Genre: Horror/Thriller
Director: Tobe Hooper
Starring: Dan Byrd, Denise Crosby
RunTime: 1 hr 33 mins
Released By: GV
Rating: NC-16
Official Website: http://www.mortuarythemovie.com/

Opening Day: 20 July 2006

Synopsis :

When the Fowler family moves to a small town in California, they plan on starting a new life... Perhaps a strange choice, seeing as this new life entails running the long-abandoned Fowler Brothers Funeral Home. The locals fear the place, and there are whispers around town that the land that the home lies on is haunted. The Fowler Family will soon discover that something lurks beneath Arkham - something that raises the corpses from long-forgotten graves and feeds on death itself.

Movie Review:

Yet another US straight-to-DVD, cable TV feature has hit our theatrical shores. The B-grade material that this movie works with actually comes from first-rate horror pedigree in its director, Tobe Hooper. Yes, the same man that brought us cinematic classics like Poltergeist and The Texas Chainsaw Massacre (1974). Working mostly in TV and DVD features these days is surely nothing to scoff at but if you’ve followed Tobe Hooper’s body of work since the 80s, you might not have been surprised at the natural course that his inconsistent talents has taken him.

Horror movies need a steady hand and a creative mind to jazz up a poor script and to scare audiences witless. Unfortunately, Mortuary has no such inspiration. It doesn’t even try, which makes it all the more frustrating to watch, as you just can’t see what this movie is trying to be. Elements of comedy and romance are all sprinkled into the film, making it seems like a long forgotten TV episode script that was padded for a quick feature release.

There’s something peculiar about the tone of this movie. It wants you to believe that it’s a serious horror film involving a family who just moved into a small town with a creepy assortment of townsfolk, the haunted mortuary where they live and a monster that raises the dead. But it’s really not. I decided that this was a homage to campy 80s horror with the requisite bad costumes, the scream queens and the corny dialogue. It shares a lot with a recently released Boy Eats Girl and to a less extent, Slither, which was vastly better. But these films had direction and an underlying purpose. They knew what they were trying to do by infusing comedy and horror to create a spoof of the embarrassingly unintentional hilarity of some of the 80s monster films.

And unintentional hilarity is something this film excels at. What a genuine throwback to the days of the B-movie culture with its clichéd and under-wrought death scenes. What else can I classify evil zombie fungus under? However, I just can’t believe that the film was meant to be a parody of those oft-forgotten films. What I can believe is that it’s a parody of itself.

But lo’ and behold, there’s a shining light in this dank and forsaken pit that this movie crawled out from. If you’ve seen the admirable remake of The Hills Have Eyes, you’d have probably noticed the harried teenager played by Dan Byrd. He was impressive in his role then as he is in Mortuary, which was actually shot before he started on The Hills Have Eyes. With a weak script and an even weaker supporting cast, he manages to actually look like he gave a damn. Something I wished the director had. This feature certainly belies the decades of experience that Tobe Hooper should have brought to the project.

Movie Rating:

(Could have been decent with some purpose but with its low production values and under-whelming direction, it’s a waste of time and money)

Review by Justin Deimen