Pumpkinhead is a horror movie starring Lance Henriksen, Matthew Hurley, Cynthia Bain, John D'Aquino, Jeff East, Kerry Remsen, Kimberly Ross, Tom Woodruff Jr, Joel Hoffman, Florence Schauffler, and oh hey, a very young Mayim Bialik!
In the distant hoary past of 1957, young Eddie Harley (Chance Michael Corbitt) witnesses a man (Dick Warlock) getting killed by the demon called Pumpkinhead (Woodruff Jr). In the present (well, in the movie's present), Ed (Henriksen) has grown up in a hard-working guy running a store and raising his young son Billy (Hurley) on his own. They're poor and the surrounding area seems to be stuck in the Depression to the point that some of the neighbor's kids are literally wearing potato sacks, but they're happy together.
And then some fucking punks come to town to have a "cabin the woods" kind of weekend, and two of them, brothers Joel (D'Aquino) and Steve (Hoffman) go tear-assing around on their motorbikes, Joel accidentally runs Billy down. He dies from his injuries, and Lance goes to find the old witch of the Appalachian swamps (?), Haggis (Schauffler) to raise the demon Pumpkinhead from the grave to take revenge!
It's a weird little movie, but it's entertaining and it's well-written, in my humble opinion. The kids do something terrible and they respond in completely understandable ways. Joel flips out and tries to cover it up, even to the point of locking two of his friends (final girl Tracey (Bain) and her boyfriend Chris (East) in a closet. Not entirely clear what his plan is, but he eventually comes to the realization that this isn't going away and he has to man up. Steve, his brother, is horrified and stays with Billy until his father gets there (he was running an errand). His girlfriend Maggie (Remsen) goes into shock. And so on.
The theme here, I guess, is that "two or more wrongs don't make a right", or perhaps "if you're seeking revenge, be sure and dig two graves." Ed is perfectly justified in his anger, but he learns very quickly that when Pumpkinhead shows up and starts killing these kids, he gets to see it through his own eyes and is understandably horrified by what's happening. He tries to stop it, but Pumpkinhead isn't really a thing you can negotiate with. It's a demon of revenge, and that's all it does.
Much like early slasher movies, this got made before the trend of making every victim character a completely unlikable douchebag came into vogue. As such, while we definitely know that Joel is a dick, the rest of the kids are trying to deal with this horrific situation as best they can. If they had all been assholes about it, or helped Joel in his attempted coverup, the movie would be very different and, I think, weaker for it.
The design of Pumpkinhead is awesome, great practical effects - the movie was directed by Stan Winston, so you expect nothing less. While the production design is good, it's a little weird (like I said, there's a kind of random swamp with animal species that you don't find in Appalachia, so it's not entirely clear where this movie is set). The ending, where we see the witch burying Ed as he becomes the new Pumpkinhead, is pretty much perfect in-theme. To wit, there's no good ending, here. A little boy died in a horrible accident. No matter how many people die, that doesn't change, so it won't help.
It's a fun movie with a really bleak story, and I think it deserved more love than it got when it came out, but what are you gonna do.
My Grade: B+
Rewatch Value: High
Next up: Sleepaway Camp
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