So, what do you do when your hubbie dies and your life falls apart, and you need to start over? Move your family to a small town and become the local mortician, that's what! At least, that's what Leslie Doyle (TV's Tasha Yar, Denise Crosby) thinks would be a good idea.
Unfortunately, the old Fowler Funeral Home (foul-er, geddit?) is not exactly the shining opportunity I suspect she was hoping for. The place is abandoned, broken-down, and has a leaking septic tank full of toxic embalming chemicals. On top of that, the place figures large in local legend, since the Fowler clan was wiped out when deformed, abused young Bobby Fowler went on a brutal killing spree and disappeared into the night. Of course, the locals claim that Bobby is still alive, hiding out in the cemetery and showing up from time to time to perform obligatory small-town boogeyman duties.
Ordinarily, that would be enough to keep any horror film chugging along toward a satisfactory (if not terribly novel) conclusion. But, there's more! There's a nasty, black fungus that seeks out blood, a small pack of semi-intelligent fungi-infected zombioids, and a giant, underground slug with Lovecraftian pretensions to deal with. It's not long before all these monster plot lines are crashing into one another, fighting for screen time. All these beasties are ostensibly connected (Bobby serves the Slug who makes the Fungus which creates the Zombies), but it's really way too much for the film's 90+ minute run time, which means that set-up scenes get truncated and, by the end of the film, plot points seem to appear out of thin air. For instance, Bobby's obsession with little Jaime Doyle, which is used to kick off the climactic underground sequence, would have been far better served if there had been some room to show more of him stalking her early on.
There are a lot of good moments in Mortuary. Production values are high, make-up and effects are quite good, and, unlike many other horror films centered around a family unit, several good punches go unpulled and mothers and small children are fair game. But as a whole, it feels like three different films were smashed together to produce this one. On top of that, I had to deduct a point from my rating because the shock, it's-not-over-yet ending was lame even by the usual standards. See this one at your own risk; if you're willing to be Tobe's apologist for an hour and a half, you might even enjoy it.
Unfortunately, the old Fowler Funeral Home (foul-er, geddit?) is not exactly the shining opportunity I suspect she was hoping for. The place is abandoned, broken-down, and has a leaking septic tank full of toxic embalming chemicals. On top of that, the place figures large in local legend, since the Fowler clan was wiped out when deformed, abused young Bobby Fowler went on a brutal killing spree and disappeared into the night. Of course, the locals claim that Bobby is still alive, hiding out in the cemetery and showing up from time to time to perform obligatory small-town boogeyman duties.
Ordinarily, that would be enough to keep any horror film chugging along toward a satisfactory (if not terribly novel) conclusion. But, there's more! There's a nasty, black fungus that seeks out blood, a small pack of semi-intelligent fungi-infected zombioids, and a giant, underground slug with Lovecraftian pretensions to deal with. It's not long before all these monster plot lines are crashing into one another, fighting for screen time. All these beasties are ostensibly connected (Bobby serves the Slug who makes the Fungus which creates the Zombies), but it's really way too much for the film's 90+ minute run time, which means that set-up scenes get truncated and, by the end of the film, plot points seem to appear out of thin air. For instance, Bobby's obsession with little Jaime Doyle, which is used to kick off the climactic underground sequence, would have been far better served if there had been some room to show more of him stalking her early on.
There are a lot of good moments in Mortuary. Production values are high, make-up and effects are quite good, and, unlike many other horror films centered around a family unit, several good punches go unpulled and mothers and small children are fair game. But as a whole, it feels like three different films were smashed together to produce this one. On top of that, I had to deduct a point from my rating because the shock, it's-not-over-yet ending was lame even by the usual standards. See this one at your own risk; if you're willing to be Tobe's apologist for an hour and a half, you might even enjoy it.