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Pumpkinhead (with Sean)
13 Plays15 days ago
Today we're on a quest for vengeance! Ya boy Chris Donovan is back at it again with his buddy Sean and we've got vengeance on our minds. Specifically the demon of vengeance, the only and only Pumpkinhead, an awesome monster movie directed by special effects wizard Stan Winston. So crank that fog machine and join us on our journey into the woods to discuss protagonist harbingers, jump scare dogs, and gun stabbing as we dig up the corpse of Pumpkinhead.
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Transcript
Introduction and Preface
00:00:00
Speaker
Hey guys, welcome to the Professional Horror Podcast, I am your host, Chris Donovan, and you are going to hear me say that again in like a minute or two, but I just wanted to come out here and sort of give you a little preface to today's episode.
Technical Difficulties and Episode Theme
00:00:12
Speaker
This episode between myself and Sean Hogan, we actually started recording about a year ago, and The reason it wasn't uploaded last year when we recorded it is the recording software we used really screwed up the endings of both this episode and the ending of the next episode, so we had to re-record it, and we kind of waited till this year because it's a very fall-themed movie we're discussing today, so we wanted to give it...
00:00:34
Speaker
the the proper season. So there will be a change in audio at some point. or you You probably could hear a difference in both of our voices, and that's just because of the window of time in which they were both recorded. I should have gotten it as good as possible, so hopefully it'll be enjoyable without even being
Guest Introduction: Sean Hogan
00:00:51
Speaker
that noticeable. So take it away past Chris and introduce this episode.
00:00:55
Speaker
Hello and welcome to the professional horror podcast, the podcast that quenches its thirst for vengeance with a nice cold mountain dew. I am your host, the wonderful and super pretty Chris Donovan. And today I am joined by the self-described boy with the oy or the chap with the strap, the reigning professional horror podcast quiz show champion, Sean Hogan. How are you doing, homie? Oh, I'm doing and great. What a great intro. I really love that. I'm the people's champ. I earned the horror Jeopardy title by defeating the paper champion, the transitional champion, Nicole Cava. And everybody was happy. The people, Joyce, there was a parade in my honor and it was for the boys. It's true. It was a good time that all the boys were represented there. Sean is not defending his Quiz Show Championship today. He will be, hopefully, in a few weeks. I don't know when we're going to schedule that, but I am cracking away finishing this year's Quiz Show board, and I'm excited for the next installment of that. That's coming in a few weeks from now. I personally can't wait until that happens so that I can prove once again that destiny was for me to win. That's that's just all I'm going to say about it for this. Destiny shines upon you. Yes.
Film Introduction: 'Pumpkinhead'
00:02:01
Speaker
Alright, so today, even though it is November, we're still feeling the spooky season spirit, so in that spirit, we're going to conjure up the spirit of vengeance and discuss the 1988 film Pumpkinhead. Yeah, absolutely. This is a piece that's directed by Stan Winston, noted special effects guru, icon in the industry, with really truly just a resume that is too long to list, so we
Stan Winston's Special Effects Legacy
00:02:26
Speaker
won't. Yeah, he's literally done just all of the things, like Jurassic Park, Predator, Tremors, helped on the thing, just so many different, like all of the best 80s horror, alien movies. Just if you've named an awesome practical effect in the 80s, it was probably Stan Winston. 100%. And when you let a director, or when you let a special effects artist become a director, then you get a really good looking movie, and that is just what Pumpkinhead is. Pumpkinhead is fantastic. And while we're in November to dismember, and there's such a thing as a bountiful harvest, I can't think of a better way to watch than Pumpkinhead to get in the Thanksgiving spirit. It's true. It's a really good time. And it's funny, too. It's a quick sign-up. There was a movie... last year i think they came out called smile and there's an incredible practical effect in that movie and i was like who the hell made this and it was like got to the credits alec willis and tom woodruff jr who were stan winston's like two big apprentices who also worked on this movie i'm like ah i shouldn't have been surprised i think stan woodruff jr what's not uh tom tom woodruff jr yeah tom woodruff jr is the guy in the suit i believe yeah yeah
00:03:33
Speaker
Yeah, he's he's super
Practical Effects and Movie Trivia
00:03:34
Speaker
good. he's in a he's in a lot of He's a lot of the guy in the suits in the Practical Effects movies. Yeah, i think he's in one of or two of the Alien movies as a xenomorph, which is great because you've got a lot of crossover in the build of the costumes and how they function. Yeah, the design definitely looks inspired by the xenomorph to a certain extent.
00:03:52
Speaker
Got some quick statistics before we dig into the film, of course. Pumpkinhead is a 6.2 out of 10 on IMDb and a 65% approval on Rotten Tomatoes. directed by the aforementioned Stan Winston, written by ed Justin, mark Mark Patrick Carducci, and Stan Winston, and of course, starring Lance Henriksen, also of Alien fame. Yes, also of Alien fame. The G. um I got some more stats for you on here. Hit me with it. So the main character who's played by Lance Hendrickson, his dog is played by the same dog that's in Gremlins. Oh, no shit. And the first death in the movie is Dick Warlock, a.k.a. Michael Myers from Halloween 2. He was the stunt coordinator. He is the first person to die in the film. Yeah, Dick Warlock, I also know he's randomly in Spaceballs as well, you know, and that scene in Spaceballs where Lone Star tries to give the Vulcan neck pinch and the guy's like, no, no, no, stupid, you got it much too high. Oh, that's him. That guy's, that's Dick Warlock, yeah. That's hilarious.
00:04:55
Speaker
But I believe that Ed Justin gets credit for writing the movie even though he just wrote the poem, correct? I think so. I think it might be a story by credit, but when I was looking at IMDb, he is he is in the written by credit, so I just kind of threw him in there. No, no, no, that's fine, but I actually have the poem here. Would you like to hear it? I would love to hear it.
Poem Inspiration and Film Synopsis
00:05:14
Speaker
So, the poem, Pumpkinhead by Ed Justed. Keep away from Pumpkinhead, unless you're tired of living. His enemies are mostly dead. He's mean and unforgiving. Laugh at him and you're undone, but in some dreadful fashion. Vengeance, he considers fun, and plans it with a passion. Time will not erase or blot a plot that he was brewing. And when you think that he's forgot, he'll conjure your undoing. Bolted doors and windows barred, guard dogs prowling in your yard, won't protect you in your bed. Nothing will from Pumpkinhead. And that's the whole poem, bro. Hell yeah. I think part of that a part of that i think was adapted into the little kids teasing their younger sibling with pumpkin head, I think. Yeah, I think they used that to mock their youngest sibling. But do we just want to do a summary of this film? I have the IMDB synopsis and Rotten Tomatoes consensus, and then we'll dig into like bit by bit, like scene by scene kind of dissection if we want to do it that way. Sure. So the IMDB synopsis for Pumpkinhead is, after a tragic accident, a man conjures up a towering, vengeful demon called Pumpkinhead to destroy a group of unsuspecting teenagers. And the Rotten Tomatoes consensus is, with effects work and solid direction from Stan Winston and Lance Henriksen adding, welcome gravitas, Pumpkinhead is a creature feature that stands a cut above. and I agree.
00:06:37
Speaker
I definitely agree. I would 100% agree with that. I have some critiques of it. We'll get into that later. But like overall, this movie is a classic, I believe. If you're a fan of horror, if you haven't seen the original Pumpkinhead, is probably up there in my top 10. I rewatched this movie
Themes of Vengeance and Morality
00:06:57
Speaker
probably. once every couple years because it's just got a ah spooky vibe and it's about vengeance and like how it darkens your soul how it that vengeance passes on from one person to another and evil deeds don't go unpunished and it and people who kind of forgive evil deeds also don't go unpunished so it's a really interesting story and and the vibe it's kind of a Usually when you get like a hillbilly hick vibe yeah to a movie, the hillbillies are the hicks or the villains. This is an interesting film because the mountain people in this in this movie are kind of the morally neutral characters. They are concerned with the protection of people's souls, so to speak. you know like They create obstacles in the movie, but they're they're kind of portrayed as the good guys. Yeah. Yeah. That's what throws me off whenever I watch this movie is something along those lines is I feel like in any other horror movie, Lance Henriksen would be the harbinger. Like we would start with that group of kids as they're going off on wherever their trip is to that cabin. And they would just see Lance Henriksen's Ed Harley at the grocery store and he'd give them some warning about Pumpkinhead. Yeah, he'd he'd read them the poem, which I think they do in, like, Pumpkinhead Part 3 or something. They have him show up and warn someone.
