Movie Review: ‘BEST WORST MOVIE’

I grew up renting out VHS’s from his local video store’s horror section around the age of 10. Most of the time I would rent 6 VHS tapes each Saturday night specifically out of the horror section. So, I have seen a lot of horror. While the beginning of this video renting period, the first movies I rented were the classics. Then, I moved on to the eye catching covers. Then, it was the awesomely named titles and films that had ultra cool tag lines.

I’ve always been a slasher/supernatural guy myself. Monsters are always tons of fun, but to me, if it ain’t a Krite – monsters from the film CRITTERS – it didn’t scare me. Something about those teeth always got to me. I remember passing by TROLL as a kid with some trepidation. It wasn’t because I was scared to rent it, it was because it looked silly and childish. It just looked like a kids movie. As a pre-teen looking to progress in his horror film history, I didn’t want to take a step backwards.I actually didn’t end up seeing TROLL until I was 19 years old. At that point of time, I had seen a lot of horror flicks. A lot of those films were bad, cheesy horror films. Some had their novelties, but most of them didn’t fulfill the promises they made on the cover.

As a video renting rule, I usually didn’t see any sequels if they were based on a movie I didn’t like. Therefore, I didn’t give TROLL 2 a chance. While the tagline “THE ORIGINAL BOOGEYMAN IS BACK” and it’s green misty cover tempted me, the fact that there was what looked to be a treasure troll, which were popular at the time the movie came out, and a shadowy monster figure that always reminded me of Gossamer from Bugs Bunny with an axe, horns and glowing eyes…well, that description should tell you why I didn’t pick this one up immediately.

When I heard about BEST WORST MOVIE a couple of years back and knowing it was based on TROLL 2, I decided it was time to go and rent the damn flick. At the stage of my life now, and not the pessimistic teenager I was in the past, I know when a flick is bad, but entertaining. In fact, there are few bad films, in the true sense of the word. A bad film to me is one that has no value whatsoever. It was so bad, that I wanted to either:

A) Slice my damn wrists open.
B) Destroy the DVD or VHS copy so this evil entity cannot tarnish another person’s time.
C) Systematically hunt the filmmakers down and question them endlessly on why they made the film.

I digress. BEST WORST MOVIE is a documentary that is made by the child star of TROLL 2, Michael Paul Stephenson. It follows George Hardy, who played the father of Michael Paul Stephenson’s character Joshua, as he encounters friends, family and total strangers via phone calls, emails or Myspace messages that know about his only film role in TROLL 2. Since he saw the film on VHS, which seems to be how all the crew saw it – not even knowing that the film was out – he just wanted to forget about it. He knew it was a bad film and that there was no benefit to it at all for him. However, as time progresses and more people contact him, he learns of the cult following of TROLL 2. Other cast members chime in about the film and how TROLL 2 has been a black mark on their acting resumes. Most of the cast has moved away from acting. Hardy was practicing dentistry when he starred in TROLL 2 (What is the damn tie-in with dentists & bad movies by the way??), so his life wasn’t as affected by it – with the exception of friends calling him to say they had seen him on HBO late at night.

We mainly follow Hardy as he is flown out to late night screenings across the US celebrating the bad movie known as TROLL 2. It starts to become a fun thing for Hardy. Soon, after getting some recognition, you can see it start to plant a seed in his brain that maybe he should get into acting again.

Hardy is a very charasmatic guy. He is funny, cheerful, and talks with a fun loving Alabama accent. He is looked highly up to by his town for the charity work he has been involved in and just his personality. Honestly, while watching the film, he will put a smile on your face – he is that damn charming.

After following Hardy and the sold out midnight shows, we travel back to Utah where the film was made and meet the man who played a crazy storekeeper and realize that he really wasn’t acting much at all. We also meet the mother character of the film and realize that she isn’t all mentally there as well. These are interesting follow-ups to these people because TROLL 2 didn’t have professional actors. They casted local people.

One of the most unusual characters of BEST WORST MOVIE is the director, Claudio Fragasso. Fragasso genuinely thinks he made a good movie about family and the struggles they go through. If you don’t know the plot of TROLL 2, it sums up like this:

Joshua and his family go on a road trip to the town of NILBOG which is inhabited by goblins (not Trolls. Yeah, that’s in the documentary) who turn humans into vegetables to eat them. With the help of his dead (!) grandpa via apparitions, Joshua does everything he can to save his family from this veggie-cum-carnivore carnage.

Yeah…..

For the most part the documentary is a lot of fun. You will laugh frequently, even if you haven’t seen TROLL 2 (which can be rectified at the bottom of this post). There are also some cringe worthy scenes with the cast and even Hardy himself. Stephenson may not be a great actor, but he spins a cohesive tale about the cult following of TROLL 2 which can also doubles as a tale on how some films gather a cult following.

St. Louis, TROLL 2 is showing at the Tivoli Theater at midnight on July 16th & 17th and BEST WORST MOVIE is also playing at the Tivoli for one week only starting today!

For those of you that can’t make the TROLL 2 screening this weekend, you can view it via Hulu.com for free. I have embeded it below…enjoy.