You're The Devil's Son: Hack-O-Lantern (1988) Is A Cult And I Am Its Acolyte
There's a world where your daydreams become nightmares that involve a Kali-coded devil woman and the metal band D.C. Lacroix. This is a place where your girlfriend has a Pentagram badly tattooed on her butt, and a fully stocked bar in her living room. In this world your hometown throws Halloween parties that have strippers, belly dancers and a glam band headliner. Is this a utopia? Close, it's Hack-O-Lantern.
It was inevitable that I would review this movie. My closest friends and fellow film degenerates (Yasmina I'm looking at you) are no strangers to its powers. They have screened it, reviewed it and venerated it. We are loyal acolytes when it comes to the word of Hack-O-Lantern. Did Jag Mundhra understand the work of art he had put to celluloid at its completion? I'm not certain. Did he understand the holiday of Halloween and its practices? Only somewhat, and for that I am eternally grateful.
Tommy Drindle needs therapy badly. Pa Drindle was murdered by Tommy's gravel-voiced grandfather (Hy Pyke, who is leaving visible teeth marks in the scenery of this film) who leads a Satanic cult from a nearby barn. Tommy's mother was raped by his grandfather on her wedding night (While he wore a wig and tux that bring to mind the flashback scenes of "young" Danny Devito on It's Always Sunny). Teenage Tommy (Read: 32 year old Gregory Scott Cummins) is being groomed to be the next member of his grandfather's cult. Preparations for this involve dressing like Glenn Danzig on a budget, lifting weights next to your Elvira poster and scowling at the functional members of your family. The initiation into the cabal is to take place on Halloween, but things take a turn when those in Tommy's orbit start being offed by a robed killer in a devil mask. As Halloween night progresses we discover that when it comes to the work of Lucifer, the power is in the blood.
Hack-O-Lantern's appeal comes from its guileless fusion of sleaze and innocence. A young Tommy slices his finger carving a jack-o-lantern, only to reveal his grandfather encourages blood drinking. Youths enthusiastically decorate a town hall for a Halloween party that features men hooting at a topless woman, and an impromptu stand-up routine that would make Andy Kaufman grimace in pain. Grandpa Drindle thinks nothing of extinguishing human life, but is difficult to take seriously given he has a voice fit for a Creole bullfrog in an animated movie about Baron Samedi. The collision of elements that would belong in The Midnight Hour versus those that would belong in The Mutilator make for hypnotic bedfellows.
Time has been kind to Jag Mundhra's diabolical creation. Boutique distribution and horror dorks have helped spread the word of his off-kilter take on the Halloween slasher. If you haven't seen it I count myself among Jag's pied pipers. I won't rest until you understand that laser blasts can turn guitars into pitchforks. I won't sleep until you recognize that the Spider-Man hand gesture is also a Satanic handshake. I'm a misplaced soul that loves to hate and it rots away my mind...I'm the devil's son.
-Dr. Benny Graves
