"CATCH YOU FUCKERS AT A BAD TIME?"

Bride of Re-Animator

tn_bridofreaRE-ANIMATOR holds up as a timeless classic, BRIDE OF RE-ANIMATOR never was one and hasn’t gotten any better. This time Stuart Gordon was not involved (if a man wants to spend 1989 doing ROBOT JOX that is his right), and the directational reins were handed over to producer Brian Yuzna. I guess I’m comparing a shitty non-anamorphic DVD to a nice blu-ray, but this one seems cheaper and more obvious than the first one in every regard, from the broader acting to the shitty Richard Band keyboard score that, when it’s not ripping off the PSYCHO theme again, sounds exactly like every score he did for any Full Moon movie in that era.

The title is inaccurate, because actually there are two re-animators. Jeffrey Combs and Bruce Abbott return as Herbert West and Dan Cain, Miskatonic University medical students, roommates and bros who made kind of a mess in the morgue in part 1. We pick up 8 months later in Peru, where the two are working as combat medics in a bloody civil war and couldn’t resist unethically experimenting on some of the freshly dead bodies. There’s an effectively disturbing part in the opening where they’re in the middle of a war zone and Dr. West revives a freshly-dead soldier using his glow in the dark re-agent… and the guy growls at him. A local coming into the tent to warn them to get away happens to see West shooting his patient in the head. You want to be careful about stuff like that if you’re a re-animator.

mp_brideofreBack in New England the boys somehow get legitimate jobs at a real hospital, even though a cop (Claude Earl Jones) is still sniffing around looking for answers about “the massacre,” as the events of part 1 are now called. He also knows that many body parts have been going missing from the morgue lately. That’s because Dr. West has been skimming. He brings home legs and fingers and eyeballs and shit to mess with in his new basement laboratory.

Their new place is located next to the cemetery (spelled “cemetary” on the sign) and he makes a hole in the brick wall where he can reach in and somehow get to all the graves or something to get more body parts.

Since part 1 he has proven that people’s consciousness is in all of their matter, so therefore he can inject his glowy stuff into a finger and it can be alive and crawl around. This was not really in keeping with what science knew in 1989, but just go with it. West delights in connecting different body parts and bringing them to life, so for example an eyeball with fingers for legs gets loose in the house like a tarantula.

There’s a whole subplot about how Dr. Hill (David Gale)’s severed head is still at the morgue, and a guy that works there, Dr. Graves (Mel Stewart) figures out that it’s alive and how to use the re-agent and stuff. Unfortunately somebody apparently told Stewart that these movies were funny, so he’s playing some of it for laughs, and not getting them.

There’s not really an explanation what happened after the ending of RE-ANIMATOR when Dan unwisely chose to inject his dead girlfriend Megan (Barbara Crampton). I guess it didn’t go well, because West has her heart in a bag. He gives it to Dan as a gift. In the last act he has built a hideous lady body from various dead parts and he gives it Megan (now always referred to as “Meg” for some reason)’s heart.

There’s some fun stuff here, but Yuzna just doesn’t have the careful touch that Gordon does. He doesn’t get that perfect serious-but-sometimes-darkly-humorous tone, the new female lead is not compelling, and Dan’s switching back and forth between reluctant accomplice and completely nuts is not very convincing. The effects are maybe too ambitious, they use alot of fake-looking composites, much more artificial than the blood-spraying puppets that dominated part 1. It’s an inspired idea that Dr. Hill gets bat wings attached to his head and can fly around, but they sure don’t manage to execute it in a way where we believe it. You will not believe a bat-winged talking severed head can fly.

The Bride character has poofy hair and reminds me of Karen Black for some reason. They did a good job of making her disgusting. It’s not just stitches like Frankenstein’s monster, there are sections of exposed muscle and veins between all the different parts, and metal parts bolting alot of it together. She recognizes Dan as her creator and then tries to hump him. Kinda funny I guess, but not as funny as it sounds.

I do kinda like how West starts yelling self-righteously about “I will not be shackled by the failures of your God!” and shit like that. Still not a great roommate, in my opinion. He actually reminds me of a roommate I had when I was young, I didn’t really talk to him much and he had stacks and stacks of phone books that he kept in the hallway. I never knew why until one night I heard him in his room making prank phone calls to other parts of the country. From what I heard they weren’t even jokes, they were just lies, like he was doing a terrible Texas accent and pretending to be a trucker stranded somewhere trying to get someone to come fix his truck, and angry that they’re saying they can’t find him. It was a weird way for this guy to spend his nights. I never talked to him about it.

Years later that roommate ran for port commissioner. True story. I wouldn’t vote for him and I wouldn’t vote for Herbert West. And I would be surprised if Herbert West was responsible about paying the rent and electricity on time and stuff like that.

Anyway, at the end a bunch of creatures made out of feet and hands and stuff crawl out and try to grab West. I guess he’s been making these little abominations and stuffing them back into the hole in the wall. And now the chickens have come home to roost. But not to fatally roost, he survives for part 3.