00:08:17
Speaker
Yeah, but it's like, that would be... he would He would not be the protagonist in, like, any other version of this movie, but the fact that he is and the teenagers are, like, the side characters is a really, I think, bold creative choice, and I do like it a lot. Yeah, and there's something, like, very... In terms of, like, American film, this feels very American, and it's, like, an original... I mean, obviously it's based off of this poem, but it's it's an original folklore tale about like the Appalachian Mountains or wherever this is supposed to be set in. It feels like that. you know like It's got that Protestant fear about like witchcraft and all of those old legends wrapped into it. Very Legend of Sleepy Hollow. As a matter of fact, when I was watching this again, was I wonder if Tim Burt took some inspiration from Pumpkinhead when he was crafting his version of Sleepy Hollow. Because you have like the witch say, go find him in this tree and all this other stuff. But we can get into that a little more when we tap into
Setting the Scene: Folklore and Aesthetic
00:09:16
Speaker
this plot. so yeah The movie starts out with a flashback to 1957 somewhere in the mountain.
00:09:24
Speaker
ranges. I know this movie was filmed in California, but some of the best day for night shooting I've ever seen, and that has to come from the fact that Stan Winston is a special effects guy himself, so he knows what looks good on camera. Yeah, there was, I think I said to you the other day when I was watching it, there was so many moments where I was just like, man, they don't like movies like they used to.
00:09:45
Speaker
yeah a hundred percent like there's so much i feel like and we talk about this i think a lot of movies today it's almost like will fix it in post and then we don't actually have the ability to fix in the post and now we just have these like overly dark or you could even call you could call it realistically dark scenes you know where if it's in the dark middle of the night you're not goingnna be able to see a whole lot whereas older movies would always have like a a streak of light going across the actor's eyes so it's like i don't care where that light came from i need it to illuminate my actor's face Yeah, absolutely. So you can see what's happening.
Film's Atmosphere: Lighting and Sound
00:10:14
Speaker
yeah they they And Pumpkinhead's a great example of that. They trust you to suspend your disbelief because it's it's revealing the aesthetic. And in the beginning of this, when they're on the inside of this cabin, it's ah it's a man and his wife who are worrying about... locking their cabin up and you have the young protagonist as a boy with his mother being told to go to sleep even though there's like a storm raging outside clearly the characters know something's up the dad's loading the shotgun it's almost like a western and the lamplight is this like deep red color so it feels very light it almost feels like you're watching a comic book you know Yeah, because the inside scenes are like this really deep bright orange and the outside shots are these very cold blue. There's such a massive contrast from interior and exterior shots of that scene. Yeah, 100%. And it's really awesome because it's establishing the tone. the animals on the outside there's like a horse freaking out like like it knows this force of nature is coming and he's locking his truck up he's locking up his animals there's a dog barking and he's barring his own door and the young ed is is sitting there asking what's going on and they just keep telling him to go to sleep and then dick warlock shows up and he is the
00:11:32
Speaker
prey of Pumpkinhead on this night and he starts pounding on the door and he obviously knows Ed Harley's father and begging for help and Ed Harley says you know I can't help you as you get into the movie you find out that people who even help Pumpkinhead's prey become prey to Pumpkinhead because just that act makes them his victims so we just see Dick Warlock get his shit wrecked on the outside of this cabin and some of this young Ed's formative memories are hearing his dad's friend get murdered outside of his cabin. Yeah, and another thing you're talking like how vengeance is sort of this, how it has a very interesting relationship with vengeance, how it manifests in different people. He also, Dick Warlock's character also claims that he didn't do the thing that Pumpkinhead is after him for. He's
Vengeance Theme and Character Introduction
00:12:20
Speaker
like, I didn't kill that girl when he runs off. So it is sort of like a, do you take him at his word and say, this was summoned for some other reason, or is it, you know. Or did he really? Yeah, there's a little bit of nuance to it as opposed, as similar as what the case will get into later. It's not like a cut and dry, evil, vengeful murder that someone's getting revenge for, you know? It's like Hamlet's father's ghost, not to make it too artsy, but like, you know, when his father's ghost first shows up, he could be a demon, could be ghost telling you something and he doesn't know which to believe. At this point in time, you don't know whether or not this guy actually committed the crime, but you know he did the punishment for it, so... Another thing I just want to say really quick is with that scene is you said it's like 1959. 57, yeah. 57, excuse me. The aesthetic of it is so old-fashioned that it does have this sort of like folklore-ish feel to it. It could have taken place, like you said, in like 1857. It have taken place in like 1812 or something it's just like, you know, lamplights, old school clothes, you know, the parents saying, oh, go say your prayers, like, you know, Christianity being like the most important thing in the world to these people kind of thing. Simple. clothes some curtains are plain lamp light is what they're going off of like the cabins made out of spare boards and things which is great for the production It just all adds to the aesthetic. So then we transition to the future where we have a soft, loving father Lance Hendrickson who's using a motherfucking flamethrower to control brush, the brush outside of his house, which is cool. He has little boy and you see from photos and whatnot that he's a widower. He lost his wife and he's raising his kid on his own. He's the owner of a general store. Him and his son get ready and wash his hands. They have a dog. Apparently the story that Lance Hendrickson tells him about his grandmother washing his hands and the skin feeling so thin was like wax paper or something like that, but it was so soft. That's apparently a true story from Lance Hendrickson's past where his grandmother... used to wash his hands and it felt really nice and he's he apparently told stan winston we only have very little real estate at the beginning of this movie before this kid dies to establish that i'm a loving father who actually gives a shit about him so let me just tell a real story that like rings true about true affection and whatnot while i do this so that was an improvised line by that's good lance hedrickson so that's cool This is like the closest we've ever gotten, I think, to leading man Lance Henriksen. And he's making the most of it. He shows off the abs. He's giving us his leading man look, which is really fun. Oh, yeah. He's got a really interesting build in this film. He's super lean, but absolutely jacked. Like the skinniest farmer you've ever seen. Like Master Roshi from Dragon Ball Z. Just this lean old man. So goes and he opens his general store and these teenagers from the city show up. And this is some of the most efficient character setups I've ever seen. You have this douchebag in a leather jacket with a top down, you know, Corvette driving with his girl. And the first lines that we hear are, you know, the girlfriend defending him saying he's not so bad once you get to know him. And then it cuts to. It cuts to him going, hand me a beer to his girlfriend in the car. And he doesn't refer to his girlfriend by name for the first couple scenes in the movie. He either calls her klutz or bimbo at the beginning. Classic.
00:16:02
Speaker
That's all he references her as. And then as soon as he gets out of the car, the first thing he does is make fun of Ed Carly's kid. He's like, look at those glasses, like fucking Coke bottles, right? And I'm just like, okay, so we know you're the asshole.
00:16:16
Speaker
Yeah. Oh, yeah. He ah he spends, he takes little time in ah solving that. It's one of those weird things. It's a quick side note. I was watching The Fog a few weeks ago, and there's a scene where Tom Atkins' character just grabs a beer behind the ah while they're driving, and I'm like, man, that was just so much different back in the day. Oh, yeah.
00:16:32
Speaker
Like, that just doesn't, you'd if yeah if that happens in a movie today, you'd be like, this is the most irresponsible man the world's ever seen. And in this one, they're just like, yeah, he's kind of cool or whatever. But it is a plot point that he's been drinking. Yeah, for sure. But they show up to this general store, and it's that whole thing that we were talking about. Like, if this were told from the teenager's perspective, they're looking at Ed Harley, and they're like, look at this freak and this weird kid, and like, I wonder if he's gonna, like, be mean to us and then meanwhile he's like these fucking city kids better not mess with my son and yeah and it's that whole uh xenophobic trade-off but told from the hillbilly guy's perspective which is like such a fresh original idea which i guess what's that uh what's that comedy movie uh what is it chuck and dale versus evil or something uh oh oh uh tucker and dale versus yeah tucker and dale versus evil it's almost like that but not a comedy the city kids and their fear and their not knowledge of the area is actually what's dangerous. Yeah, it's like when Lance is, when, excuse me, when Ed Hardley is going to get the feed for that one guy, And he sees the kids, you know, on the motorbikes. He doesn't even have a moment like, ah, these damn city kids.
