PUPPETMASTER

D: David Schmoeller 1989

From the house of Charles Band, the Roger Corman lite of the new millennium comes a classic example of late 80s exploitation and madness. With well over 200 movies under his belt either directing, writing or producing, Band knows how to entertain. Sure it’s all low budget, small time television actors and washed out ex-stars, strange stories, cash-ins and exploitation but he does it so well. With Puppetmaster he’s come up with a story that can best be described as just plain nuts but entertaining never the less. Schmoeller, who directed Tourist Trap and Crawlspace amongst others, would seem to be a kindred soul and he’s put together a beautifully looking film using the main set of a 1930s hotel to its full advantage.
Our story starts in 1939 at the Bodega Bay Hotel where a strange old man is making puppets, evil looking little buggers that he then brings to life. Seems the old man is the last in a long line of alchemists who know the secrets of the after life as passed down from the Egyptians. Of course we don’t find that out until later in the film so for now we just know he’s a clever bugger. When two men in trenchcoats with German accents show up though we also know the old guy hasn’t got much longer to live. Unperturbed he hides the puppets, bites the bullet before the trenchcoats can even be opened and we then segue to ‘now’ where Paul Le Mat (American Graffiti) , looking remarkably like Peter Gabriel circa Sledgehammer only gone to seed, is having bad dreams about leeches and guns. It turns out that Paul’s character Alex is part of a small group of psychics who have been brought together by a man named Gallagher (Jimmie Skaggs) to do something though they aren’t quite sure what. When the group consisting of Alex who dreams of future events, a white witch Dana (Irene Miracle – Inferno’s Rose Elliot) who has a dead dog as a companion, a couple of scientists, Frank (Matt Roe) who doesn’t do much except look like a pimp and Carlissa (the very hot Kathryn O’Reilly) who can tell who’s been shagging in this bed, bathtub, elevator etc just by touch (nice work if you can get it) gather at the Bodega Bay they discover that Gallagher is dead, having bit the bullet himself. From there it’s a magical mystery tour as the story slowly unfolds, puppets pop up everywhere and people start dying. The puppets are awesome too. There’s a pinhead with human size hands, a puppet with a drill on his head, a Klaus Kinski lookalike with a hook on one hand and a knife on the other and a seductress who spews leeches! I kid you not!! While Alex dreams strange dreams about Gallagher and his wife Megan (Robin Frates) who owns the Bodega Bay, the puppets knock off the others one by one. Gruesome, bizarre and in the case of the leeches just plain disgusting, this is a film you wouldn’t want to watch while on psychedelic drugs. Unfortunately for all involved, it seems Gallagher has discovered the secret of eternal life but wants to eliminate his quartet of psychic companions before they can stop him. Unfortunately for Gallagher he upsets the puppets who then turn on their master and in a gory, twisted finale, give him a real seeing to. Luckily for us, Le Mat doesn’t have to do too much because, lets be honest, a bloated, gone to seed Peter Gabriel lookalike is not what you would call hero material.