The Monster Squad (1987)

A quick note: I really, really wanted to talk about this movie on its own merits. Really. I didn't want to bring the Goonies into the fray. But, like the Stay Puf't Marshmallow man, it just popped in there; it seemed innocent at the time, but the comparisons grew to destroy the review. Sorry.

'The Monster Squad' has earned quite a reputation over the years as being some sort of lost masterpiece. This is evidence of how tricky nostalgia can be: it's not a good movie unless it was a part of your formative years. In a nutshell, the story is a dumbed down Goonies fighting against the classic Universal monster library.

'The Monster Squad' came out two years after 'The Goonies' did, and without saying it plagiarized the latter, well, it borrowed their template. Heavily. The Squad in question is the group of misfits who rally together when the forces of evil come to town. Okay, it's a movie aimed at a younger audience, it's going to feature kids. It's the personality types involved that are troubling; there's one older kid who all kids in school look up to, there's a central kid who holds the team together, also a fat kid-- no, seriously, instead of calling him Chunk, they just call him Fat Kid-- and, um, there's some other kid. I guess they threw in the "Some Other Kid" because there was no need for a Data character, as there really are no inventions required in this story, or any puzzles to figure out, really. About halfway through the movie, Frankenstein's Monster joins the squad, because, just like Sloth he's large, strong and intimidating, but gentle, and befriends the kids when they show him a little kindness (side note: yes, Frankenstein's Monster is the most sympathetic of Universal's catalog, so if a monster must join the kids, yeah, it'd be him. But Come On, Really?). And oh yeah, late in the show the girl that the older kid crushes on joins the Squad.

Now, about the villains. Tri-Star released this movie, and Universal Studios has the rights to the monsters in their library, so liberties were taken to avoid lawsuit. The reinventions were abominable. Dracula leads the gang and is nowhere near as frightening as Ma Fratelli. The actor playing him made sure to ditch any of the elegance that makes Dracula really frightening, and the script calls for him to have selective memory of his abilities. Why would he use dynamite? His second in command is the Wolfman, played in human form by the likeable Jon Gries, otherwise he's just a man in a fur suit who shows up to be menacing when called for. The true atrocities are the Mummy, whose two key moments are just for comic effect (just why WAS he hanging out in a kid's closet?), and the Gillman who is only in this movie to be wasted. Stan Winston did the creature designs, so it's fitting that the Gillman looks like a prototype for The Predator, which came out two months earlier. Come to think of it, Shane Black was in that movie, too. Things that make you go Hmm. . .

'The Monster Squad' was 'Van Helsing,' before anyone knew there was a niche for destroying all monsters' reputations.

There's a plot in this movie somewhere, too. See, there's an amulet that controls the forces of good and evil. Every hundred years it shows up to do. . . something. Something evil. Or maybe good. There's not any real logic to it, nor is there real logic to how it is seen in Transylvania in the movie's prologue, only to show up in Southern California post-credits. That's a fatal flaw to the movie: everything is just too easy. The kids never have to think their way through any problems; they're just given everything. They need the amulet? Good thing it's right there. They need to translate Van Helsing's book? Good thing there's a German who lives next door.

The movie is all the more disappointing because it was written by Shane Black; 'Monster Squad' and 'Lethal Weapon' both came out in the same year, so I can't write this off by saying "a young Shane Black." The father of the modern buddy action movie could have come up with a better buddy action movie. I've heard people give 'Monster Squad' flak because the kids in it swear-- that's about the only thing I give it a pass on, because kids that age? They do swear. The other behind the scenes disappointment is director Fred Dekker, whose 'Night of the Creeps' is well worth seeing.

So. If it's a rainty day and you want to show your kids a good time, show them the original Univeral movies. Show them 'The Goonies.' But beware of showing them 'The Monster Squad,' as nostalgia may rear it's Predator-lookin' head.