A four chapter
horror anthology which opens up with the
first chapter titled Terror
in Topagna of a woman
named Lisa (Cristina Raines) who leaves
her house late at night to drive to the
store in order to buy cigarettes which
her husband Phil (Joe Lambie) is nagging
her to quit Meanwhile a killer is loose
and she finds out from her neighbor while
walking his dog when she pulls out of the
driveway, wherever she goes, she
encounters strange people along the way
which makes her feel unsafe including
local employees at a corner store and gas
station.
The second
chapter is called Bishop
of Battle of
an arcade whiz kid named J.J. Cooney
(Emilio Estevez) of his obsession with a
game in the mall that no one can beat and
the only way to win is to pass level.
No one believes that level exists until
J.J. tries to beat the game. But his
parents ground him for missing out on his
homework as well as stealing quarters
from them to continue playing the game.
He sneaks out at night and breaks into
the mall to continue playing it until he
makes it to level 13 but then deadly
consequences occur as the characters in
the game come to life.
In the third
chapter The
Benediction a
small town priest named MacLeod (Lance
Henriksen) who also runs a funeral home
loses his faith and decides to leave town
but while he's in the desert he is
stalked by a mysterious black pick-up
truck that tires to kill him. Could the
truck be driven by Lucifer himself?
The fourth and
final chapter is called Night
of the Rat a family's
problem with a rat is larger than they
think as it's a rat from hell. First it
kills the family's cat, then it sabotages
a little girls room except for her
stuffed toy mouse and then starts tearing
at the walls of the house as it wants
something that they have.
The first two chapters were
great it seemed like the best one of them
all.
Terror in Topaganda
was very original, dark and spooky as you
wonder what can happen driving alone at
night just to buy some cigarettes at a
corner store when a killer is on the
loose as you know it's too silent and
strange that the terror will happen
eventually.
The Bishop of
Battle was my favourite chapter
of all time bringing back the memories of
the video game craze in shopping malls.
This one seemed to borrow heavily from Stephen
King's novel of Christine
with a boy's obsession on something and
nothing will stop him.
However, now the chapters
start to weaken when I tell you the
lowdown on the other two.
The Benediction
seemed to go nowhere and was almost like
a ripoff to the Exorcist
as well. All it was about was a priest
being terrorised by a truck from hell in
a deserted area.
Night of the Rat
was dark and effective with lots of
chills but it was too disturbing when a
cat gets killed since I'm a cat lover but
of course it was the films drawing card
once you watch the whole chapter to it
and the cat was never harmed in any way
in reality too so you gotta look at it
that way.
The
acting in the film is well performed in
all the chapters.
However, the first chapter Terror
in Topaganda was a wee bit rough
but still enjoyable by lead actress Cristina
Raines as she did well at being
tense as well as playing a good person
feeding her addiction to smoking.
Joe Lambie however who played
her husband could've been better but he
wasn't lousy.
In The
Bishop of Battle we spot quite a
young teenaged Emilio Estevez
who does wonderful as an typical teenaged
kid obsessed by a video game as he really
brings it out with his role. He's a
multi-talented actor regardless.
Billy Jacoby is also good as his
insecure friend and plays his role off
well.
Moon Unit Zappa looked stunning
in her role as a typical teen hanging out
at the arcade mall.
Louis Giambalvo was believable
as a stubborn and strict parent. Two
thumbs up for him.
In The
Benediction Lance Henricksen
played a perfect and tense priest in the
film but his acting skills were always up
there with every film he did.
Night
of the Rat had a nice cast of
characters in the film.
Veronica Cartwright portrayed a
great and troubled mother and has high
energy all the way.
Richard Masur who played her
husband shows nice aggression to his role
as someone being typically arrogant.
Child actress Bridgette Anderson
brings alot of charm to her role as the
little girl in the family.
There are
bloodystabbings and shootings during
Terror in Topagna chapter
There is a corpse of a cat in Night
of the Rat but it looks dark so
not very gruesome.
Joseph
Sargeant seemed to direct this puppy
well as he makes it look like a perfect
bedtime tales with each chapter.
During
the first chapter Terror in
Topaganda he makes it look like
a perfect drive in type of flick as well
as having some good old fashioned
dialogue sequences.
The first killing looked quite phony but
the story does pick up with his direction
as he knows how to make it still,
mysterious and creepy with the going on's
involving Cristina Raines when she drives
her car at night to a corner store.
There is a nice intimidating reaction
involving small actor Anthony James as
a store clerk towards Raines' character
when he shows her a gun to protect
himself from danger and Raines shows
a nice frightened look.
There's something really terrifying
during a scene at a gas station but that
would be a spoiler.
The
Bishop of Battle was also nicely
directed giving a sci-fi feel to it too.
He coached Emilio Estevez very
well having a typical teenage attitude
with video games and we have great camera
shots on him seriously concentrating at
winning the video game.
The dialogue between Estevez and
Louis Giambalvo with their
dispute between father and son looked
excellent and believeable.
We see a great performance with Estevez
battling the video game characters
coming to life.
There's great reactions on all Billy
Jacoby, Mariclare Costello
and Giambalvo during the ending
of what happened in the video game room.
The
Benediction was boring but he
did direct Lance Henricksen well
with his frightened emotions ans well as
his preaching at the funeral parlours.
There's a great scene with the demon
truck jumping out of the ground.
Although
I didn't like Night of the Rat,
this was probably his best work.
We see a suspenseful scene that involves
Veronica Cartwright being terrorised
after she sees her kitchen cupboards
bursting open
Cartwright and Richard Masur
play off well as wife and husband having
arguments.
We see a disturbed look on Cartwright
and child actress Bridgette Anderson after
seeing a torn up room
Masur shows terrific angered
expressions with his scene between
Albert Hague as a rat exterminator
when he first encounters him.
Masur also shows a nice menacing
performance trying to shoot the rat down.
Masur, Cartwright and Anderson
all did great with their tense and crying
emotions too.
Craig Safan has
great dark and spooky screeching sounds
during the scene's involving the first
chapter
He also composes some great sharp violin
music for other chapters in this film too
which sounded great.
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