Along with Halloweentown, The Monster Squad is one of my Halloween guilty pleasures. In fact I've been known to watch it even at other times of the year, that's how much of a rebel I am! *ah-hem* The Monster Squad was directed by Fred Dekker (Robocop 3 and Night of the Creeps) and features some lesser known child actors from the late 1980's. The film follows a bunch of pre-teen kids who are the only ones standing between a bunch of monsters and the end of the world as we know it. The kids include Sean, played by Andre Gower (Caesar and Otto’s Paranormal Halloween and In Search of Darkness parts 1 and 2), Robby Kiger (Children of the Corn and Welcome Home, Roxy Carmichael) as Patrick, Brent Chalem (Moving Violations and Dance ’Til Dawn) as Horace, Ryan Lambert (Freeze Frame and Wrecker) as Rudy, and Michael Faustino (Blank Check and Suburban Commando). This group of boys worship the Universal Monsters from the early horror movie days. Sean's little sister Phoebe portrayed by Ashley Bank (A Smokey Mountain Christmas and The Haunted) wants to be in the club as well but Sean's not having it.
Sean is given Van Helsing's diary but unfortunately it is written in German. They all must nut up and go to an old man in town who they call "Scary German Guy" to translate the diary for them. The diary mentions an amulet made completely of concentrated good. Whatever that is. One day in every century the amulet becomes vulnerable and can be destroyed by the forces of evil. Count Dracula (Duncan Regehr also known for The Banker and Blood Surf) has amassed an army of monsters to find the amulet and destroy it. Among the monsters are Tom Noonan (Heat and Manhunter) as Frankenstein's monster, Jon Gries (Napolean Dynamite, Men in Black, and Taken) as The Wolfman, Tom Woodruff Jr. (who has played many monsters in movies such as Tremors, Aliens, and Aliens vs. Predators) as the Gillman of Creature from the Black Lagoon fame, and Michael Reid MacKay (who has played monsters in other movies including Cast a Deadly Spell and Highway to Hell) as the Mummy. It is revealed that "scary German guy" was really not so scary at all and in fact is a survivor of the holocaust.
Frankenstein's Monster decides he does not want to help Dracula and runs away into the forest. He meets Phoebe, Sean's little sister, and the two become friends. She brings Frankenstein back to the tree house to meet the boys in order to get them to let her join The Monster Club as they call themselves now. Finally, they are convinced the rest of Dracula's army is heading to their town for the amulet. Can they use Van Helsing's diary to open a portal to send the monsters back to limbo where they came from? Originally, the film was pitched to Universal considering it was made as a tribute to their classic monsters it was thought that it was a sure thing Universal would green light the film. They passed but they did eventually help with the films distribution. Instead Tri-Star Pictures took the film. Liam Neeson (a relative unknown at the time) was nearly given the part of Dracula. The film is known specifically for the impressive Gillman suit that would go on to influence the suits used for the first Predator film. The film has been compared to The Lost Boys as well as The Goonies and for one reason or another does not fare well with critics in comparison. Sure it has it's flaws, some of the effects like the vortex, looks horrible and the story suffers in that the producers chopped nearly fifteen minutes from the original product to give us the final film. Reportedly more character development was given to Sean's parents and their marital issues. Again, the film isn't a spectacle of great film making but it is a nice love letter to the classic horror movies we all know and love. I will give this three and a half nards out of five.
Fun movie. I liked it, want to rewatch it.
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