This was Yuzna’s second movie as director. The first one was SOCIETY, which was written by the same guys, Rick Fry and Woody Keith. Those two later did a movie called DEMENTIA starring Matt Schulze.


This entry was posted on Tuesday, November 12th, 2013 at 2:22 am and is filed under Horror, Reviews. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can skip to the end and leave a response. Pinging is currently not allowed.

17 Responses to “Bride of Re-Animator”

  1. Great tagline, though.

  2. I remember showing this to a friend, who was already pretty grossed out from the first one, and he had to throw up during the scene where the Bride (spoiler) falls apart.

  3. I’ll be in the minority, but I really like SOCIETY and I like BRIDE OF RE-ANIMATOR. The comedy is goofy and over the top, as are the slimy special effects… but I’m drawn in by the gung-ho attitude. They don’t cop out, but they also don’t go as completely daft as MY NAME IS BRUCE and others.

    Looking forward to seeing what you think of SOCIETY and BEYOND RE-ANIMATOR. Neither matches the brilliance of RE-ANIMATOR (or the equally great NIGHT OF THE CREEPS) but they’re damn fun.

  4. Society is a very good film, methinks. A lot better than Bride of Re-Animator. Yuzna’s heavy approach suits the themes of Society (“I really, really fucking hate rich people!”) extremely well.

  5. I’m surprised to hear that this movie is regarded as “not very good sequel”. I was always under the impression that people like it as least as much as the original.

    Anway, am I the only one who think it’s interesting that Combs is one of the MVPs of STAR TREK, but for any reason is even in the eyes of his fans better known for his horror roles?

  6. Re-Animator is filet mignon, Bride of…is Salisbury steak. I’ll eat ‘me both but Swanson only makes one of them. Or something. Anyway Vern’s right.

  7. This obviously pales in comparison to the first one, but I can still have some fun with it. Mainly because more Jeffrey Coombs as Herbert West is always a good thing. I have yet to make it all the way through part 3, though.

  8. I don’t know about this one, but SOCIETY is legit great, really creepy and subversive while still being kind of darkly comic. The ridiculous 80’s milieu has actually aged nicely, and now adds an additional comic layer to everything. And man, that ending is pretty wild. Sure seems like Yunza went downhill after that, though.

  9. Return of the Living Dead III is pretty great, imo.

  10. I guess Franchise Fred started young, because I was so excited to see another RE-ANIMATOR I was pretty forgiving. FWIW They did shoot a prologue with a different actress playing crazy Meg brought back to life but they just did away with it completely, probably for the best.

    I was disappointed that winged Dr. Hill never molested any naked women by flying between their legs. That was a missed opportunity in my opinion.

    Still never saw BEYOND RE-ANIMATOR though. It’s Syfy premiere was a turnoff.

    Sternshein, I recall RETURN OF THE LIVING DEAD III being quite good too. Now it always amuses me when I’m reminded that was Leah Remini.

  11. Fred, that was actually Melinda Clarke (credited as Mindy Clarke) in Return of The Living Dead 3, not Leah Remini. Also yeah, it’s pretty great.

  12. Oh right, the other TV mom. Was Remini also in an early horror film?

  13. I thought it was a fabulous film full of twists and turds and t and a and something for everyone of all ages. Did I win any special effects awards? That’s about as sure as Publishers Clearing House coming to my door. I am still kicking old and not quite as bloody See Freddy Vs Jason or Skeeter or Ticks or Manic Cop 2 or Children of the Corn 1,3,4 and 5 gag gag

  14. And PHANTASM II and III, right? Good job! Thanks for stopping by.

  15. Watched this for the first time last night with a double feature of FROM BEYOND. I can´t imagine anyone not loving the sheer insanity of it, though the plot is just a jumbled mess which hampers the enjoyment slightly.

    But the ridiculous amount of prostethics, creatures and other whims that inhabit this gory wax museum of a movie makes somewhat up for it. It makes no sense whatsoever and lacks cohesion. But I think Vern is a little bit hard on it.

    FROM BEYOND however was unfallable.

  16. Finally watched it. It’s really not as good as part 1, but am I the only one who laughed really hard at the sight of the fluffy white kitten that pops up in the background between all the disgusting creatures in the climax? It’s maybe the best joke of the series and just because it’s such a casual “Oh yeah, we put a plush kitty in the middle of the mayhem”.

  17. I remember kind of hating this one way back when, but I’ve just discovered the existence of the third one, watched it, and what do you know, kind of loved it! Cheesiness and runaway mugging actors notwithstanding, bless its corny, ugly, B-movie heart. It’s made me want to go and revisit the sequel.
    Not a patch on the first one, obviously, but I don’t think anyone would ever reasonably expect Yuzna to top Gordon. Would love for you to close out the trilogy, Vern!

Leave a Reply





XHTML: You can use: <a href="" title=""> <abbr title=""> <acronym title=""> <b> <blockquote cite=""> <cite> <code> <del datetime=""> <em> <i> <q cite=""> <s> <strike> <strong>