Troll 2.

Review #1181: Troll 2.

Cast: 
Michael Stephenson (Joshua Waits), George Hardy (Michael Waits), Margo Prey (Diana Waits), Connie McFarland (Holly Waits), Robert Ormsby (Grandpa Seth), Deborah Reed (Creedence Leonore Gielgud), Jason Wright (Elliot Cooper), Darren Ewing (Arnold), Jason Steadman (Drew), David McConnell (Brent), Gary Carlston (Sheriff Gene Freak), Ben Meyer (Bells), and Don Packard (Sandy Mahar) Directed by Claudio Fragasso.

Review: 
It is odd to admit how long it took to watch this film, in part because of the fact that it has quite the reputation for being so awful. How many movies can spawn a documentary (named Best Worst Movie (2009), naturally) detailing its creation and its aftermath years later? The best way to describe this movie is to say that it is a palate cleanser kind of film, as anything one watches before or after it will automatically feel much better in comparison, as if one needs to watch something horrid in order to appreciate film. In the long run, it isn't the worst film ever made or even the worst one ever watched, in part because of how ridiculous the final product manages to be. The Italian director-writer combo of Claudio Fragasso (under the pseudonym of "Drake Floyd") and Rossella Drudi (a married couple) wrote a screenplay that was in broken English. Calls by the actors to ad-lib the lines were denied by the director, who would later describe them as "liars" and "dogs" - take that for what you will. The script was apparently inspired by the frustration of Drudi's friends becoming vegetarians. What better way to mock your friends than with killer vegetarian goblins taking the place of vampires in a vampire story?

Some of the cast certainly had their own strange experiences with being in this film; one of the actors was actually out from a mental hospital at the time of his scenes being filmed, and another had their shoes screwed into the base of a tree pot that meant he had to stand inside the pot for hours on end. George Hardy was a dentist (who still maintains a dental practice) before being in this film. The villainous goblin queen's costume was designed by the actress playing her. The actors were only given the parts of the script scene by scene, with little context. How does one give the actors heavy criticism when they are stuck in something so ridiculous? Hardy is amusing, in the sense that he is playing a parent who sure takes his sweet time to realize the obviousness of the evil town. The "And you can't piss on hospitality! I won't allow it!" sequence is so amusing, and it is made even funnier in that it was the scene that Hardy did for his audition that was liked by the filmmakers enough to cast him. Stephenson is amusing, since he has to react to not only seeing visions of his dead grandpa, but also evil goblins without looking completely confused. Reed is amusing as the villain in a chew-the-scenery kind of way. Naturally, the "They're Eating Her!" sequence from Ewing (complete with fly on the forehead right before the big line) is one to be patient to giggle for. At least the actors don't seem completely stuck in a zombie state as one might think of something like Manos: The Hands of Fate (1966) or the Birdemic films (2012, 2013).

To the surprise of no one, this is not actually a sequel to the 1986 film Troll, as it was meant to called "Goblin", but distributors in America wanted to called it Troll 2 to try and garner success in markets. I guess "Attack of the Killer Vegetarian Goblins" or "A Nightmare on Nilbog Street" would've been a bit too on the nose. I will admit, I did not expect a scene where a kid figures out that the only way to stop his family from eating contaminated Nilbog food is to... urinate onto the food. Apparently, the script was originally intended to have the kid to simply act possessed and scream while on top of a chair, but this was changed by Fragasso when it came time to film. This is the kind of movie that surely has sincerity in its ridiculous plot decisions, whether with a romance scene with corn, ghostly interventions by a dead grandpa (including using a Molotov cocktail), a "Stonehenge Magic Stone" that gives the goblins their power, a double-decker bologna sandwich that saves the day, and so on. Despite all of these things, there is an amusement to be had with watching this film, where filmmakers who should have known better persisted on to make something they really thought would work out without being laughed at so much. It's a horror film with semblances of fantasy that surely thinks it is doing something worth making on the cheap. In a sea of awful movies, Troll 2 stumbles into place among other horrid pieces of the crop without question, with a 94 minute run-time that will certainly mesmerize a viewer in some way - for better or worse. Before we know it, this film will have celebrated three decades since arriving to stalk the halls of entertainment for groups that persist in watching dreck like this. I can only imagine how it will feel decades from now when it reaches half a century or more, having an ooze of charm that makes it memorable and makes one appreciate in a sense what it means to make or watch film.

Overall, I give it 1 out of 10 stars.