Monster Dog
1986
D: Claudio Fragasso
**********
Being an Alice Cooper fan, I could not help but check out his dabbling in B-Grade horror with Monster Dog. The man has many valid potential 'songs that could include a snake, spider, dragon, wolf, or, my personal choice, yinglet. Who could possibly deny him as a werewolf in a Spanish movie made by the husband and wife team that gave us Troll 2 with a mostly Spanish cast with everybody's (including Cooper) voice dubbed in English? However, if you’re in the mindset of watching an ironically amusing romp based on that last data point, you might be in for a disappointment.
But, Pyrodox, you say, you don't have to pretend this movie is good just because Alice Cooper is in it, do you?
Yes.
Yes, I do.
Rock star Vincent Raven (Cooper, dubbed by eventual OC namesake Ted Rusoff) travels with his band (Victoria Vera, Carlos Santurio,Pepa Sarsa, Pepita James, Emilio Linder (I'm not sure if I'm crediting these characters right, the credits lists aren't too helpful online) to his spooky ancestral home to film a video or two, but this unfortunately coincides with a rash of strange dog-related deaths, one of whom is the old retainer of the house Jos (who I don’t think is credited).
The band experiences much creepy foreshadowing in the forms of a book and a scary painting that culminates in Jos’ body crashing through the window while they film a moody song, and, instead of running with that like professionals, they all freak out.
Despite the rumors about his ancestry, Raven is well-liked by the locals, including the B-Movie version of Mario and Luigi cops (Ricardo Palacios and Luis Maluenda) with the exception of a violent gang (Charly Bravo, Fernando Conde, Fernando Baeza, Nino Bastida) that seems to be using the legend as a pretext for violence. There would be some plausible sympathetic angles to the locals’ being suspicious of the resident demon-blooded man, but I suppose that would be too cliché. They cause trouble for our band, until Vincent takes the old family shotguns and dispatches them on the rooftop. This results in a rather amusing moment when Alice Cooper goes “Hey, you” to a thug before blowing off the top of his head.
Unfortunately, this conflict, as well as all the lycanthropy, causes the crew to die off one by one, with the main culprit's being an old man (Barta Barri) who was revealed to have been infected with lycanthropy by Vincent's father.
The premise, which is not too played out but not too original, The werewolf is Raven’s father who ends up passing on the curse to our reluctant hero. There's even a token female member of the group with limited clairvoyance she panics over (she dies). In the finale Vincent compels the last girl (Vera) to kill him which she does right after he transforms.
Despite all the cheesiness, I genuinely enjoyed Monster Dog, but I'm obviously biased. I would expect to see more affectionate reactions, but virtually every review seems to hate this movie. Then again this is low-budget B-Movie which Alice Cooper decided to get involved with for fun/drug recovery and agreed to be in it only because it was an obscure B-Movie that would only be released in the Philippines (?). The daytime scenes are cheap-looking, and even my DVD’s grungy picture quality cannot prevent one of the thugs’ obviously fake tooth gap from shinging through. The movie’s production was also a chaotic affair involving the menacing of its cast with firearms and half-starved dogs. Fortunately, Alice Cooper was apparently immune from the latter issue since there’s one atmospheric scene in which his werewolf blood establishes him as a sort of dog whisperer.
Still, the movie has its strengths. The nighttime scenes, with the help of creative lighting and a fog machine, are atmospheric, and it is genuinely engaging, almost bordering on suspenseful. The grainy picture is part of the charm of the era, and the monster make-up isn’t bad, especially since it’s shot with surprising restraint. Maybe I’m just a fan of the old-school low-budget aesthetic, and this movie at least shows a level of competence that does not track with Troll 2.
The movie also features two original songs by Alice Cooper and local composer Teddy Bautista, and they’re pretty good. The movie is introduced via the first song and its thematically significant title as a demonstration of Vincent Raven’s typical work. These songs were never officially released afterward until they were included in The Life and Crimes of Alice Cooper (1999). During the first piece, as Alice Cooper posed as secret agent in front of a Rolls Royce whose rental I presume constituted the majority of the movie’s budget, I could not help but think that a clean-cut Alice Cooper looked familiar, until I realized that it was Michael Scott he reminded me of. I’m not the first to make that connection, by the way. Judging from what I’ve heard about the aforementioned production shenanigans, I wouldn’t mind seeing a movie about it with Steve Carrell.
Though perhaps too slow for some, Monster Dog is a fun watch for fans of 80's B-Movies and Alice Cooper, and is at the very least justified by giving us two good Cooper songs.
MEMORABLE QUOTES
ALICE COOPER: Hey, you! [blows off the top of thug's head with shotgun]
No comments:
Post a Comment