Rawhead Rex is set in Ireland where a farmer is trying to clear a field of a huge stone pillar, as he does so lightening strikes the pillar & it falls over. From under where the pillar stood an ancient 8 foot tall demon known as Rawhead Rex (Heinrich von Schellendorf) is released, the farmer is turned into mincemeat. American photographer Howard Hollenbeck (David Dukes) his wife Elaine (Kelly Piper) together their two young children Robbie (Hugh O'Conor) & Minty (Cora Lunny) are on holiday, a holiday on which Howard is working on his book of sacred religious sites. Meanwhile Rawhead Rex kills a local farmer named Dennis (John Olohan), Ireland's finest Detective Inspector Gissing (Niall O'Brien) is on the case. Rex then attacks a caravan site & kills some more people which annoys everyone, Inspector Gissing doesn't believe the stories of monsters told by Howard who saw Rex in the woods. As the Hallenbecks are leaving town Robbie is attacked & killed by Rex, Howard is distraught & sets out to kill Rex with the knowledge he has learned from his investigations of the local Church & it's mythology...
This English Irish co-production was directed by George Pavlou & is a pretty bad film in all respects although it's fun to watch if nothing else. The script was written by Clive Barker based on his own short story, it moves along at a fair pace & it's never boring but it's just too silly to be completely effective. The film feels like a basic monster on the loose randomly killing people with a few of the complex religious ideas & themes that Barker likes so much shining through but they are ultimately lost in the daftness of it. There's a scene in which a woman runs through a wood with her boyfriend supposedly holding her hand but when she checks she is holding his severed hand, as if you wouldn't notice.
The dialogue is funny at times & the film has no subtly at all as Rex walks around making silly roaring noises, the bizarre Verger Declan O'Brien (Ronan Wilmot) who at first is just plain creepy & then suddenly turns into a foul mouthed nutter who worships Rex & gets a golden shower off him in a unique baptism ceremony! Some of the stuff this guy comes out with needs to be heard to be believed, very funny. I honestly think the filmmakers set out to make a disturbing, scary & effective horror film but it just comes across as silly & downright funny at times much of which has to be laid at the door of Rawhead Rex himself. Rex looks absolutely awful, his has crossed red eyes, rubber claws, a very rubber face, rubber teeth, a really bad mo-hawk hair-do, a stupid outfit & you can actually see actor Heinrich von Schellendorf's teeth at the back of Rex's mouth, this is most apparent at the rubbishy twist ending when he bursts out of the grave. To it's credit it's good fun to watch & provides a certain amount of dubious entertainment & unintentional laughs.
Director Pavlou does an OK job but there's nothing spectacular about it, it has no real style or visual flair. There isn't much atmosphere, there's no scares or shocks & most of Rawhead Rex's entertainment value comes from it's silliness. The most effective scene is when Rex first bursts out of the ground at the start. There's a few decent bits of gore, a few decapitated heads, some bites, a severed hand & some dead bodies.
Technically Rawhead Rex is OK, it's well made throughout except for the dodgy rubber monster suit that is. The acting was OK, some of the accents & dialogue are funny at times but that all adds to the cheese factor.
Rawhead Rex is a decent watch, it's fun in a way the filmmakers probably didn't intend & I sort of liked it overall. Worth a watch for sure. Apparently Barker was so disappointed with this & other adaptations of his work that he set out to make his own film & thus the brilliant Hellraiser (1987) was made with Barker as director, at least that's one thing we can thank Rawhead Rex for.
Rating...
6/10
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