The Monster Squad

The Monster Squad
Directed by	Fred Dekker
Written by	Fred Dekker Shane Black
Produced by	Rob Cohen Peter Hyams Jonathan A. Zimbert
Starring	Andre Gower Robby Kiger Stephen Macht Duncan Regehr Tom Noonan
Cinematography	Bradford May
Edited by	James Mitchell
Music by	Bruce Broughton
Release dates	August 14, 1987
Running time	82 min
Country	USA

This article is about the film. For the TV series, see Monster Squad

The Monster Squad is a comedy/horror film written by Shane Black and Fred Dekker and directed by Fred Dekker (who also wrote/directed Night of the Creeps). It was released by Tri-Star Pictures on August 14, 1987. The film features the reunion of a number of classic monsters, led by Dracula (Duncan Regehr) and including Frankenstein's monster (Tom Noonan), The Wolf Man (Carl Thibault), The Mummy (Michael Reid MacKay), and The Gill Man (Tom Woodruff Jr).

Plot summary

The Monster Squad is the name of a group of young teenagers who idolize classic monster movies. After the club leader Sean (Andre Gower) is given the diary of the legendary vampire killer Abraham Van Helsing, he and his friends get the local "Scary German Guy" (Leonardo Cimino) (who is a Jewish Holocaust survivor) to translate it from German to English. The movie also co-starred Ryan Lambert, former star of Kids Incorporated and current lead singer of elephone.

The diary describes, in great detail, an amulet that is composed of concentrated good. One day out of every century, as the forces of good and evil reach a balance, the otherwise-indestructible amulet becomes vulnerable, and can be destroyed. The next day of balance falls within a couple days, at the stroke of midnight.

If the kids can get ahold of the amulet (which is inconveniently buried in a stone room under a house that the monsters occupy) before the day arrives (the aforementioned room is littered with holy symbols such as crucifixes, thus preventing the monsters from simply taking it), then they can use it in conjunction with an incantation written in Van Helsing's diary to punch a hole in the universe and cast the monsters into Limbo. But, if the monsters can obtain and destroy the amulet, then the world will be ruled by the forces of evil.

With the assistance of the friendly Frankenstein Monster (who defects from the monsters) and the Scary German Guy, the kids prepare to rid the Earth of the monsters, or die trying.

Monster designs

The monsters' makeup and design differs from the original films that The Monster Squad draws from, as Universal Studios still owned the trademarks to those designs and would not allow the filmmakers their use. In all comparison, however, the designs which appeared in the film are produced utilizing what was then modern day technology to bring them to life, and so have a somewhat more striking visual appearance, particularly in the cases of the Frankenstein Monster and the werewolf costumes. Dracula's basic appearance in Monster Squad isn't entirely dissimilar from his Universal Studios incarnation, though there are enough differences that Universal was not able to sue over trademark infringement. Ironically, however, the movie was filmed on the Universal Studios backlot.

Trivia

Jon Gries, the actor who plays Uncle Rico in the film Napoleon Dynamite, plays the werewolf in human form. Gries also played a werewolf in Fright Night Part II, released the following year.

David Proval of The Sopranos and Mean Streets fame appears in the film as one of the pilots carrying Frankenstein's body aboard the bomber.

Andre Gower's character desperately begs his father to see a horror film called Groundhog Day Part 12, which spoofs multi-sequal calendar date themed horror movie-titles like Halloween and Friday the 13th. A few years after The Monster Squad was released, there was an actual film called Groundhog Day made in 1993, but it is a romantic comedy starring Bill Murray & Andie MacDowell and it never had any sequels.

Availability

There was a 20th Anniversary Reunion of The Monster Squad cast including Director Fred Dekker in February 2007, where it was announced that The Monster Squad would be officially released on DVD by Lionsgate films and that it would a wide range of features.

As of February 2007, the movie is not available on DVD, however a special edition is set to be released by Lion's Gate Entertainment in spring 2007. Various types of bootleg copies are, however, frequently sold on online sites. The best quality version is taken from an HD screening from Voom's Monsters HD Channel, and while cropped slightly to 1.85:1 from the original aspect ratio of 2.35:1, still provides much more image clarity than the earlier bootlegs taken from 4:3 VHS or Laserdisc sources. Fred Dekker recently urged any interested fans to write the copyright holders via snail-mail.

Remake Rumors

The film's cult popularity and the film industry's continued interest in remaking classic horror films from the 70's and 80's have made it a popular subject for rumors. A script purported to be that of a "reimagining" of the film made a circulation in late 2006, but was later revealed to be a fan project. As of this time, there are no official plan to remake the film.

References

Jones, Stephen, ed. The Illustrated Werewolf Movie Guide. London: Titan Books, 1996. (page 110) ISBN 1-85286-658-6

External links

• The Monster Squad at IMDb
• The Monster Squad at I-Mockery (also includes rare Monster Squad Commodore 64 game)
• Recent Q&A with cast and crew