A mining company blasts open an old silver mine that's laid undisturbed for decades after a series of mysterious and deadly accidents, and releases something monstrous that wrecks bloody havoc on a couple of young miners, their girlfriends, and one dog! So I think what this movie does best is the genuinely creepy atmospherics of the scenes in the mine and the cellar, and I think the snowy setting and the limited locations gives it a nice closed-in frosty atmosphere that helps it out a lot. This isn't the worst small-monsters-on-the-attack 80s horror movie ever but I wouldn't say it's a gem either because the plot never really goes anywhere and it has a really flat and weak ending, when the situation clearly called for a classic epilogue of some kind. The vibe is like a weird blend of the Descent meets Critters, with just a hint of the Amityville Horror! It's a very slow burn but worth the time if you can get into it, when something scary does happen it's effective, and so are the deaths, because the characters are for what they are, established a bit more than what you'd usually get in this kind of movie. I thought the best character was actually the pretty annoying dog, he was having a good time, and it was so mean how they really string you along and make you think the little guy has been killed early on in the story, only for him to unexpectedly pop up alive and well near the end - and then die for real!!! They went there! The turtle-octopus fang-faced Boogens themselves are a bit of a letdown when you finally do get to see them, I could certainly see why they held off on revealing them for as long as possible because they were more effective as something that was unseen and lurking in the dark that's stalking its prey through a spooky old house, but they were actually shot better than you might think, they look better in the movie than in the lame still shots of them you can see online, and they were vicious and relentless enough that you do buy them as a threat. So while to me it's not as good as it could have been, it did keep me intrigued until the end and never totally lost me, the scenario is a lot of creepy fun and it's a decent enough little romp of a monster movie. It's worth a look at least once to see if it's your thing or not, who knows you might even have a good time with it! You're likely to have fun with it if you go in not expecting too much, worth a watch every once in a while x
Review of The Boogens