Conflict Setup: Ed Harley and Teenagers
00:17:53
Speaker
No respect. He's just like, okay, they're kids. They're doing dumb stuff. He doesn't even acknowledge it pretty much. He just keeps going on with his life. Yep, he just keeps going on with his life. And there's, again, great world building. All the other teenagers chill. They're actually really nice. They talk. They talk to Ed Harley's kid. They pet the dog that was barking at the asshole guy. They stop the other hillbilly kids that show up with that guy who's ordering feed from Ed Harley from bullying their youngest brother too much by telling him the story of Pumpkinhead and scaring him. And we get introduced to the eldest of the hillbilly kids who clearly doesn't want to live the life that he's been given. You know, he's not happy with being a hillbilly out in the middle of nowhere and kind of looks at the rich city kids with kind of desire a little bit in that scene. And it's really just setting up everything and it establishes that the dog can get out of the store on its own so ed harley goes to go get this feed from this guy who showed up and he had forgot the feed back home he tells his son stay in the store dog gets out while the kids are riding on the motorcycles kid goes and chases after his dog and on accident the asshole kid runs the ed harley's son over with a motorbike Yeah, but I like about that, how that shot, I mean, it's fucked up, but it is kind of, it's not funny, but it is kind of a weird subversion where, like, the first dirt biker makes it over the hill, and you see Billy, like, freak out, and then he just misses him, and you're like, oh, whew, thank god they didn't hit the kid, and then the next dirt biker comes over the hill and hits him. Oh, yeah, definitely some subversion of expectation there, it makes, like, the payoff, it makes you wait for it.
00:19:31
Speaker
and you're you're like oh they got it didn't hit the kid then splat and then it's like really sad the kid's just laying there limp doesn't like cry doesn't anything he's just laying there unconscious with blood coming out of his head the teens don't know what to do they're trying to put a jacket on him and then the asshole guy starts packing up his bike and basically hits his girlfriend friend and tells her that they got to get out of there because he's drunk and he's got priors or something. So he drives off to the cabin that they were going to get to. The other kids are trying to figure out, like, you know, how do we help? Is there a telephone? Is there something we can do? And the only solution they have is we got to drive further up to the cabin And the youngest brother who didn't hit the kid with the bike says, I'll stay with the kid for when his dad comes home. So the kids are actually good people. It's an interesting take on it. They really want you to see that maybe these kids don't deserve to die when Ed Harley makes the choice that he makes. Yeah, it's definitely played in a very interesting way like that, where when Ed Harley comes back and it's just the one kid there, he kind of takes that as like, they hit my kid, they killed him, and then they just took off. When in reality, most of the kids were like running every way they could to help this kid, but they just didn't know what or where to go. So they're like, we need to do something.
00:20:49
Speaker
I can't just sit here and let this kid die,
Parental Grief and Character Development
00:20:51
Speaker
you know? and And then on top of that, that seems so crazy because he comes back and it's all silent. It's almost like a silent film. And it makes it so chilling. He goes, first he drives up, he goes into the store, sees his son isn't there, realizes that the teenagers are gone. So he steps out and he looks over and he just sees the one kid sitting there next to what he, he's at such a distance, he can't see what's going on, but he just sees something on the ground next to this teenager. And you see him slowly start walking over and then you see the panic set in and him like run over but there's no dialogue exchanged at all he just scoops up his son and is heartbroken looking down at his son's broken body and the kid hands him his son's glasses he takes it from him cleans them off puts them on his son's face so he can see and he just starts taking him away and the first line that gets spoken is it was an accident can i do something to help And he turns and he gives him that like sinister glare. Get the fuck away from me and my son. you know, that's the only dialogue that's spoken there. And like I the first time I watched this movie, I was really young. Right. Like I was probably the age of the kid that got hit. It was way too young to watch this movie. I'll get further into the story of me first watching this movie when we get done talking about it entirely. But like I should not have been watching this movie at the time. As an adult, having watched this movie multiple times, this is the first time I watched this movie when I had a kid.
00:22:23
Speaker
yeah Yeah. I have a two-year-old daughter now, and this is every parent's worst nightmare. you know I took my eyes off of my kid for... like one second and the worst has happened what we know about this area from the details of what takes place afterwards there's no phone there's no nothing there's no hospital anywhere around right he's just hoping he can get his kid home and maybe take care of him and put him back together we see him go home with this kid and the last words the kids say to him is a questioning daddy and then he just goes limp in his arms and i'm like yeah Oh, fuck. I actually had to watch this on two separate nights because I was just thinking about my daughter and like yeah the way that he carries the kid away and the kid's arms are over him. I'm like, that's how my daughter, when she sleeps on me, looks yeah and all of that. And it just was too much for me. And I had to actually turn it off and then watch it the next day past that scene. to like yeah get myself in the right headspace for it. But like the way it's portrayed is so heartbreaking. But here's where one of my only grease about the movie is, right? Yeah. The soundtrack, because immediately after this heart wrenching deep scene, it cuts to him driving in a truck and it's like a fucking harmonica and like a slide guitar. It's like, Okay, it's I get it. He's a hillbilly. They're in the mountains. But this isn't like, the soundtrack shouldn't sound like we walked into a rockabilly bar yeah when his son just died, you know? It's like, the only thing about, I will say one positive for the soundtrack is that moment you were talking about where it's dead silent. And then the guy's like, the kid's like, it was an accident when Lance turns around, when Ed Harley turns around. There is like a big musical sting that accompanies it. Oh, yeah. And it makes it like even more jarring, like, oh shit, like something big just happened. There's a lot of good moments of like the clever camera work where there's like a turn. And we can get to those moments too, but like there's a lot of moments in the film that when you get shocked, it's not just a jump scare. It's also like they ratchet up the soundtrack for intensity purposes. Like you said, they just don't make movies like this anymore. They don't. So that that part is good. But the overall score, I wouldn't say the soundtrack, the score for the movie with that like slide guitar and harmonica just doesn't fit all the time.
00:24:50
Speaker
It would fit better in a movie like Tremors. This is a more intimate... What's so funny, when you were saying harmonica and slide guitar, I was thinking of the musical... I think it's in Tremors 2 specifically. There's a sound cue that they use over and over again that sounds like that. Yeah, absolutely. It's almost like a mouth harp is getting played somewhere. You know? Yeah.
00:25:13
Speaker
So he drives with the kid. The other teenagers get to the house. The scene in the cabin is ridiculous. It's really over the top in a kind of interesting way. Because first of all, the cabin really nice. Way better than any like evil dead situation. Like a really fancy looking cabin. They really want to hit home the dichotomy between the rich city kids and the the hillbillies are living in like shacks.
00:25:38
Speaker
Yeah. But, uh, Joel, who's the leather jacket wearing jerk teen, when the other kids try to call for help, he cuts the phone lines. Yes. And he's, because his girlfriend explains, he, he's,
00:25:52
Speaker
this This is not the only kid Joel has hit in the past few months. He hit a girl, and he's on probation. And that's why he doesn't want anybody to know. Plus, he's been drinking. He's like, bitch, I got priors. Ain't nobody gonna find out about this. Could you imagine, though, if like the other if the little girl he hit, their father also summoned a pumpkin head, and he just had two pumpkin heads? Which pumpkin head is gonna kill me first? Yeah. That'd be pretty wild. But they it's but they he cuts the the phone and his girlfriend explains it. So clearly his girlfriend has unfortunately been abused by him because she doesn't. Yeah. She's just sitting there like feeling like, well, you know, it's better if we just listen to him, you know? And I'm just like, oh, God, this Joel guy really is an asshole. So the other two teens show up and there's another girl. I think her name is Maggie, the religious one. Yes. She was the one who saw the little boy running out to the field and tried to stop him, but she's the worst runner in the world and just kept falling.
