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HOBGOBLINS
PLOT
Hobgoblins are malevolent creatures from another world who
can tap into human brains and make their wildest desires come
true for the purpose of destruction. Kevin, a college-boy
security guard at an abandoned film studio unleashes the creatures
from their vault. They escape and go to his house to crash
a party that his friends are having. It’s up to Kevin to save
his friends and destroy the Hobgoblins before it’s too late.
REVIEW
I don’t know if you can even really call this a horror film.
It’s more like a throwback to cheap, fifties sci-fi movies mixed
with the 80’s attitude of stuff like “Gremlins”, “Ghoulies” and
“Munchies”. If you’ve seen any of those, set your standards
much lower and you have “Hobgoblins”. Apparently this was even
cheesy enough to be featured on MST3K.
All the characters in this movie are either dumb or mean,
especially the characters that are supposed to be “friends”...
there’s the whiny hero who has to overcome his feelings of inadequacy
and his sexually repressed girlfriend. And then there are the
“friends”: a phone sex addicted geek, a macho army dude who insists
on fighting everyone, and his slut girlfriend Daphne (who is about
the only entertaining person here). The actors playing them pretty
much milk the stereotypes for all they’re worth.
The creatures are pretty much ugly stuffed animals that don’t move
around a lot and look especially cheap when they “attack”...honestly,
these things don’t even come close to being menacing.
The first half of this movie is really dull and slow moving.
We get the whole spiel on how the Hobgoblins came to Earth from an
old-timer security guard that trains Kevin. Of course, he’s the
leading authority on the creatures, but didn’t have the brains to
just kill the damn things fifty years ago. The second half doesn’t
fair much better as we’re treated to a lot of bad comedy with shitloads
of sexual innuendo...a pretty standard combination in any low-brow
movie, but none of which in “Hobgoblins” musters a chuckle (okay, I
laughed at a few things but maybe that just means I’m easily amused).
My favourite part of this movie is where the characters go to “Club Scum”
to chase after Kevin’s hoity-toity girlfriend, who’s transformed into
a slut by the creatures. A goth-rock band performs (a pretty good song,
in my opinion) complete with a beehive sporting go-go dancer.
“Hobgoblins” was created by Rick Sloane, who also gave us the “Vice Academy”
series. A lot of the actors in here showed up in one “Vice Academy”
movie or another. Tami Bakke is in the cast playing a fantasy girl...
she dated Weird Al and now plays a character on “Days of Our Lives”.
Duane Whitaker (who went on to play the red-neck gun shop owner in
“Pulp Fiction”) plays the doorman at Club Scum. Who knew?
GORE
If you actually pick this one up, you won’t/can’t expect much in
that department. A guy dies by falling off a stage (?) and you see
his lifeless body with some blood dribbled on his head. A guy starts
on fire but manages to survive unsigned. This movie is rated R, but
feels more like PG-13. If it weren’t the references to sex and the
overall tone of the movie, it would be a great one for the kiddies.
SOUNDTRACK
As I said, a pretty good song by a band...the rest of it sucks.
BOTTOM LINE
I really don’t know what to say...the above review should speak
for itself. If you don’t mind an hour and a half of bad camp,
then by all means proceed.
Review
By: The Scaremaker
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