In a small suburban town, a group of college students visit a mysterious wax museum, where they encounter several morbid displays, all of which contain stock characters from the horror genre.
"Can't a girl get laid around here without being burned at the stake?" Let me start by saying Anthony Hickox is a brilliant man. This movie was his first time as a writer and director and he did it perfectly. Going on to make a Warlock movie and a Hellraiser film, he has established himself (though still remains under-appreciated).
The film stars the kid from "Gremlins" and his group of friends who encounter the guy from "The Omen", who along with a midget and a Lurch-like butler manage a wax museum full of horrible characters. Dracula, the Marquis de Sade, a werewolf, the mummy, and nine other nasties. Well, the museum offers a portal to each of these horrible worlds -- but if you die in the portal, you die in real life and become part of the museum.
This film is brilliant because of the perfect combination of horror and comedy. You will get spraying blood, mutilated flesh, and a dismembered hand that lives on its own (see "Waxwork II" for more on this and its connection to "Evil Dead II"). You will get a girl sexually aroused by being flogged (sado-masochism goes hand in hand with horror). But yet, it is funny. The midget is cute, one of the kids is just weird and you should hear the way Dracula says "steak tartar" or the scene where the AARP (old people) raid the place.
I could complain about the really odd plot and lack of sense. I mean, there is a part where the origin of the museum is explained. Not only does this make little sense, but there is no reason the man telling the story should know anything about it. Then there is the bit about the sculptures needing relics from their real-life bodies to become alive. Yet, there are sculptures of The Fly, the Invisible Man, and a scene from a zombie film. These things never happened, so how can they have real relics?
But you know what? It is so much fun, you just ignore things like this (especially compared to the complete nonsense plot of the sequel or "House II"...) Recommended? Heck yeah. Great comedy, great horror, great 80s film. Dana Ashbrook appears before the day of "Twin Peaks". Oh, and the professor from "Sliders" is in it, too.
My only concern is that allegedly the film was cut by the MPAA due to gore in the vampire sequence. I would love for that sequence to be put back together (and a director's commentary never hurts). This film would be even better with more blood.
"Can't a girl get laid around here without being burned at the stake?" Let me start by saying Anthony Hickox is a brilliant man. This movie was his first time as a writer and director and he did it perfectly. Going on to make a Warlock movie and a Hellraiser film, he has established himself (though still remains under-appreciated).
The film stars the kid from "Gremlins" and his group of friends who encounter the guy from "The Omen", who along with a midget and a Lurch-like butler manage a wax museum full of horrible characters. Dracula, the Marquis de Sade, a werewolf, the mummy, and nine other nasties. Well, the museum offers a portal to each of these horrible worlds -- but if you die in the portal, you die in real life and become part of the museum.
This film is brilliant because of the perfect combination of horror and comedy. You will get spraying blood, mutilated flesh, and a dismembered hand that lives on its own (see "Waxwork II" for more on this and its connection to "Evil Dead II"). You will get a girl sexually aroused by being flogged (sado-masochism goes hand in hand with horror). But yet, it is funny. The midget is cute, one of the kids is just weird and you should hear the way Dracula says "steak tartar" or the scene where the AARP (old people) raid the place.
I could complain about the really odd plot and lack of sense. I mean, there is a part where the origin of the museum is explained. Not only does this make little sense, but there is no reason the man telling the story should know anything about it. Then there is the bit about the sculptures needing relics from their real-life bodies to become alive. Yet, there are sculptures of The Fly, the Invisible Man, and a scene from a zombie film. These things never happened, so how can they have real relics?
But you know what? It is so much fun, you just ignore things like this (especially compared to the complete nonsense plot of the sequel or "House II"...) Recommended? Heck yeah. Great comedy, great horror, great 80s film. Dana Ashbrook appears before the day of "Twin Peaks". Oh, and the professor from "Sliders" is in it, too.
My only concern is that allegedly the film was cut by the MPAA due to gore in the vampire sequence. I would love for that sequence to be put back together (and a director's commentary never hurts). This film would be even better with more blood.