Mindkiller

Awkward attempt to emulate the success achieved by the Yuzna/Gordon team who put forward an entirely personalized take on H.P. Lovecraft’s poetics of horror with cult films such as “Re-Animator” (1985) and “From Beyond” (1986) in which they introduce two ingredients nearly absent from Lovecraft: a grotesque comedy component and an erotic dimension. Unfortunately, when such aspirations fall into the hardly brilliant hands of Michael Krueger (screenwriter of garbage like “Lone Wolf” and “The Amityville Curse” for instance), the result is bound to be disappointing.

So what we end up with is a modest, thoroughly 1980s product that employs lame humor in a vain attempt to play on a host of preoccupations besetting contemporary man (and others): the importance of exercising some sort of control over your world, the desire to succeed in relationships with significant others, the servile craving for power that lurks in even the most lethargic souls.

Mediocre on both the technical and acting fronts and characterized by a flood of rubbery special effects that aren’t terribly effective, this film is ultimately scuttled by a flat, disjointed screenplay (written by Krueger himself, obviously) that totally fails to develop its few potentially interesting ideas.

Only suitable for hardcore fans of sci-fi horror Z movies that were all the rage in the legendary eighties.