Rawhead Rex - A Drunk Review
Welcome to a special feature I’ll be doing—sometimes solo, sometimes with a guest—as often as I can without developing alcohol poisoning!
A long time ago, I used to watch movies, drink throughout and record my commentary (always very witty, never a single spelling error) on a Facebook note. Lots of friends got a kick out of it, but then Facebook decided it hates fun and removed the Notes feature.
Skip to now. I bought a website and I can write my own shit! So, I present to you: the first of a new era of Drunk Reviews!
Tonight’s movie is one I HAVE seen before, which I try not to do as it’s much better to go in fresh. However, I watched it so long ago that there is literally just ONE scene I can recall. So it’s basically fresh. Fresh-adjacent.
The heroes over at Fangoria actually developed a drinking game for this one that I’ll be using as well. You will see a * every time I have to take a drink according to the rules. Those rules, by the way, are:
· 1 drink every time there is vegetation in the background (not sure how brutal this one will be)
· 1 drink every time there is a phallic object (that’s penis-shaped, for the uninitiated)
· 1 shot when Rawhead Rex explodes from the ground (I’m assuming this is his grand entrance
· 1 drink every time you can feel Clive Barker (the author of the story it’s based on) shake his head in disappointment (I will note these specifically, as I’m pretty sure I will be thinking of Clive Barker’s disappointment for the entire 89 minute runtime, as this is the film Barker hated so much that he would go on to direct the next adaptation of his work himself…that being Hellraiser)
· 1 drink every time we get treated to a Rex POV shot
· 1 drink every time a stained glass window is shown (much like the vegetation rule, how many stained glass windows can there be?)
· 1 drink every time you see the whites of Rex’s eyes
· Chug during the urine baptism (somehow, this is NOT the scene I remember)
· Finish your drink when magic beams of light appear
That is a lot of rules, and I promise to try and stick with them.
(A quick note before I get started…did you guys know Fangoria still exists? It was a horror magazine from back in the day, and not only do they post all kinds of cool stuff on their website and socials, but they still have a quarterly magazine available! Just proves that horror persists where other genres stumble)
Alright. Let’s proceed with the film, which I will be watching so you don’t have to!
WHAT THE HELL. Jump scare off the bat, as the top billed actor is David Dukes. Imagine my relief when a quick search told me that is NOT* the dude from the KKK whose name is David Duke, hold the S. If I were the actor, I would change my name to something less controversial. Replace Dukes with* Berkowitz or something*.
Oh, they weren’t kidding, by the way, we’re three minutes in and there’s SO MUCH vegetation (I’m assuming they mean farmland…look, I don’t know what goes through Fangoria’s mind, so I have to make assumptions, ok).
Cut to our first stained glass window, which looks like THIS:*
Average church-going experience
Yeah, holy shit, right? Obviously we’re in a church now, and judging by all the Irish accents I’d guess we’re in Ireland (or Boston, but nobody has used a racial slur yet). There’s an American dude taking photos in the church cemetery (covered in vegetation*) like a creep, and he tells his kid to buck up and enjoy their Irish excursion. The kid tells him to hurry up with his damn pictures. This kid sucks. If my parents had been able to take me to Ireland, I would have enjoyed every minute of that overgrown cemetery*. Best they could do was Brule, Wisconsin.
As the priest leads his flock* in an aggressive rendition of just singing “Hallelujah” over and over while making sexy eyes at a woman in the front row, a storm comes. Lightning strikes a giant monolith outside and UP COMES RAWHEAD REX*!
This fuckin guy!
Meanwhile, David “Not a Klansman” Dukes is checking out all the stained glass windows in the church****. He’s looking for a Reverand Coot (Yes, his name is Coot), but the googy-eyed priest says “that ain’t me, dawg”. It seems, though, the Father Creepy is pretty jacked about the giant monster that just popped outta the earth, though. He gets a sign from above when he gets a vision of Rawhead’s POV*, a tablecloth starts his hand on fire and he makes THIS face:
David “Looks Familiar But Definitely Not Because He Was A Klan Leader” Dukes is hard at work researching his book on ancient fertility cults (hehe, nice) while his wife and two kids bicker and whine because going to Ireland must be soooooo hard.
Over at some farmhouse, a dude finds his shed door busted. Rex, ol boy, is inside because we’re treated to more POV***. Anyway, Farmer Fred gets ripped to bits while his wife preps their evening stew. It’s not evening in the kitchen, though, because that part was shot on a different time of day. Anyway, Rex chases her through the house and claws her up pretty good. Also, he spills the spaghetti.
Most traumatic moment in the film so far
It turns out Rexy didn’t kill her though, because she was pregnant at the time of his murderous rampage. The police arrive to smoke pipes and make incorrect theories, which is the same thing I do every time I go to Arbys.*
Next up, Rex stalks a horny couple who are trying to make with the sex in front of the bratty child they’re babysitting, which even when considering the dismal reputation of babysitters in horror films is pretty lousy behaviour. Rex smashes the kids toy, which leads to a zany misadventure* in which the babysitters sneak off to BoneTown and the little boy loses his innocence in a completely different way: by witnessing a giant beats drinking the blood of a man hung from a tree. A good time had by all.
