Macabre...ish Horror Review: Jack Brooks: Monster Slayer

Jack Brooks: Monster Slayer, 2007/ 1 hr 30 min.

Jack is a rage machine but he wasn’t always. When he was a child, he saw his family was slaughtered by a monster during their annual camping trip. He survived because he ran and hid.

And after a life of uncontrollable rage and totally freaking out on a plumbing job, he finally sees a therapist.

He’s also in night school and barely takes it seriously but ends up at his professor’s (Robert Englund) house to do some plumbing work. While fixing the problem, all the plumbing is blown and some kind of creature is released and possesses the professor. And uses him to dig a crate of bones out of his lawn. A skeleton with a still beating heart...that he stuffs down his own throat.

The professor wakes up later, still possessed and ravenous, he shows up for class acting strangely and looking like hell. He immediately dismisses the class, on the grounds of being hungry and goes back home to eat his dog. And that’s after a tentacle crawls out of him and he snips it off with some shears.

Meanwhile, Jack is still grappling with his anger and his past. And hears a story about the house he’s working on being cursed, by a man who lived there as a child. He has a hook where his left hand used to be, after his uncle ate part of it.

All that before the movie really gets crazy! Professor Cohen goes back to the school and he is clearly not himself anymore and frankly the students are in danger. And Jack is gonna use some of his rage on them!

I was not sure about this one, the first 10 minutes or so reminded me of that old show, Land of the Lost and hoped that wasn’t the tone of the entire movie and it wasn’t! This movie turns out to be gross and hilarious! Robert Englund is great!

The practical effects are disgusting and over the top. Deadite like monsters. Perfect for this movie, it was fun!! Aside from feeling like 2 or 3 different movies, at a couple points...this turned out much better than expected!