Bad/awesome flixxx review: Elves (1989)

"What? No. Grandfather's in the study. Dad is dead." - Kirsten

"I don't know, a troll? I think it knows you're helping me." - Kirsten

"Yeah, you've got fucking big tits and I'm going to tell everybody I saw them." - Willy

"Yeah, well, I had a rough day at work... Santa got murdered." - Kirsten

"I need to know the connection between the elves and the nazis!" - Mike McGavin

This is one of the best bad flicks I've seen in a long time. It falls in with the category of GREMLIN ripoffs but is more in line with the TROLL 2 unintentionally funny type gems. Its low budget, poorly shot, and ridiculously written. Starring Dan "Grizzly Adams" Haggerty, I give you- ELVES!!!

First of all, let's not beat around the bush... There are no Elves. There is one ELF. This is the kind of stuff I live to find. Most flicks you hope are this good/bad don't come close to living up to how cheesy this is. My VHS copy (Given to me by HOSS- who also gave me my CAPTAIN AMERICA from 1990- thank you brother) has another amazing trailer for a flick called ALIEN SEED starring Erik Estrada. It looks like it may even be better than this (better being the subjective word here). So our protagonist Kirsten and her friends hate Christmas. They go out into the woods to have a pagan "I hate Xmas" ritual and somehow Kirsten cuts her hand, and they all get grossed out and decide to split back to the house. She drips blood on the ground though and literally 5 seconds after they walk away, smoke rises from the blood spill and a hand comes up from the depths. As soon as Kirsten gets back from the woods, her German grandfather (bound to his wheelchair) smacks the shit out of her and she runs upstairs to take a shower. Then her little brother spies on her naked and she catches him and he's proud of it. On top of all that her mom is a COMPLETE bitch for seemingly no reason at all. Weird family.

That night the elf busts in on the little brother and is jumping on his face but then runs out the window when the mom and sis come in. Mom blames Kirsten's cat (her "only" friend), and then viciously drowns it in the toilet the next day. HEAVY. So Kirsten works at the mall (big surprise) and since its Christmastime there's a Santa picture setup there. Kirsten hates xmas so much that she wants to fuck with the mall Santa on her break. Meanwhile there's an ex-cop named Mike McGavin on the hunt for a job since he's just gotten his 60 day chip from AA. Mike is a bigtime chainsmoker/ ex alcoholic / ex fuckup / ex detective since he apparently fucked up bigtime in the past. He's just at the mall looking for some kind of job but the uptight store manager has nothing for him. So the Santa says some fucked up shit to Kirsten and she gets him in trouble and almost gets fired herself. Mall Santa goes in the back and he's sweating and freaking out and chopping out lines and cursing everyone saying they'll all pay when- OH SHIT- here comes the little elf monster. He kills Santa quick fast and bolts. Guess what Mike? Yer hired.  

So Mike, never without a smoke becomes the new Santa and quickly decides he's gonna stay in the mall overnight. Little does he know that Kirsten and her friends have the same idea and are inviting some boys over to get wild. Mike catches them, but Kirsten calls him out for being there without permission as well. He agrees to let them stay as long as they don't steal anything or bother him. Before the boys can get there though, Kirsten's friends are murdered one after another by the elf. All the while something totally bogus and fishy is going on with this symbol that keeps showing up, and Kirsten's grandfather and his weird germany/Nazi-ish friends. Mike, against his better judgement, gets caught up in probably the world's worst attempt at modern noir ever.

Mike decides to hit the local library (?!) to get some information on the symbol and then is directed to a VERY informative professor and busts into his house on xmas eve. If I go any further, I'm going to reveal probably the most ludicrous xmas plot to a movie ever. There are so many words I want to use here but will all give away things that I was totally not expecting, so I feel like I should clam up. However, IF you are so inclined, you can head over to YOUTUBE and see the whole movie for FREE!! Hope you dig it as much as me. Probably hit that one hitter first.

Wednesday, August 22, 2012