3/10
Only in the 80's...
29 April 2011
Warning: Spoilers
To say the very least, they don't make them like this anymore.

The Edge of Hell is really like nothing you will ever have seen before. It a horror film that epitomizes the term 'eighties cheese'. You would think after witnessing this that it must surely have been written by a 14 year old boy, and possibly a slightly stupid one. But no, this is the work of Jon Mikl Thor the lead actor and pioneer of the completely forgotten heavy metal sub-genre known as muscle-rock. He sports a haircut so obscene it is easily the most disturbing element in the entire movie. His music is mind-bogglingly awful and he gets to play a couple of tracks in full for our benefit. Lyrically you will be hard pushed to find anything more banal. But of course the sheer stupidity of this film is the chief reason to see it. Thor is nothing if not a one-off, and as events unfold in this film you will agree that this cheese-fest is certainly unique.

The story is borderline incomprehensible. It's sort of about a possessed house where a heavy metal band have decided to record music in but by the end you will be left entirely baffled and unsure just what exactly has unfolded before your eyes. Characters disappear and reappear with really no rhyme nor reason. For instance, about half-way in a bunch of groupies appear in the middle of the night for a scene that has truly no purpose whatsoever. The monsters in the film compromise for the most part of finger puppets and cheap masks. They are completely ridiculous. As is the accent of the drummer – was he meant to be Australian? English? Who knows quite honestly.

However, nothing, I repeat NOTHING, can prepare you for the final confrontation. Up to this scene the film has been a pretty strange experience. A combination of lame horror, vaguely hideous soft-core sex and mind-bogglingly awful hair metal music performances. But the finale takes everything that has gone before and disregards it with an extended scene where Thor turns into a character called The Intercessor and battles Beelzebub. Words are simply not adequate at describing the contents of this scene. But suffice to say Thor strips down to his leather underpants, sports eye-liner and has his previously ridiculous haircut made even more ridiculous via the application of a bottle of hairspray. The homo-erotic nature of this metal warrior is simply impossible to ignore. He then proceeds to battle the giant puppet that constitutes Beelzebub. For some reason the demon begins this confrontation by throwing starfish at our hero. They then engage in a wrestling match. This whole scene is quite honestly legendary, and worth enduring the other rubbish for.

Yeah, as I say, they don't make them like this anymore.
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