BEFORE: This seems like the type of film that I would normally save for October, but some exceptions have to be made when a film just doesn't seem to link up with ANY other horror films on my list, and also, I really need it to be here, to make a particular actor connection to tomorrow's film. Sure, there might be another way to get there, but I don't have time right now to find it, and if that other path is any longer than one film, I don't have room for it. Every slot between now and Father's Day is spoken for, though I may end up dropping a film or two before then. Still, I'm booked up so I can't go hunting around for another path right now, let's just put this one here, it gets where I need to be for tomorrow, and let's just move on, OK? This will also free up about 90 minutes on the Movie DVR, it's starting to get full again.
Chris Parnell carries over again from "Senior Year". Let me use this film as a reminder that I really, really, need to get a horror movie plan together for October, STAT. I've got 117 horror film cast lists to work from, that should be at least twice what I'll need to put together a 25-30 film chain. I just need to sit down and do the linking work, and if the chain doesn't link itself together, I'll need to start figuring out what bridging material I'm going to need to put two or three smaller chains together. But the chances are good that this film's actors won't be needed for that process.
THE PLOT: When a pizza delivery driver is murdered on the job, the city searches for someone to blame: ghosts? Drug dealers? A disgraced werewolf?
AFTER: This just feels like a film that didn't know what it wanted to be, a comedy or a slasher film or just a weird little thing - it's the director's first film but he has made some music videos before, though those aren't usually known for their strong narratives. You might compare this to "Thriller", another music video that had horror elements to it, but even that didn't have much of a plot. (Michael Jackson turns into a werewolf, then a zombie, everybody dances, Vincent Price raps, that's it.)
Maybe this should have been something like "Thriller", a long-format music video for Chance the Rapper, though then I suppose he would have been accused of ripping off the King of Pop. But it sure doesn't work as a 90-minute movie, because it's all over the place. Kingfisher is a town in an unnamed U.S. state that has a large ghost population, due to the previous accident at the asylum, or something. The obviously corrupt mayor has stayed in office because he managed to move the deceased spirits over to "Ghost Town", so they'll stop haunting the living citizens. But something is still going wrong in town, because now pizza delivery guys are being murdered by having their throats cut. Who's responsible?
When the town's former werewolf starts showing up again, naturally the police focus on him, but a werewolf wouldn't need to use a knife to kill people, would he? Maybe the activist group that seem to be in league with the mayor are more likely to be responsible, but then why kill pizza guys and make more ghosts in the process? The group wants justice for the 40,000 souls amd they think if the Halcyon Shopping Center can be demolished, maybe the city's ghosts will be laid to rest and they'll move on to the afterlife. In the middle of it all, Astrid gets her old job at Perfect Pizza Base back, only to learn that her boyfriend Sean was delivering drugs for Big Cheese along with the pizzas. But in the process, she becomes a ghost herself, whoopsie.
Perfect Pizza turns out to be in the center of it all, the owner refuses to close the shop even after his delivery staff get murdered, and he learns that the shop, former home of Yummy Yummy Chinese, is also on the location of the old asylum, which had a gateway to Hell in the basement.
Even after this was explained, I'm still not sure if it made any sense. For that matter, why are pizza guys delivering to Ghost Town, anyway? Surely the ghosts can't eat pizza, can they even use the phone or a delivery app? The Pizza shop also employs a ghost for some reason, he seems to be full of wisdom about what's going on, only nobody seems to take him seriously. Can they even see him? I'm not sure, everything is so unclear.
Finally the werewolf does get involved, after trying to stay out of it for the whole movie - guys, he just wants to use his powers to deliver quality Chinese food to people at a decent price, is that really so wrong? And the pizza place re-opens in a new location that is NOT over the gateway to Hell, which honestly seems like a marketing mistake. Remember when brick oven pizza became a thing? Then wood-fired ovens? What about pizza that's cooked from the heat of Hell itself? That seems trendy as Hell, so to speak - it just needs a really catchy name. I used to frequent a bar/restaurant in the East Village called Hop Devil Grill, their logo was a devil drinking a beer with a burger on his pitchfork. I realize that "Hell's Kitchen" is already taken, but "Satan's Pizza", "Underworld Pizza", there's got to be something catchy in their somewhere. Jeez, even "Ghost Pepper Pizza" would work, just have one really spicy pizza on the menu and the hipsters will flock there.
Didn't "Stranger Things" do a whole pizza-place thing in the most recent season? Sure, I realize that the pizza place in the show was called "Surfer Boy Pizza" (the ice cream shop, "Scoops Ahoy!" had a much better name...) but why doesn't someone open up a "Stranger Wings" tie-in restaurant? You can get chicken wings in all kinds of heat levels, with the hottest one called "The Mind Flayer". And all kind of dipping sauces, including "Demo-Gorgonzola cheese". (See, this is what I do, i design all kinds of restaurants that I'm never going to open...) You can also get fried chicken wings with "Eleven" herbs and spices served over Eggo waffles, and don't forget to order a round of jalapeno "Hoppers" for the table. OK, nobody steal this idea, I have to go make a couple of phone calls...
The real crime here is wasting the talents of Joe Keery (Steve from "Stranger Things") and also Hannibal Buress, who's in the diner scene but only for about 10 seconds. Since this movie was originally planned as the pilot for a TV series that didn't happen, maybe they would have had larger roles in future episodes. Yeah, this does make some sense now, this is the kind of show somebody would pitch about two years after "Stranger Things" first became a Netflix sensation. You might as well watch this one after getting stoned and ordering pizza, it couldn't hurt.
Also starring Zazie Beetz (last seen in "The Harder They Fall"), Chance Bennett (Chance the Rapper) (last heard in "The Lion King"), Rae Gray, Marilyn Dodds Frank (last seen in "The Game of Their Lives"), Katherine Cunningham, Will Brill (last seen in "Not Fade Away"), Y'lan Noel (last seen in "The First Purge"), Hannibal Buress (last seen in "Spider-Man: No Way Home"), Lakin Valdez (last seen in "Licorice Pizza"), Rudy Galvan, Tim Decker, Kelli Simpkins (last seen in "Chasing Amy"), Joe Keery (last seen in "Free Guy"), Elijah Alvarado, Paul Scheer (last seen in "How It Ends"), Hanna Dworkin, Rebecca Spence (last seen in "Candyman"), Allison Latta, Gary Houston (last seen in "Proof"), Larry Neumann Jr. (last seen in "Let's Go to Prison"), Austin Vesely, Michael Brunlieb (last seen in "The Trial of the Chicago 7"), David Ruhe, Liz Sharpe, AC Smith, Bishop Stevens, David Temple.
RATING: 3 out of 10 press conferences
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