Bambi's B-Movie Boutique: "Nightwalkers"

NIGHTWALKERS (2003)

I remember my first anthology movie. It was called "Satan's Scrapbook" and the whole premise was that Satan's grandmother was forcing a couple of hot cheerleader-types to look at photos of her grandson as he grew up, and each picture led into a different segment of the movie. It was pretty lame, and even though I looked smokin' hot in my role of the gym teacher who ties up her students naked in the showers to punish them for having an orgy that she wasn't invited to, the movie sucked bad. I think the guy who made it put the whole thing on his MasterCard and then sold dubs at flea markets.

Of course, he's a big-time director now who won't answer my calls. Prick.

Anyway, when it comes to horror movies, anthologies are pretty much regarded as the easiest of the easy to make. All it takes is three or four short stories, some kind of wrap-around segment to connect them, and boom…you got a movie. Most of the time it's a crapshoot. A few of the stories might be okay, one might be really good, and the rest will be terrible crap that even the writer's mother wouldn't love. One exception to this rule is "Creepshow," where every story plus the wraparound was well-written and interesting, but anthology movies as good as that are few and far between.

Which brings us to "Nightwalkers." Unfortunately.

This shot-on-video extravaganza takes place in the perpetually haunted town of Pumpkin Hollow, where demons live in houses with ironically placed "no smoking" stickers on the front door and everybody seems to be scared witless of a primer gray Mustang. Ooooohhh….scary…

In the case of this anthology, a guy is looking to buy the above mentioned Mustang, and along the way, everybody he runs into has some kind of story to tell about the car. Not that the car pulled a "Christine" and came alive and killed people. Not that the car itself was used for multiple murders. More like, the car happened to be in the vicinity of some murders. Parked outside a house, usually.

Yeah, that's some terrifying stuff right there.

The first story deals with three wanna-be frat brothers who take some poor idiot out to a supposedly haunted house to make a Jackass-type video that will ensure their frat acceptance. Of course, their prank goes bad, and the brainiacs decide to bury the guy out in the yard of the house. That's always a good idea, by the way. Nothing bad EVER happens to people who bury the bodies of their murder victims to hide their crimes. And because these boys are Mensa candidates, eight months later they come back to the haunted house to party…and guess who claws his way out of his shallow grave? Yeah, you got it.

The second story is a little more disturbing in some ways, but just as lame in others. A trio of drug dealers run out of gas (in the Mustang O'Doom) and decide to walk until they can find someone to carjack or a house to pillage. They find a farmhouse and decide to do a little bit of a home invasion. Charming. Meanwhile, inside the house, Mom, Pop and Daughter are chatting about the scarecrow hanging out in the cornfield. It protects the family, Pop says.

Yeah…about that…not so much, it turns out.

The trio break into the house and proceed to do all kinds of bad stuff to the family. Meanwhile, the scarecrow just hangs around outside. Way to protect, there, straw-boy. But before the punks can leave, something brings the scarecrow to life and he does what you knew he was going to do the moment you saw him hanging in the field…but it's all a little too late. You know, having a living scarecrow guarding your family must be one of those things that works out better in theory than practice. I think the scarecrow from "Wizard of Oz" would have been a better watchdog, and he didn't even have a brain.

The third story in this trilogy of tepidness is about a love affair gone bad. For all you red-bloodeds out there who were waiting for a glimpse of sex and/or nudity, this is the segment for you. Sort of. A little girl-on-top grinding and a butt shot from some actress whose last name is "O". Really. Just "O." I did a movie once where I just went by Bam-Bam, but that was a long time ago and I was young and needed the money and I don't' want to talk about it now.

Anyway, somebody is accidentally killed, just like in the first segment, and some yahoos with shovels think it's a super-great-keen idea to bury the body in a shallow grave (and we all know how that always works out). There must be something in the dirt in that town. Nothing seems to want to stay buried. I guess they've never heard of the wonder of cremation.

"Nightwalkers" is one of those movies, though, that as bad as it is, you can tell that a lot of people believed in what they were doing when they were making it. Which makes me feel like Queen Bitch of Bitchytown for writing a negative review of it.

Would I recommend this movie? No. But I can appreciate the work that went into it. Plus the director managed to talk Brinke Stevens into doing a three minute cameo, so he's obviously got some connections (and I might want to hit him up for a part in the future).

I suggest that if you want to watch a good anthology, you should check out my classic: "Satan's Scrapbook" or my starring role in "The Vault of Tombs" (I play the witch in the wraparound, and star in all three segments—the director didn't want to hire three other actresses). Cheap bastard. He's working at a Home Depot now.

Hugz!