00:26:54
Speaker
And she's basically catatonic from shock, yeah from which which is a really realistic depiction of what might happen to somebody who watches a little kid get smoked by a motorcycle, you know?
00:27:06
Speaker
Yeah, for sure. She's just wracked with guilt, so she's almost catatonic. The other dude's like, well, then I'm going to go drive for help. And the jerk Joel literally pulls a gun on them and locks them in the closet so they can't go for help. He also like beat one of them with a log. it was like, oh, that's because we're going. Yeah, the guy tried to run and knocked him on his ass. And when and when he wasn't looking, you hit him over the head with a log. yeah Yeah, he's like holding them hostage. It's really intense. It's really intense. It goes from zero to 100. And then Joel has like an arc in this movie that's nuts. We'll get into that. But but he basically becomes the hero character at one point. It's bizarre. At some point, yeah. Like he learned his lesson and or something.
00:27:47
Speaker
Yeah. So Ed Harley is driving and he goes to the hillbilly guy who had showed up to his place for the feed. The whole reason he had to go back to the house in the first place. He says to the one guy, got to talk to your father. He's the the patriarch of this hillbilly clan that lives in this part of the mountains. And Harley says, i don't need you to pay me for the feed. i need you to tell me where this old woman is. He says, i ain't going to tell you about that because he he's like, the only thing that woman can do for you is take your soul straight to the devil or he'll she'll send your soul straight to hell. He just says, go back home, bury your boy and forget him all of this he refuses to help you know he's like this vengeance isn't going to actually help you all it's going to do is curse you so he's the harbinger and he tries to warn him not to go but this yeah kid that we saw earlier who doesn't want to be a hillbilly kid anymore he goes up and he's like hey man if you pay me some money i'll tell you where to find that old witch lady
00:28:47
Speaker
Yeah, so he he brings her to the witch for like $15. It's $10, exactly. He just hands him a $10 bill, which really goes to show how fucked we are with inflation. you know because ten dollars Imagine how much you need to spend to get someone to bring you to a witch these days. Oh my god. Well, he's like, oh man, I am going to sell this man's soul to a witch for $10 and I will not feel guilty about it at all.
00:29:13
Speaker
But he does say it is really funny. he gets ah He takes the money, he goes, oh, just drive to this place or whatever. And Ed Harley grabs him by the collar and is like, you get in the back of the truck and you show me where to go. Now, mind you, he's driving around with the body of his son in this car. car the entire time and the only person he shows is the older hillbilly guy this teen doesn't know that somebody kid killed ed harley's son so he doesn't know why he's going to go see this witch yeah he's just like and i'll just bring him whatever it doesn't matter Yeah, so he bring he he rides in the back of this truck against his will. And this is some of the sloppier editing of the movie, because there's like a time jump immediately where it cuts to darkness, yeah even though it was a broad daylight when they first started driving. And then this kid, I guess, is going to just walk home in the dark, like no big deal. Yeah, because he doesn't want to go all the way there.
Supernatural Elements and Pumpkinhead's Resurrection
00:30:05
Speaker
He's like, no, no, no, no. He says, I'll take you as far as I can, but that old lady scares the shit out of me, is what he says.
00:30:12
Speaker
Yeah. I'm like, that's so true. I'm like, yeah, that felt very real. So he meets this old lady, and it's a classic witch's cottage. It's overrun with vines and stuff. It's overrun with vines. There's an owl in there. There's also a pet rat. The owl's not trying to eat the rat. They're just hanging out near each other. She's got familiars. She's sitting in front of a fire. And when he walks in... And she looks like she's 400 years old. Yeah, 100%. classic old crone witch and and this isn't even we don't even get to see the extent of how witchy she is in the scene she's just facing a campfire doesn't even look at ed harley when he walks in he's carrying the body of his son and without looking at him she says i can't bring the dead back to life that's outside of my powers
00:31:01
Speaker
you get right away like i said it's a very efficient movie it's conveying the themes it's like we want you to know this is a witch here's a witch's hag cottage she looks like a hag and she's got power she already knows that he's got a dead person with her yeah and her name is literally haggis yeah And so he meets with her and she's like, you got to tell me what you want. You have to say it out loud. He has this great, Lance Hedrickson has this great internal turmoil where he's so angry and so vengeful, but he knows what he's doing is wrong, that he can barely say what he wants to say. And he finally spits out, I heard, you know, when I was a boy that you could help people, that there's ah something you can do when somebody gets wronged. And I want to do that. I want to summon that. I want these people to suffer for what they did to my boy. Right. And so she says, what you're asking for, got to go to sick name for a location. Razorback hollow. Yeah. that' And she says, go visit your a grave. What you need to do. You need to go dig it up and bring it back here. And she goes, you know, you'll know which one it is.
00:32:10
Speaker
Yeah. And is this the part where she says pumpkin head while she's laughing? Or is that later? I forget. Yeah. I think this is when she calls it pumpkin head. could Yeah, she's like, say what you want. She's like, it's pumpkin head. Yeah. And it looks like it might be played by a man. Like, you know, in that scene. could be. Because it had that, like, extra level of disturbing, uncanny valley to her face when she said it. And she's all lit up by the fire. Like we said, the lighting in this is really cool. So yeah he goes immediately from there to go dig up Pumpkinhead. When he gets there, it's almost like Army of Darkness. you know like it's yeah It's like a set. There's blue light everywhere. There's there's fog. the Yeah, the fog machine's working overtime. this is It's one of those weird things about the cemetery, too. It's like literally in the middle of the woods, it seems. It's like, who used this cemetery? She did say there were mountain folk who used to bury their kin there, the ones they didn't like to mention. So it was like, all of the evil mountain folk are buried in this cemetery. And i was going to really quick to talk about the the fog machine. I was watching this last last night, literally, and I had all the lights off my room. i'm watching it. the
00:33:24
Speaker
The light off of the fog was so bright, had to shield my eyes. Remember talking about how they don't light scenes at night like they used to? I'm like, this is literally a blindingly bright in night scene. And Lance Hendrickson is acting his heart out in this movie because like it's essentially a silent film during this scene again. Like, during... he he goes through the gravestones you can tell he's afraid that he he has trepidation but he's driven by this anger you see him set his jaw and walk in anyway there's like a vulture that like squawks at him as soon as he goes in there and it's just got that old classic icky horror movie vibe he sees a grave that's literally raised out of the ground and there's a pumpkin grove or patch growing around this grave. So he knows, okay. She said, I'd know it when I saw it. That's the, that's the one he barely even has to dig, yeah which like implies that it's a shallow grave and people keep digging this thing up and they keep using it. But, and when he pulls it out, it's fresh.
