Wolf Man's got nards and a rubber mask!

THE MONSTER SQUAD (1987)

Reviewed by Jerry Saravia

Fred Dekker's "The Monster Squad" has become something of a cult favorite for former 80's teens and perhaps today's audience though I can't say for sure. So is "The Goonies," though that Richard Donner movie was a box-office hit which "Monster Squad" was not. Dekker's film is not even half as fun as "Goonies" and that is a problem for an alleged kiddie flick - "Monster Squad" is an uneven, unmemorable, insufferably bland picture that can't make up its mind of what it wants to be. "The Goonies" was hardly the most memorable movie experience but it knew what it was.

So there is some business about an ancient, powerful amulet that Dracula (Duncan Regher) wants to get his hands on. This amulet is a force of "concentrated good" and it creates a balance of good and evil when it isn't powerless, which it is one day out of every century. The amulet also opens a portal by which Van Helsing had hoped to send Dracula and his gang of Universal Monsters into Limbo in the opening sequence. Dracula wants to shroud the world in darkness. Kids from the Monster Squad, that is experts on Universal Monster Movies, find Van Helsing's diary which will allow them to open the portal and get rid of the Monsters who are haunting their idyllic suburbia. Only problem is that the diary is written in German, and only a conveniently located German neighbor (Leonard Cimino) can translate it. But it would help if the incantations are read by a virginal female in a church. Atheists could have a field day with this.

Right off the bat from the first reel, something feels off in "The Monster Squad." There is no real sense of urgency or danger and the kids are a mixed bag at best, though Michael Faustino as "Monster stole my twinkie" Eugene or the late Brent Chalem as Fat Kid stand out. The old reliable Universal Monsters are also a shade disappointing. The Wolf Man (Jonathan Gries) has nothing more than a hardly emotive rubber mask, The Gill Man looks more threatening than the beloved creature from the Black Lagoon but he's not on screen much, and Regher's Dracula is no better than the ridiculous interpretations from low-budget stinkers of the 1970's like "Dracula vs. Frankenstein." Tom Noonan brings some sympathy to Frankenstein's Monster that is enough to make one wish he were the star of the show. Gill Man could've been afforded a little sympathy when the creature, in the 1954 flick, never wanted to harm the female lead. Here, Gill Man doesn't have many scruples.

"The Monster Squad" is all over the map with a slim story and slimmer motivations for its characters, especially a generic Dracula (since when did the good Count ever want to shroud the world in darkness?). In many ways, this is my kind of comical creature feature flick as I adore the Universal Monsters but Dekker is lost in a haze of throwing everything but the kitchen sink (he helmed the far more upbeat and terrifically paced "Night of the Creeps"). No magic and no real sense of fun make for a dull Creature Feature.