By Geno McGahee
I remember going to the video stores in the 1980s and seeing the WAXWORK VHS tape sitting there. It never appealed to me. Perhaps it was the little person on the cover. I have always been weary of little people. It’s my problem… I know that. Well, all these years later, I elected to finally give it a go and it turned out to be a very interesting watch that bordered on an anthology. It wasn’t really one, but it had elements that made it close.
Mark (Zach Galligan) is a wealthy college student that is unlucky in love. His girlfriend, China (Michelle Johnson), is not satisfied by his loving or personality and pulls no punches when she tells him. His group of friends all say in unison: “Oh, that’s got to hurt,” as she tears into him. They must do it with regularity for them to all say it at once. In my opinion, they were not really Mark’s friends. He’s getting his heart and balls stomped on and they all rejoice in his misery. That’s not what friends are for.
China and her friend, Sarah (Deborah Foreman), are walking home when they meet up with Waxwork Man (David Warner), and he invites them and their friends to a midnight showing of his wax displays. You may remember Warner from THE OMEN or as the prick from TITANIC. He has a unique delivery and his accent makes him mysterious. He may be less mysterious if you have a similar accent.
Inside the wax museum things get very cool. Each display is a gateway to that world. When the guests get too close, they get transported into that time and must deal with the monsters that reside in it. WAXWORK is truly for the horror fans and focuses on the classic monsters. In the first mini-tale, we see a werewolf attack and it actually tears a man in half. What a great visual. The werewolf looks great too. We then have a vampire and I’m not a fan of vampires, especially the playboy ones that get all the girls. I like the scary vampires…not the sexy ones. So, I didn’t really dig that too much. When they went to the mummy, business picked up.
Sarah and Mark escape and seek answers and discover that there is a plan to bring back 18 of the world’s worst creatures and that when that happens, the entire world would end. It’s up to Mark and Sarah to stop it, but when they enter the museum again, they once again deal with the problems. It was rather cool to see Mark transported into a NIGHT OF THE LIVING DEAD world. It was black and white and Mark was even dressed in 1950’s attire.
Mark discovers the secret to the museum, but must still find a way to stop the evil from ruling the world and that’s when this movie sort of falls apart. The ending is sort of silly and stupid and that’s a real shame because of the steam that this horror flick had built up to that point. They tried to end it on a lighter comedic note and that was a bad idea. I had hoped for some more horror and I didn’t really care if the good guys won or not. I just wanted more. I would have loved to see the zombies roaming the neighborhood or the mummy crashing into a home. There were a lot of things they could have done, but they didn’t. Too bad.
WAXWORK pays homage to the horror icons in a very neat way and presents a horror film that is really like no other. The idea of being pulled into other worlds is always interesting. That’s why I liked LAST ACTION HERO so much. Hey, I know it has its haters, but LAST ACTION HERO is pretty good. WAXWORK follows the same path and gives the horror fans a horror sampler with just about everything you would want. It’s almost like they were saying: “Mummy…we love you. Take a bow.” Then the mummy would come out for a few minutes, kill some people and that’d be it. Each horror character is treated with respect and so is the viewer.
I highly recommend WAXWORK. It’s unique and fun. I am sure you can get over the shitty ending.
Rating: 7.5/10
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