00:34:25
Speaker
There's like maggots all over it. And he gets squigged out enough that he like tries to run away for a second. and then again, he like sets himself back to his task and he yeah grabs it. And the witch said he had to bring it back to to do their business. So he he brings the thing back to the witch and there's this crazy scene where she cuts his hand, dribbles it over this thing and he starts having like hallucinations and he faints. And it's almost like the life force is being pulled from his body into this husk of a corpse. And it turns into a giant alien baby. And then from alien baby, it's neck sprouts out and it starts growing uh it's yeah and i had a couple notes on it when it's we first bring when it first comes to life some of the sound effects of uh it moving is directly i think taken from the the dog kennel scene from the thing yeah it's there which is also the scene yeah yeah the cicadas it's the same sound effects it's the same that's the scene in the thing that stan winston worked on
00:35:26
Speaker
And also when, when pumpkin head is small, his head kind of looks like ah Sam from trick or treat, which I don't think that's unintentional yeah for sure on trick or treats part. Cause he's also a pumpkin headed individual, but in his, the pumpkin that when he, when he's fully grown, especially in the shoulder region, that's where it really looks like a xenomorph where it is just kind of like a really bulbous, like mutated. Yeah. It's not in the head. They intentionally made it not look like a pumpkin. but they made it not human it it's like yes it's a demon like if if you've ever seen what is that de demon knight with billy zane like it's yeah they like modeled those demons after like pumpkin head it's very similar like he's got very sharp teeth up front like this cruel smile and these big pale eyes that look like he should be blind and he's got this whipped tail that like moves around and undulates while he walks. It's very alien. It's very not of this earth. And he's got these crazy long fingers and fingernails. And also the witch, when she's doing all the magic, you get to see her hands and they put so much craft and care and yeah making her look like this shriveled, horrific withered tree. And like you said too, the face is really expressive for an animatronic face. Usually they don't do that because for every bit of articulation essentially in the face, you would need another puppeteer or another person on a remote control. But they I think it's it's a sharp choice with how with how they use Pumpkinhead to make sure its face was moving as expressively as possible. And that becomes a major part in the plot too, to like convey to the audience what's going on but we'll get to that but like yeah it just looks it's a really great look and it stands up like some of like the if they were to ever remake pumpkin head my biggest fear would be they're like it's just a cgi because this this thing has so much character there's so much art put into this the mannerisms of of this guy that you said ah thomas uh woodruff jr Yeah, Thomas Woodruff Jr., his performance in the suit, knowing its positives and its limitations, really give this character life, you know? We just see that as Pumpkinhead wakes up, Ed Harley passes out, and he wakes up a little later, and the witch tells him, it's done, you can go now, Ed Harley. And he doesn't really know whether or not this thing worked or what's happening with it, but he's like, I guess my vengeance is going to be set upon these kids, and I'm... I'm going to go home and bury my son. And then his son's dead body sits up and says, Daddy, what did you do? do
00:38:03
Speaker
yeah that's like the creepiest thing in the whole movie. i was like, what the fuck? And then the son's just laying down again. You get to see after this long, harrowing night of being driven by anger and rage, he finally grieves the loss of his son and he breaks down in the car. Because he also almost like hits another car because he was smart choices that the kid was a nightmare. And they actually also show that he didn't just wake up and is not tired anymore. He's still like dozing off because he's you know literally falling asleep at the wheel.
00:38:32
Speaker
Yeah, absolutely. And then it cuts back to the kids. The other teenager finally showed up to the house on his motorcycle, his busted motorcycle. yeah i think his that character's name is steve and i think he's joel's brother yeah joel's younger brother steve because they have a very helpful one of those on the nose exposition which i always love where it was like someone something bad about joel and he was like ah but he's my brother and i'm like okay thank you for that yeah he he literally says it like that too he's like uh it's it's when they're about to race the motorcycles his girlfriend maggie says to him do you have to encourage him he goes Maggie, he's my brother. And that guy's the way that Steve talks is very Southern California. And it's funny. So Maggie's still catatonic. He's like, yo, did you call for help? what What happened? Where's the other people? And then he finds out that they're locked in the closet. But his reaction isn't like, you got to let him out of there. He's like, oh, well, this is just great, Joel. like you Kidnapping people again. It's so true. It's so funny.
00:39:38
Speaker
He's just, but like, it could just be his character's just like, man, I've had a hell of a day. i just, I can't, I literally can't process any more shit going on right now. But, you know, then ah Joel says to him, I ain't going to jail for no stupid hillbilly kid, you know, further proving he's the villain of the story. and uh joel says i don't even think we're gonna get in trouble he goes the dad came and picked the kid up and he left and he's like he didn't he's like what did he say to you he's like he didn't say nothing he just you know he looked at me and his brother screams at him don't lie to me it looks like he's gonna throttle him he thinks it looks like he's gonna murder him and he's like he just looked at me like he wanted to kill me okay It's so funny. like the scenes with the teenagers are not
00:40:24
Speaker
great they're probably one of the weakest parts of the movie because and this could just be you know alarate time they didn't have time to get the performances out of them that they needed it was a low-but film and you have every actor on the set we got to kill off a few of these kids before we can start getting good performances out of people So his ah brother threatens to kill him. and then we we cut away from there. They're having their whole crisis of what to do. Well, not not so much. Joel is still being an overbearing dick about things. and He's got a gun. The cops aren't going to come and get me out of this house. like He's to have a shootout with the police if they should. Yeah, it's one of those fun things where i I do at one point wonder, I'm like, Joel, what's your endgame here? You're just going to keep everyone in the cabin until you all like run out of food or water? This does not have a lot of forethought put into this plan. but Yeah, he's like, I'm not going to to jail because some kid died or because I hurt some kid, and yet you're willing to commit kidnapping at some point. these Are you going to murder the people that you have holed up in the cabin with you? Yeah. Yeah. Start a new life in Mexico. like where, yeah what's the end game here, am my man. It's just really showing off that he's not a good person. So then we cut back to Lance Hendrickson and he buries his son next to his wife. He says, Betty, they took our boy. And he goes inside. And then we have our first scene where Steve and his girlfriend, Maggie, Maggie finally comes out of her catatonia and Steve chases her off into the woods because she's trying to flee. Yeah, she just little ji just straight just gets up and walks into the woods. You're like, what the hell, Maggie? like she does The second she's not catatonic anymore, she's just like, okay, goodbye, and just walks out. Yeah, I think the implication is that she's still whacked out, but all the fighting between the different characters is stressing her out further, so she tries to flee. Yeah, what's so funny is Steve's way to get Maggie out of her catatonia is to, like, grab her cross necklace and is like, remember your faith in God, Maggie? And that shakes her out. It almost feels like the original draft of this was, like, written by Mormons, and they had to, like, edit in, like, more more... more horror movie stuff because yeah it does it doesn't feel like that should be there it's almost like it's an allusion to evil dead where it was like uh the necklace is supposed to bring comfort to ash's girlfriend or or whatever uh so he's just like this used to bring you so much hope let it bring hope now and on cue pumpkin head snatches steve up into the sky We don't get a good look of pump at Pumpkinhead there, but we see Steve get picked up into the trees and his girlfriend watches as he gets tossed around like he weighs nothing and is getting ripped to
Pumpkinhead's Revenge and Intelligence
00:43:11
Speaker
shreds. She runs back inside and alerts them that, well, before she runs back inside, Joel has a change of heart and he's like, you're right. I'm better than this.
00:43:20
Speaker
I gotta let them go. And he lets the people out of the closet. And that's when Maggie comes running in is like, it's killing him. And they think, oh, the hillbillies have found us and they're going to kill us. yeah So they grab guns and they go out and they're looking for Steve. She's saying that it's a devil. She literally keeps saying to them over and over again, because now we know that we've established within four. That she is very Christian. Only at this point have we established that she's very Christian. yeah So she's like, it it was the devil. And the one girl is the logical girl, the girl with the camera, the the final girl.
00:43:59
Speaker
She says... ah ah what's What's her name? I have it written somewhere, I think. If I don't, I'm the fullest fool who's ever fooled. Kim. There you go. Yeah, Kim. So Kim, who is the girlfriend of the other survival guy. Yeah. who is, I have this Chris. Chris. Yeah.
00:44:17
Speaker
Kim. And how could you forget Chris? Chris. Exactly. So Kim is like, it wasn't the devil. And she's like, it was, i saw it. You don't understand. So Steve and them, they're going through the woods and they're looking, but wow. While Steve was getting murdered, back at his cabin, Lance Hendrickson has these prophetic visions of what's taking place. Like he he has a connection to Pumpkinhead. And when Pumpkinhead is exacting vengeance on his behalf. He goes into creature vision, which is weird in this scene because creature vision essentially is they go from shooting day for night yeah to it's just the daytime.
00:44:59
Speaker
And that's the Pumpkinhead's version of creature vision. yeah It only really gets used in this and and and one other scene before they kind of bail on the concept. But every time Pumpkinhead kills someone, ah Ed Harley reacts like in pain, like he feels the pain that Pumpkinhead's inflicting or something. Yeah, he either feels the pain or it's just that he's being forced to watch yeah and he can't handle like you know the horror that's being caused. and and And after Steve gets killed, he does drive back up to the witch's house and he says, i know I didn't want this shit. like It's horrible. Or is it or is it after Maggie or after maggie gets killed? it is i think it's before maggie gets killed there is one scene know that's really fun where because the guys go out and the girls are all hunched over and it's um she's like it's the devil it's the devil and maggie says like god's the only thing that can stop that thing and there's a scene of pumpkin head walking past the window unnoticed which is really fun oh yeah yeah he she and and kim grabs kim gets kim gets up from the table And it's a matched tracking shot of when Kim leaves the table and goes to get catching knives. You just see pumpkin head go past the window at the same pace as the tracking shot. It's beautifully shot. It's horrifying. And there's a great line Kim has where she pulls out the knife and she's like, just in case God doesn't show. And I'm like, that's a, that's line. That's so good. That's so good that's how, you know, she's the survivor. Right.
