SHRUNKEN HEADS (1994)
Label: Full Moon Features
Region Code: Region-Free
Rating: R
Duration: 86 Minutes
Audio: English Dolby Digital 2.0 Stereo and 5.1 Surround (No Subtitles)
Video: 1080p HD Widescreen (1.78:1)
Director: Richard Elfman
Cast: Julius Harris, Meg Foster, Aeryk Egan,
Bodhi Elfman, Rebecca Herbst, Bo Sharon, A.J. Damato, Darris Love, Troy Fromin, Leigh-Allyn Baker, Paul Linke
Here we have some early 90's culty goodness from director Richard Elfman (The Forbidden Zone) - Shrunken Heads (1994), an offbeat comedy horror head-trip about comic book loving teen boys Tommy Larsen (Aeryk Egan, Flatliners), Bill Turner (Bo Sharon, The Puppet Masters) and Freddie Thompson (Darris Love, The Secret World of Alex Mack), who taking a page from the comics want to keep their inner city neighborhood free of crime. To that end they videotape a trio of street toughs who call themselves The Vipers, leader Vinnie Benedetti (A.J. Damato) and his brain-dead sidekicks Podowski (Troy Fromin, Class of Nuke 'Em High Part II: Subhumanoid Meltdown) and Booger (Bodhi Elfmam, The Others) while they're stripping a car for parts, which lands the low-level thugs in the slammer.
This doesn't sit well with butch lesbian crime boss Big Moe (Meg Foster, They Live) who doesn't appreciate her street toughs drawing unwanted attention to their crime exploits. She orders Benedetto and his cronies to kill the troublemaking teens after they once again interfere with her operation. The thugs end up gunning the kids down in the street to set an example to any other neighborhood do-gooders.
This is not the end for the teens though, they are resurrected by the proprietor of the newsstand where they bought their comics, Mr. Sumatra (Julius Harris, Super Fly); a retired cop who worked for the Haitian secret police, the dreaded Ton-Ton Macoute. When Sumatra learns that these good kids - his best customers no doubt - have been gunned down in cold blood he sneaks into the funeral home after hours and chops off their heads. He brings the heads to his apartment where he tosses them into a bubbling cauldron and reanimates their severed heads with an old world head-shrinking recipe that includes a dead black cat. Once resurrected he keeps them in his apartment and trains them to use their newly acquired voodoo-powers over the course of a year. Once he feels they are properly prepared the trio of tight-faced floating craniums have their disembodied revenge from beyond the grave on those they hold responsible for their deaths one by one!
Each of the shrunken heads has a unique powers, one is able to emit an energy beam from his third-eye, one has vampire fangs that he attacks with, which seemingly secrete a zombification serum, and the other one can manifest a switchblade knife that he clutches in his mouth like Randian in Freaks to slash throats. Strangely, for reasons I don't quite understand, the zombified victims come back not hungry for flesh but with a craving for cleaning graffiti and trash from the neighborhood streets - and they fart a lot. Okay.
It's a fine blend of absurdity, almost kid-friendly dark humor, and fevered insanity, and I find it hard to believe I've never seen this gem before. The crown jewel here for me is Meg Foster (Lords of Salem) in a pretty wild scenery-chewing role as the cigar chompin' lesbian crime kingpin Big Moe, complete with a thick Brooklyn accent and a stylish Pompadour - she is terrific! Its also great to see Julius Harris (Black Ceasar) in his last role, clearly having a good time as the voodoo ringleader of the trio of supernatural shrunken head crime fighters.
The effect of the disembodied flying heads is the perfect mix of cheese and can-do low-budget goodness using compositing and motion-control blue screen, it's looks perfectly hokey. I also loved the city miniatures of the neighborhoods used throughout the film, while its light on gore its still a wickedly fun flick with a demented sense of humor. The gore is relegated to some blood flow, the more gruesome aspects like the kids being riddled with bullets and later having their heads cut-off happen offscreen, so it's not a bloodbath, but that's fine - it's not that sort of movie.
The film also benefits from an original theme by Elfman's brother, the award winning composer Danny Elfman (Beetlejuice), plus an underscore by the talented Richard Band (Re-Animator), brother of producer Charles Band. The stylish lighting and cinematography by Stephen McNut (Dead Zone) also sets up the offbeat atmosphere quite nicely, pulling all the disparate elements together in an attractively lensed film.
Audio/Video: Shrunken Heads (1994) arrives on region-free Blu-ray from Full Moon Features in 1080p HD widescreen (1.78:1), advertised as being digitally remastered from the uncut 35mm camera negative. Its an attractive HD image that's mostly free of blemish aside from some minor speckling and a stray vertical line or two. Grain structures look pretty great throughout with pleasing fine detail, and the garish colors come through quite vibrantly and well-saturated with pleasing depth and clarity to it.
Audio comes by way of lossy Elisha Dolby Digital 2.0 stereo and 5.1 surround, there are no subtitles. Compressed though it may be dialogue is rendered without issue, the main theme by Danny Elfman (Beetlejuice) and score from Richard Band (Re-Animator) sound terrific as does the Oingo Boingo tune!
Extras include an archival 28-min Videozone featurette covering the making of this film with some great footage of the miniatures and interviews with the cast and effects team. It also features some bits about other Full Moon productions from this era like Oblivion and the Trancers films,. The disc is buttoned-up with a pair of Trailers, and a selection of 9-min Full Moon Trailers.
Special Features:
- Original Videozone (28 min)
- Trailer (2 min)
- Alternate Trailer (2 min)
- Full Moon Trailers: Barbie & Kendra Storm Area 51 (2 min), Blade: The Iron Cross (2 min), Weedjies: Hallowed Night (2 min), Head of the Family (2 min), The Dead Want Women (1 min)
Shrunken Heads (1994) is quite an offbeat gem; it sort of baffles me that I had not watched this before, and now it's probably one of my favorite early 90's Full Moon productions. The Blu-ray, while light on extras, looks fantastic and comes highly recommended.
Screenshots from the Full Moon Blu-ray:
Extras:
