Creepshow 2 – Film Reel Review

Not quite as good as the first one but some really gory effects on display. – Will

Down to only 3 segments for the sequel, Creepshow 2 puts Romero in the writing seat with King and delivers some gory stories.

Directed by – Michael Gornick

Written by – Stephen King, George A. Romero, Lucille Fletcher

Starring – Domenick John, Tom Savini, George Kennedy, Philip Dore, Dorothy Lamour, Frank Salsedo, Holt McCallany, David Holbrook, Dan Harvey, Dan Kamin, Paul Satterfield, Jeremy Green, Daniel Beer, Page Hannah, Lois Chiles, David Beecroft, Tom Wright, Richard Parks, Stephen King, Joe Silver

If you really don’t like gore then I suggest skipping the pics for this one. I couldn’t help myself when it came time to add some images for Creepshow 2 and I had to throw in the Hitchhiker from the final segment. Anyone who has seen the film can probably remember his mashed up face and the line that I waited the whole movie for! “Thanks for the ride lady!” Classic. This one serves up more gore than the first film did and by only having three segments instead of five the shorts run a little longer. That’s not such a bad thing but you also have less to prop up the film. This ends up making the good segments better but causes the worst of the three to really drag on.

First up is Old Chief Wood’nhead. This one sees a man and his wife running a little store in the middle of nowhere. Everyone has left the little town to go where the jobs are but the old man won’t give up his shop. The chief of a local indian tribe comes and gives the old man some precious stones and jewellery in return for allowing their tribe to get supplies for free. One of the young men from the tribe returns with his friends later in the day and robs the old man and his wife of the stones to make money so he can go to Hollywood with his lovely head of hair. They wind up killing the old man and his wife which angers Old Chief Wood’nhead, a wooden Indian statue out front of the store. Wood’nhead seeks out the young men to avenge the death of the old man who took care of him those many years.

I'm sorry, you seem to have something sticky on your face.

I’ve never really been a fan of that first segment although the wooden Indian looks amazing. It’s hard to tell when it’s actually a wooden statue or when it’s a guy dressed up, except for the fact that it will move when it’s a guy! The next two segments are great but it’s this second one that has always been my personal choice. Titled The Raft, 4 friends head out to a lake where a floating dock is. Why they travel to the middle of nowhere just for a floating dock is beyond me but I’m glad that they do. When they get there and start swimming out to the dock one of them notices a slimy substance in the water that eats a duck. Nobody else notices it but he urges everyone to hurry to the dock. Once the climb up on top they see the substance as it speeds towards the dock and begins picking them off one by one. This one serves up a healthy dose of horror as the slime literally eats the flesh off their bones when it gets its gooey hands on them.

Thanks for the ride lady!

Well, if you made it through that last pic there then you should be ready for the final segment, The Hitchhiker. A cheating wife is leaving her lovers house when she accidentally hits a hitchhiker. She quickly speeds away before other drivers see her and thinks she’s gotten away with it until the she sees the same hitchhiker coming up behind her car. She runs him over, shoots him and drives him straight into a tree over and over again trying to kill him once and for all until she finally gets home and believes that she’s escaped the invincible hitchhiker. That’s when he drags himself from under her car, mashed up beyond recognition and strangles her to death all while screaming “Thanks for the ride lady.” Oh man, I never get tired of that line.

Each segment gets more and more gruesome until that final moment when the mushed up hitchhiker crawls from under the car. This flick gives up on the more creative stories that ran through the first one and just delivers the horrific goods. The first segment probably has the most story going for it but also winds up having the least amount of gore. It would have been nice if they could find a nice balance between the two as the first film managed to deliver in story and horror but it’s still a great film. This is the one where I remember the shorts better since it’s hard to forget the amazing effects work, once again by Tom Savini. In my opinion, just play both flicks back to back and have 3 hours of sheer horrific delight. You won’t be disappointed and you probably won’t swim out to floating docks anymore either.

Under the marquee – Will