00:46:24
Speaker
You know, she's the last And then actually, final girl yeah, according to my my notes, right before we do get Ed Hawley back with ah Haggis, Maggie is pulled out of the window and Pumpkinhead carves a cross into her head because I guess Pumpkinhead has a sense of irony. Yeah, matt Maggie runs out and she's like, oh, I gotta to help it help Steve. She gets nabbed and pulled up by her fucking head. She gets grabbed one hand palmed by her head and pulled up into the roof. And then there's this great shot where Kim runs out and then looks up at the roof and you just see Maggie's legs get pulled over the other side of the rooftop. Then we cut to the scene where he's experiencing pumpkin head, torturing yeah Maggie and she gets like,
00:47:08
Speaker
cross carved into her head and then he curb stomps her and then it almost gets comical in a horrific way because they're hiding in the house they identified that steve was dead so the boys come running back and they saw kim get taken Right. But they're hiding out and Pumpkinhead starts taunting the teens where he picks up Kim while she's still alive. Well, ah first it goes to the you you're going to have to edit this in order to make us sound not like idiots. Chris, sorry. First, Ed Harley is at the witch's house and he's yelling at her. He's like, you tricked me, you old witch, like this, this and this. You got to undo it. I didn't want it to be like this. And she gives him a lecture about like, what did you think was going to happen? Like everybody told you this is the the demon of vengeance. Did you think it was going to be easy? yeah Did you think that it wasn't going to be horrific and and awful? Like you're in it now at heart. yeah like And he says, I want it undone. She tells him I can't undo it. And he says, then I'll stop it. And she's like, you'll die if you try. yeah she's like He says that great line. He goes, then I'll die. Then I'll die. yeah I love how she's like, you'll fail and you'll die, Ed Harley. It's so dripping with, like ah it's such a as the new kids would say these days, it's such a vibe. It is a vibe.
00:48:30
Speaker
It's giving me swamp, you know? And it's it's just really good. She's clearly like you know the evil puppet master behind things. And then he says out he says, then I'll die, then I'll die. and then he says, God damn you, God damn you. And she says, he already has it, Harley.
00:48:49
Speaker
He already has. I love how she only refers to him by his full name. it's just it It gives everything she says that much more like like a fun spin to it. That's how you know she's the bad guy. Only bad guys use people's full names. So then we get the scene where they're hiding out in the cabin. They know that there's a creep. There's something out there. Initially, they thought it was hillbillies. Now they know something took... their friend up into the air and they're hiding in the cabin and suddenly in the window from where they're hiding you just see kim's face that kim's face sorry maggie's face yeah pop up into it and she's getting squished against the window and you hear like you hear like the blood and like the skin and it's like somebody rubbing balloons on like glass and it's like as she as pumpkin heads like hey i got your friend i'm checking it out He's puppeteering her while she's still alive. And then he forces her through the window, severs her neck artery with the glass. yes Everybody screams. I think Joel runs out and he's like, it's me that you want. yeah Come take me. Yeah, Joel seems to know. He's like, yeah, it's probably coming after me for being a shit. So, ah yeah yeah. Yeah. So he goes out and he and I think they. Oh, I forgot. Oh, you have to add this part. What's that?
00:50:07
Speaker
earlier so the way that what happens with steve is she says i have to help steve and as she it's it's one of those moments we were talking about that this movie hasn't so great i can't believe we forgot when maggie is concerned for steve she wants to go look for him they're trying to stop her after you know we see that he walked past the window she walks out and she goes i have to i have to go find steve and she turns and his body slumps down in front of her Yeah. in the cabinet it's that great score and it's that jump scare and then she gets nabbed and pulled up into the yeah so just make sure you add that part in there to make us sound smart and not like it is
00:50:45
Speaker
or leave it like this everybody everybody knows we're a bunch of idiots where were we okay so he goes out and he's he's shouting you know it's me that you want but like an idiot he left the other people in the cabin alone The other guy's trying to figure out a way for them to get out of there safely. And when Joel goes back to the house, he sees his girlfriend unconscious on the ground. he's like, what's this? And then Pumpkinhead comes out of the living room like he was like getting a beer. He's like, hey, what's up, buddy? And he drags his girlfriend away, and Joel tries to fight back. And Pumpkinhead catches his hand like Batman and snaps his wrist in half. And so this big tough guy, Joel, gets KO'd like immediately and he runs out. This is actually a legit line that I like. Joel just screams, it's a thing, it's a thing. And he's like, I don't know what the fuck it is. It's a thing, it's a thing. And I'm like, that feels real. like You know, like like, I feel like if you saw Pumpkinhead, you wouldn't know what to fucking say. So Joel gets a backbone, but gets his arm broken when he tries to attack Pumpkinhead with a machete. It's pretty nasty and gnarly. Kim, Joel's girlfriend, gets dragged up a tree. Pumpkinhead is a savage. He goes up the tree and he waits for them to notice where he is while he's dangling her off of this tree branch. Yeah. And he just drops her down from this tree onto a rock like a seagull cracking open clamshells. Yeah, he seems to really like dragging people to a really high height for some reason. And that was brutal. She just like snaps in half basically. Yeah, name is Pumpkinhead.
00:52:22
Speaker
And pumpkins don't grow on trees, but this guy certainly loves to climb trees. i guess it just makes him scarier. Yeah. It cuts back to Ed, who's kind of acting more animalistic and his features are kind of getting sharper. i think the dog's kind of growling at him while he's kind of experiencing this these flashes of what's happening. The other kids kind of run to get some help from the mountain people, the hillbillies, but the hillbillies chase them off and say that they can't help them. Yeah, the one the one guy with the gun literally looks at them is like you folks is marked. Yeah, you're marked. The dude that looks like 1980s pro wrestler. Yeah, and he has this really adorable like blue dog. like It might not be blue. It might just be the fact that the movie's lighting is so blue that and like it's reflecting off the fur in a certain way. Yeah, that day for night shooting where everything was just kind of blue. Yeah, he's got like some sort of shepherd dog. Lance Hendrickson shows up to save the day just in time. He shoots Pumpkinhead, but surprise, surprise, anything that Lance Hendrickson does, Ed Harley does to Pumpkinhead, is actually being turned around on him tenfold. I guess it's like a curse like Cain and Abel kind of deal. So he shoots Pumpkinhead, but it's as if he shot himself and he drops instead. So Joel then jumps in thinking he's going to be the man and he tries to shoot pumpkin head point blank, but pumpkin head just keeps coming. And in one of the weirdest, creepiest creature moments, it like stabs him with the shotgun and like lifts him above. And then it does this thing where like it, like the other kids are like running and screaming and it cuts to them and it cuts back and he's like cradling Joel's head. Hmm. And he keeps like tilting it up and letting it drop as if he's like, you may only be paralyzed and I want to cause the maximum amount of damage to your spinal cord. And I'm like, this is so fucked up. Like why? i absolutely love, I think Michael does this in Halloween four too. I love the, oh no, he's got a gun. What's he going to do with it? Stab you with it.
00:54:22
Speaker
He's not going to shoot the gun. He's just going to stab you with it. And then he like holds it. Like he was like about to like turn to the camera and be like lock and load. like Exactly. Like he's a Terminator 2 all of a sudden. Yeah. Then the hillbilly's dog ends up biting Ed and Pumpkinhead reacts. And that's where Ed kind of figure out, figures out what happened to him and like what's going on. Because before he didn't really know why he dropped to the ground when he shot at Pumpkinhead. And then that one Tom Sawyer-ish hillbilly kid helps them get away, and he takes them to this awesome church set piece. I love that. I wish more horror movies bothered to... like Because this movie, let's face it, this movie could have suffered from the low budget, just a chase scene through the woods, because we could it doesn't cost any money to go find a location in the middle of the woods to shoot in. But they were like, let's build this sick as hell, burnt down church set piece. I love it because his logic is that maybe since it's like some kind of demon, it won't be able to go on somewhat holy ground or whatever. Yeah, it's it's cool because like Pumpkinhead's kind of like a piece of modern American folklore, right? Like this in this universe, it's like a modern American folklore. So like they are acknowledging that these ah other bits of folklore exist. Like maybe it's like vampires or witches that came. going hollow ground. But we already know from where, when it was fucking with the other, the other chick that died, yeah this isn't going to work because he carved a a crucifix into the head of the one chick before he killed her, that's so which is also balling. In that and scene, what I also love is from like a cinematography standpoint, one of my favorite things in horror movies is the shot where like the character we're actually focusing on is just in like one third of the screen. So that it's so that you, the audience are like looking in the background, like, where is he? I know he's back there. And they're like, they're like giving you enough of those shots to be like, like I don't know, baby pumpkin ads coming soon, you know? And they they they hang out in the church for a little bit thinking that they're safe. Just long enough for them to like wonder if they're going to be all right. And then he shows up and walks into the church anyway. that's i mean, it really is just what happens when you give a special effects guy carte blanche to make a movie. He's going to go all out with the art direction and all of that. He also breaks the the crucifix just for no other reason than because he's like, this is awesome. You know, like. Yeah, you you guys thought you were safe, but this is pretty dope. Check this out. Oh, well, check it check this out. Cracks the crucifix. You're like, oh, man.
00:56:57
Speaker
I don't know what movies were coming out at that time period, but maybe, you know, the director was tired of vampire movies or whatever. so he's like, fuck your religion. They make it to these dirt bikes, which are just parked there. And what I love about Pumpkinhead is, like, it starts out, you think he's just, like, a brainless monster that's, like, pursuing him? But he actually has intelligence and he like left the bikes there as like a trap and he took the bike chain off of First of all, I don't know how many people out there have ever tried to take a chain off of a motorcycle. It's not like it's an easy thing to do. You need like tools, but he takes the chain off of these motorcycles. And then there's that shit eating grin he has when it like cuts to him on the side and he's like... dangle in the chain it's like it's not just like like the first bike he breaks it's you could very easily be like he's smart enough to know that that is a means of transportation he sees you know it has wheels you can move in that but to like know like i need to set this bike up without a chain so that he you know completely falls on his face when he tries to ride it that's a different level Absolutely.
Conclusion and Reflection on Vengeance
00:58:05
Speaker
It's diabolical. And so he pick he picks this guy up. I think this guy's name is Chris. He picks Chris up in this dirt bike while he's on it and he slams him on the ground. Just utterly shatters this man's pelvis. like kind it
00:58:19
Speaker
Like killing him would have been nicer than what Pumpkinhead does to this guy. When I'm watching, I'm like, when he's like, he brings him back later on. i' like, you didn't kill him, Pumpkinhead? What for? Why? He's just causing the maximum out of He's like, I hope you enjoy your several months of physical therapy after your hip replacement, bud. Because he just destroys this man. And then they go there has to be someone who can help. Like, you know, when they're running, they finally make it to that little...
00:58:49
Speaker
town set piece and there has to be someone who can help and then boom ed harley comes out and we get the call back to his weed burner that he was using to burn all the weeds in his crop which he is outfitted to be a flamethrower on top of a pitchfork yeah yeah sick as hell yeah he uh he uses it and in the lighting it's really fucked up you can really see how they've been like changing and morphing the creature to look more and more like lance hendrickson look it looks so it's it's i i hate to say because don't this feels is like a diss on lance hendrickson it looks way freakier the more it looks like lance hendrickson
00:59:27
Speaker
Yeah, 100% because he's just got those weird angular features and I think they even gave him bad teeth or maybe those are his real teeth before he like he got money to fix them or something. And Lance Hendrickson also is becoming more and more creature-like. He's got those like yellow thriller lenses in and all of that while it's all going down. I also love there's the scene where Ed Hart is going to try and attack them with the blowtorch, but then he like passes out because of like some pumpkin and connection. And in the house, we have a classic dog scare where the dog leaps out at ah the kid. But then when the kid hides in the closet from Pumpkinhead, the dog is also hiding in the chest and he like pokes his nose out. Oh yeah, we got some classic 80s dog shenanigans. Yeah, it's so good. I love it so much. Yeah, you know that was some trained dog that they actually had on hand. Oh yeah. The Pumpkinhead ends up using this hillbilly Tom Sawyer kid as beat to get the girl to come out. But Lance Hendrickson, Ed Hardy knows that like the only way to kill Pumpkinhead is to kill him, so he tells the girl to shoot him.
01:00:32
Speaker
He, like, shoots him first shoots himself first, but it's like a glancing thing where he's not dead, and now he's also kind of fucked up and can't finish the job. Yeah, I guess we'll have to call him Glance Hendrickson now. But, yeah, he he does the thing with the hesitation wounds on the suicide, but it could also be the magic spell. Like, the curse of the spell is that he can't undo right what he's done, you know? Somebody else has to undo it.
01:00:56
Speaker
Or, t'was beauty that killed the beast, so to speak. Right, right, right. So that that chick blows, you know, Ed Harley's head off. And that's the end of the the horrors that were taking place with these teenagers. Yeah, the pumpkin head also like lights up on in flames and like descending rates into ash, which is pretty rad.
01:01:15
Speaker
when they die, they die in the same pose. Like, there's those little touches that, like, really, like, Pumpkinhead gets kind of humanized at the end, and then Ed Harley gets demonized. Yeah. But then when they die in the same position, and then Pumpkinhead, like, bursts into flame. But then also, ed Harley's body shrivels up, like, the original Pumpkinhead body, and then it cuts to the old woman, like, burying him back in the swamp. Like, and and it's that...
01:01:44
Speaker
the symbolism of like you know the cycle of vengeance like you and hatred never ends and it's the it's the if you go on a path of vengeance dig two graves kind of thing yeah exactly and you can tell it's ed harley when she's burying him in the grave because he's wearing the pumpkin head body and now has the necklaces kid made for him at the beginning of the movie which i thought i love that Yeah, Chef's Kiss is great because otherwise you wouldn't know because they shrunk the body down, you know? Yeah. but Yeah, just a great overall great movie. It hits all the emotional notes. You know, you got a dad out for vengeance for his kid. You have teenagers just being teenagers with not willfully being evil at first. You have the the asshole jockish older brother who goes kind of psycho. And you have all the all the elements are there, but there's just so many unique touches on it. And the art direction is so good. It's so beautiful. When I was watching it, i was rewatching it last night. There were so many moments where I was like, man, they just don't make them like this anymore. They like, that's so like, there are moments where like the lighting is almost painfully bright, but I prefer to that. I want to be able to see the things like the lighting is so good throughout. There's just so much love put into every set piece. you know And I don't know how much of that they found and how much of it was them dressing things up. But this was one of those movies that when I watched it, it stuck with me for the longest time because of all of those artistic choices that they made. It wasn't just a run-of-the-mill slasher. it wasn't a monster. it wasn't like a creature feature, so to speak. I mean, it is a creature, but like you know yeah there's so much emotional depth in this movie that... yeah
01:03:19
Speaker
is lacking in so many other art pieces you could just tell that the direct the director you know really cared about this being his first outing being allowed to run the show and that yeah practical effects are just sick you know just they're gorgeous they're i love practical effects that this is this is definitely a movie that you would be like here's why we do practical stuff like look at it you know look Look at how unique this looks. Look at how real it looks. How an actual actor embodying this. And then occasionally cutting to like a claymation full figure. yeah you know um Just really cool. It looks beautiful. And what i think is very fascinating is because it has this sort of weird, the harbinger is the main character kind of thing, it could have...
01:04:04
Speaker
lent more into the teenagers being more generic and joel has like such a weird arc where he goes full crazy and then quickly and i think kind of humanly realizes okay this thing is clearly after us it's my fault take me not them and i'm like joel in most ah versions of the script as far as like writing it i don't think would make that decision i think that was a very interesting way to take this when they didn't have to your sort of thing yeah and it for the film as well it's interesting that his kid gets killed but these are also for the most part teenagers they're also kids like you know and you cut back in the very beginning of the movie to he's complicit in his dad ignoring the neighbor that has pumpkin head chasing after him because he doesn't do anything to help uh and he doesn't know any better as a kid he doesn't learn the lesson you're supposed to learn from it and the Kids show up and they do something horrible, but, you know, they did the right thing. The one, the Steve stays behind to tell him what happened and yeah everything that's going on. They tried to get him some help. The kids did everything right in the situation that they caused with the exception of, you know, Joel running away with his girlfriend. once Once Joel kind of messed up the situation, I feel like there wasn't any good options and they still were like trying to be like, okay, you stay here, we go get help. That's like the best they could have done under the circumstances aside from Joel, obviously. Yeah.