Our horny babysitter is ripped from his lady friend’s loving arms, which sends the whole little town into a bit of a tizzy and has David “Should Change His First Name To Pudupyer” Dukes chain smoking. He tells the police he saw Rex just standing around in the night, and they continue to do not very much of anything. He goes back to the church*, trespassing again, and roughs up the creepy priest because of reasons. Then its time to pack up the famjam and hit the road to Dublin (cannot confirm if it is a rocky road).
They stop so the like 5 year old daughter can go off to pee. Mom insists that her daughter should wander off alone in this unfamiliar country filled with strangers because “she has to grow up sometime”, but thankfully her father isn’t a gigantic piece of shit. Turns out the kid gets petrified by a bunny rabbit, so it was probably best not to let her go alone. Anyway, while David “Duke Box Hero” Dukes and his wife tend to the mental scarring their daughter is experiencing after seeing a rabbit, the other child is brutally murdered*. When the police arrive, bumbling as always, Dad reacts quite normally.
“It’s not a phase, MOM!”
Buddy goes BACK to the church* to hang out, I guess? The creepy priest spouts some stuff about burying the devil until Reverend Coot chases him off. David “OK the Character’s Name Is Actually Hallenbeck” Dukes discovers some puzzles in the stained glass windows** that make no sense at all. When Reverend Coot suggests he might be distraught, he responds by screaming in his face and running away, proving himself entirely in his right mind.
Rex freaks out on a trailer park**, massacring half the residents and exposing a pair of breasts (the film’s first nudity, which is perhaps its only use of restraint). Then he chokes a man who makes a top notch funny face*.
Part kissy face, part “gotta poo”
Has anyone stopped to ask what Rex’s purpose is? He woke up because there was a storm. Okay. So this was a Special Storm, apparently. But he’s awake. Then he just, like, kills people and wanders around. Does nobody want to know why? Maybe they all owed him money. Maybe he just wants a hug but they all just scream when they see his face, so he goes a lil overboard. My point is, we just don’t know.
Clearly just looking for love
Hallenback annoys his grieving wife with theories about magic weapons in the stained glass windows, which seems like a LOT of reaching but okay brother. He goes full conspiracy theory though, complete with maps on the walls and lines of string connecting….stuff.
Rex now makes an appearance at the church*, and Father Creepy drops to his knees. Uh oh.
Ohhh. It’s okay, you guys. I thought we were going to see some weird stuff, but Rex just pissed all over the priest. Hey, that’s the piss baptism, isn’t it?!*****
It’s poor quality and a bad angle…but do you really want to see this image more clearly?
Reverend Coot confronts our Pissy Priest, who proceeds to light the church on fire and rant and rave about Rex being God, really getting into a solid monologue that climaxes with him complaining about getting raw head.
First a golden shower and now this?
Coot gets absolutely wrecked (dead, not drunk) and the police show up. Thank goodness! PSYCH! One of the cops is a double agent! He blows everyone up and professes his love for Rex while burning to death. As one does.
Romantic
Hallenbeck shows up to play the hero. He beats up Father Creepy some more and like IMMEDIATELY just GUESSES that there’s a fuckin magic tablecloth covering a magic chest with a magic rock inside. I’m assuming it’s a Pet Rock, because he looks pretty concerned about it being locked away.
Hallendukes comes out holding his new pet rock over his head. Remember, he has no fuckin clue if this thing is magic or just some priest’s geology hobby.
Rawhead just tosses him aside, so I guess it wasn’t a magic rock after all. He’s pretty pissed though, so he eats the priest and beats the fuck out of Hallenbeck while his wife watches. Oh, yeah, she showed up too. Oh, I guess the rock is only magic for ladies, because she immediately guesses “Hey, this rock on the ground is probably a magic weapon only I can wield”, a though many women have each and every day. And boom, we have our magic lights*****.
Is this a shitty horror movie or a Pink Floyd show, man?
Rex doesn’t like any of this. He says “RAAAWRGH” a lot and then just kinda dies. The Hallenbecks leave to go and remember that they have a 5 year old daughter alone in the hotel room, processing the fact that she watched her brother get eaten by a demon god earlier today.
A HAPPY ENDING FOR ALL.
(The following was written by sober Paul before posting)
This was an absolute mess, but one that there’s a ton of enjoyment to be found in. Rex looks utterly ridiculous, but the big guy fucks up a lot of people’s days in a pretty short run time. Including a kid! Horror movies never go for the kid! It’s hilarious that his family seems to forget about him pretty much 11 minutes after he bites the dust, but ah well. For the record, THAT was the scene I remembered. Not the golden shower.
How could I possibly forget the golden shower?
