Thursday, September 9, 2010

Troll 2 (1990) On Further Review


Worst film ever made?

I think not.

Roger Ebert tells of being handed a copy of the film and being told that since he didn't have time to search out the worst film ever made, this person would make it easier for him. Ebert tells the story as part of his review for The Best Worst Film, which is a documentary about the making of the film made by people in the film.

I'm not saying that this is a good film.

I'm not.

But at the same time I'm not saying it's the best bad film or the worst bad film. All I'm saying is it's a bad film and probably should be just left in a pile somewhere.

The plot of the film has something to do with a kid and his family ending up in a house in a town where goblins eat people.

Its got bad acting, cheap special effects, bad Halloween masks for monsters, and poor direction. It's a crappy little film of the sort that got one week releases to sucker unsuspecting crowds in. (Actually this was filmed as Goblin, then the title was changed to cash in on the Troll bandwagon...yeah right)

How did this film get the reputation as the best worst film? Certainly it is a party film, but even so there are better choices.

Actually what I'm guessing is that the cast of the film started to hawk the film as something special because it gives meaning to them. I mean why else take the time to make a documentary 20 years after the fact, and why would you go around to the various film and horror conventions saying that they were part of this? Honestly if I saw someone listed from this I'd wonder, why would you say you were in it as if it was something like Insert Big Blockbuster Here? I think in the process of hawking themselves people started to get the film into their heads as being something special.

There are worse films, both in a good way and a bad way. I mean my worst of the year list includes such "winners" as Paranormal Entity (a rip off of Paranoral Activity), Circle Of 8 (a dreadful online serial turned feature film, 2022 Tsunami (a Thai disaster film with one of the most out-there scripts I've ever run across), Look @ Me (a thriller about a web cam girl being kidnapped), Buried Land, and Zaat (one of the worst men in suit films ever and was featured on Mystery Science Theater 3000).

As a bad movie lover I really wish that people would stop handing out monikers like "Best Bad" or "Worst Of All Time" because frankly most of the films given those titles aren't the bottom of the barrel. The titles are picked up by people who only want to put their toe into the scum pond of cinematic drek and not dive in and find the true wrecks under the surface. As someone who's spent many an hour in the cess pit I know what's good and what's bad in the film world and frankly Troll 2 really doesn't rate.

(A word of warning: beginning October 25 and running through Halloween Unseen Films will be pluming the depths of real cinematic badness with a series of Horrible Horrors, some of the worst films we've ever run across. These are films that will make Troll 2 pale in comparison.)

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