01:05:31
Speaker
And so it kind of goes, it's it's it's that weird thing of like innocences being destroyed literally and figuratively, you know, yeah in in the story. And even like some of the other characters, like the grandfather who Lance Henriksen brings the feed to, i love that scene where he's like, um hey, can you tell me where that old woman is? And he's like, she can't do anything for you for him.
01:05:53
Speaker
Go home and bury your kid. Like, I feel like, again, that's a much more like nuanced version of that kind of character. Yeah, every character has emotional depth. He's like, I feel for you, man, but that's not the route you want to go down. Yeah, don't do that. hear you. I totally hear you, man, but like, no. Yeah, overall, it's one of my favorites. I think I watch that probably once a year. Yeah, it's a really good movie. I don't remember when I first saw it. It's just been weird mess. I think I might have first seen it on SyFy, just because SyFy used to love doing, like, four Pumpkinhead movies in a row on a Saturday, and I probably threw it on at one point was like, what's this all about? Yeah, at some point, I think, didn't they make, wasn't one of them a SyFy original movie? Yes, I believe, like, Pumpkinhead, like, four, like, Ashes to Ashes, I think was what it was called. Yeah. It's one those things, so I don't think I've, I'm sure I've seen bits and pieces. I don't think I've seen any of the sequels all the way through. And I know Lance Henriksen is like the star of multiple of them.
01:06:51
Speaker
And like, logically that makes no sense. So I don't know how it happens, but I'm like, sure, man. He's not the same character, if I remember correctly. I just think that it's, if I remember right, the second one is the dad from Hellraiser as like the local sheriff. And for some reason, the new, well, it's not for some reason. they're Like I said, they're going for Pumpkinhead is just a piece of American folklore. Mm-hmm. So in this town, Pumpkinhead is the vengeful spirit of a mentally handicapped child that got tormented by bullies. It's very Jason Voorhees-esque. And then in the the next ones, I think they bring Lance Hendrickson back because he was affordable and available. Yeah. And I don't think he's the same character, but he's like a stand-in for the same concept. Yeah. You know? I wouldn't be surprised if it was like, ah, Ed Harley. No, that's my brother. I'm Stead Harley, you know, like that kind of thing. Yeah. Wouldn't shock me at all. But yeah, I i really liked this movie. i I kind of want more pumpkin head stuff. I'm like, I feel like that is kind of right for a remaster reboot, you know, like, um, probably not a requel with Lance Henriksen, but some kind of new installment. Yeah. I can't remember if I brought this up earlier in the podcast, but, uh, so it was so long ago.
01:08:13
Speaker
yeah But it's it's kind of my dream to revamp Pumpkinhead for like a modern era yeah and make it more about like police brutality. Because I think one of the movies like touches on that. like there's like a local I think the second one has like a local mayor who's like corrupt or whatever, but it's still all white teenagers and all that stuff. If someone's going to summon a vengeance demon, yeah I really feel like it wouldn't be the rich white people. Yeah.
01:08:41
Speaker
It'd be kind of fun. I would like to like so i'd like to see more of this. I know at one point they made a comic series out of him, but it was kind of like, um yeah again, I didn't read much of it, but I just and read like articles about it. I think it was kind of like ah like ah almost a a Godzilla type thing with him where it was like the spirit of vengeance versus the spirit of, insert other phrase here, and he was just fighting other demons or whatever.
01:09:04
Speaker
Interesting.
Potential Remakes and Effects Discussion
01:09:05
Speaker
Again, I would be interested in reading them, but like, I don't, that's not what I want out of more pumpkin in necessarily yeah'm not saying it's bad, but like, it's not what I'm aiming for. Yeah. I just worry somebody would be like, all right, now completely CGI pumpkin. Oh my God. But don't worry, we got this famous actor to put blue dots on his body to pretend to be blue. Nobody wanted that. Nobody asked for this. Yeah, I remember one of my, we might have mentioned, I actually don't think we did, but i we might have mentioned it, because talking about Alec Guinness and Tom Woodruff Jr., When they worked on the Thing prequel, they were like so excited because they're like, sweet, we get to, the the Thing is like the best practical effects movie of all time. We get to sort of add to that. And they had all of their practical effects CGI'd over. And that's why it looks so terrible because people in the studio were like, yeah, it looks fine on this angle. But if we go on this angle, looks terrible. And they're like, well, we're planning this shot we don't need it to look good over there. You know? Yeah. And that's the difference. You need to plan practical effects out more, whereas CGI, you could you can literally just be like, we'll fix it in post. Well, even even CGI, you should plan it. You should. They said that they go famously one of the worst CGI's out of like the Marvel era has to be the the ending Black Panther scene. and...
01:10:23
Speaker
Killmonger. Yeah. The Michael B. Jordan character. Yeah. Him and Killmonger fighting in like the cave. They literally are like, okay, set design. We're going make you fight in a, you're both going be wearing black suits. It's going to be in a black cave and we're going to give you blue lighting. there this The special effects people are like, so you, you're good. You want this to look terrible digitally. Yeah. Because it's going to look like if you give it those conditions, it's going to look like we did this on an early edition of Xbox. like Yeah, it's it's everything is better with intention when it comes to special effects.
01:10:59
Speaker
But practical effects necessitate specificity, whereas CGI can't. you can You can do it without being specific. You really shouldn't, but you you you physically can do it, you know?
01:11:12
Speaker
Yeah. But yeah, I think that's we can we can wrap on Pumpkinhead right here. Love this movie. Want more of it. Watch it again. it's it's It's past Halloween, but we're still in November. It is a very autumnal movie. This an autumnal season. i mean i'll I'll tell you one thing that never goes out of season.
01:11:28
Speaker
Vengeance. And I will have mine. I shall have my revenge. So have your revenge and rate and review this... podcast. Please don't. Please be kind. If I said something to offend you, you have my permission to raise a pumpkin monster from a a shallow grave as long as you do speak to that Appalachian
Humorous Reflection and Gratitude
01:11:50
Speaker
witch. Yeah. I feel like if I had a pumpkin head go after me, I'd probably be like, you know what? Fair.
01:11:54
Speaker
Yeah, fine. you know, if I'm going to die, this is probably one of the better ways to die. So, you know, what whatever. Just stay away from trees. You should be all right. I might i might want to take it up with whoever summoned the Pumpkinhead's manager and say, I don't think I deserve this, but like, you know what? Cool way to go. Yeah. Thanks for having me on the podcast, Chris. Hell yeah, brother. And we'll have you on next time as well when we do our long awaited edition of Monster Mashup. Stay tuned for that. too
Episode Wrap-Up and Listener Engagement
01:12:22
Speaker
No idea what I'm going to do.
01:12:24
Speaker
Well, that's going to do it for this episode of the Professional Horror Podcast. Thank you so much to my guest, Sean, for appearing to talk about Pumpkinhead, an amazing movie. We're going to be back in a couple weeks to do one of our favorite games, Monster Mashup, Sean and I, and in a few more weeks after that, we're going to be playing the Professional Horror Podcast Quiz Show with some guests, and I'm super duper excited for that that. Hope you will stay tuned for both of those. Also, please, if you'd be so kind, could you, you know,
01:12:49
Speaker
like, rate, review, comment, all of the things you can do to podcasts, you know, whatever your podcast, listener of choices, just go to the podcast store, say, hey, that one seems pretty good, I'll take one of those, and you know, do whatever you gotta do, do it positively engaged with the show, it makes me feel warm and fuzzy inside. But yeah, that's gonna do it for this week's episode, so, see you in two weeks for our Monster Mashup episode, and a couple more weeks after that is the Professional Horror Podcast Quiz Show. But until that time, stay scary, but keep it professional.