MONSTER MASH *** USA 2024 Dir: Jose Prendes. 85 mins
Monster Mash, the movie is very much what it sounds like. Riffing off on all classic monsters that once were marquee names for Universal Studios, Monster Mash finds Count Dracula, the Mummy, the Wolfman, and the Invisible Man joining forces to take down Dr Victor Frankenstein (who is expectedly aided with his dim-witted monster minion).
Frankenstein’s plan is to create a near-immortal abomination and the other aforementioned monsters take it upon themselves to stop him and do something good for a change. Yes, this is 100% the fever dream that my pre-teen mind would have come up with when I first read Stoker’s Dracula and Shelley’s Frankenstein!
One important detail that you need to know before watching this low-budget entertainer is that it’s produced by The Asylum, the notorious studio that is famous (or rather infamous) for belting out cheap-looking genre parodies. Some of the Asylum’s classic “mockbusters” include Snakes on a Train and the Sharknado series.
So, if you have an appetite for The Asylum productions, Monster Mash would be an exciting guilty pleasure. For now, in the year marking its 25th anniversary, the studio is trying to actually produce decent films. The acting is naturally hammy and for some reason, frequent Quentin Tarantino collaborator Michael Madsen (Reservoir Dogs, Kill Bill) leads the cast as Dr Frankenstein. But beyond the usual flaws, this “monster Expendables” makes for a fun midnight screening (perhaps with some copious amounts of substances to make the experience better).
Despite once being an in-demand character actor, Madsen is clearly doing a project like Monster Mash for the paycheck. He’s not alone as even actors like Eric Roberts and Kelsey Grammer have had their terrible shlock value projects that are fit to be Tubi originals. But what is more important is that Madsen is having a lot of fun taking on a character that has been previously played by Peter Cushing, James McAvoy and many British stalwarts.
Madsen has no intentions to even attempt a British accent and he completely owns his scruffy, almost Goth-punk, all-American attitude. The best Michael Madsen roles are the ones in which he’s hateable and in Monster Mash, he is the most hate-deserving Victor Frankenstein. The actor’s self-aware seriousness is what makes this shamelessly campy tribute to Universal Monsters worth a watch.
Despite some decent makeup work and Madsen carrying the movie on his beaten shoulders, the editing of Monster Mash is all over the place and the dialogues heavy on painful exposition. And yet it has enough heart to become an underrated Halloween B-movie in the future, walking a step ahead of most of the other lacklustre Asylum productions.
Review by Shaurya Thapa