience boos. Cheryl and Joannie are unable to turn it off. Toby plans to recreate the final scene. The screen goes up to show Maggie and Suzanne trapped onstage. Thinking it is an act, the audience cheers Toby as he prepares to kill Maggie. Mark makes it inside and uses the mosquito cables like a zipline to get to the stage and distract Toby. This short circuits the mosquito prop, which then travels down to the stage and impales Toby. Maggie and Mark later embrace outside of the theater.

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Review:

Every now and again a movie comes along that stumps you when it comes time to write the review.  It is usually an unexpected title.  Something that one might not think would cause so much consternation.  “Popcorn” is one of those films.

Reviewing it for being a genre movie at its core, it demanded a negative critique.  But I felt guilty going that route because of how much I smiled while watching it.  I thought about writing two separate reviews.  Maybe even in two separate voices.  Like Statler and Waldorf of “The Muppets,” except with one of them actually liking what he saw.  Eventually I realized I was making this review much more difficult than it needed to be.

This one is very easy.  If your taste in horror mandates a serious tone, let’s say “The Shining” or “Last House on the Left,” then “Popcorn” is definitely not for you.  It may even foster frustration and resentment in between eye rolls.  If, on the other hand, you can stomach unintentional silliness and occasionally look the other way when it comes to ridiculous plot elements, then you might have some fun.

At the risk of sounding like Bill Hader’s Stefon character from “Weekend Update” on “Saturday Night Live,” this might be the best way to put it:

This movie has everything: A Toyota-sized animatronic mosquito, people wearing clothespins on their noses, E.T.’s mom, the Max Rebo band dressed as the Village People playing reggae music, My Favorite Martian, a man who wears skin masks like he is Nicolas Cage in “Face/Off,” electrocutions, an acid-dropping film cult, death by exploding toilet, and not one, not two, but three (technically four if you count “The Possessor”) more horror movies within the movie.

None of that is made up.  Colorfully worded for an exaggerated effect, yes.  But all of the above is actually in the movie, and then some.  Dialogue is absurd.  (Make sure you’re not drinking anything when the last line of the movie is said, lest you wish to do an unintentional spit take all over your couch.  Make sure that you are drinking beforehand, however.  And heavily.)  The acting is, well, not great.  Neither is the staging.  (Refer to the scene where Mark loses his popcorn after a punch in the face.)  Yet somehow everything that can be criticized about the film comes together as something enjoyable when taken as a whole.  It is a brisk 90 minutes too, with quite a bit packed into it.

Imagine if instead of music, the Manson Family made avant-garde movies after an acid trip.  That is what the cult of Popcorn’s Lanyard Gates did.  When critics ravaged his work, Gates had his revenge with “The Possessor.”  Staging the last act of the film live gave him the opportunity to kill everyone in the theater, presumably even himself, when Gates set the place on fire.  Years later, a girl who may be related to Gates suspects he has returned to kill her film school classmates as they stage a horror movie marathon for a fundraiser.

The movie marathon provides a great milieu.  The audience shows up dressed for the marathon as if they are at San Diego Comic-Con.  There isn’t a masquerade contest or anything.  The majority of them just felt like ambitious costumes were appropriate for the event, I suppose.

The marathon itself consists of three separate faux horror films, each with its own William Castle-esque gimmick ranging from 3D to jolting seats to “Aroma-rama.”  These movies are almost as goofy as “Popcorn” itself.  The actors do not have that 1950’s look, even though the films themselves do.  But they are an interesting enough distraction.

Behind-the-scenes issues reportedly plagued the production.  One result of these troubles was the employment of two different directors on the film.  That might explain some of the plot gaps and tonal changes.  When examined after the fact, the film does not exactly hold water.  Once the story behind the movie marathon murders is revealed, you can think back on the scene where Dee Wallace confronts a supernatural theater marquee and realize it does not fit with what happened.  Although learning from the credits that “Popcorn” was shot in Jamaica explains the otherwise bizarre inclusion of a reggae band that provides no less than three songs.  I guess it evens out.

Why someone would bring a crew from Los Angeles to Jamaica to make a film set in L.A. is up for debate.  Particularly when 98% of the scenes are interiors.  Hey, it’s just one more nonsensical curiosity that adds to the movie’s charm.

Even though it was released in 1991, “Popcorn” is a prime example of a fun 80’s horror movie.  Turn down your nose for an hour and a half and indulge in some unmotivated lights with red and green party gels.  It is the type of movie that Rhonda Shear would have hosted on “USA Up All Night” back in the 90’s.  (Maybe she did.)  If those are references that bring back memories and make you smile, then you know exactly what I mean.

Review Score:  65

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