Forever Evil [DVD] [Region 1] [US Import] [NTSC]

OK, I recently bought this film, because I saw an old intro from USA's "Saturday Nightmares" which featured this film. I vaguely remembered it, and after seeing it again, it's easy to understand why I forgot it lol.

This film is, incredibly, cheesy to the Nth degree. It's terrible in every facet possible. However, there's just something appealing, to me, about these, unintentionally, funny horror films, with the worst acting, horrible and boring dialect and cheesiest effects possible.

The film makes little sense, and just seems to drag along forever. Honestly, the more I watch it, the more I enjoy it, but then again, my mind is warped like no other. So unless you enjoy really terrible, cheesy, 80's schlock, I wouldn't recommend it.

80's cheese at it's worst!

This movie, trying to incorporate some pieces of Lovecraftian lore into its cheap, brittle storyline, was an utter travesty. Besides having a budget that barely rivaled the popcorn and drink ingested during its showing, its ties to the otherworldly menace, Yog Kothag, and the essentially useless book, The Necronomicon, were simply veiled attempts to bring in viewers. It was, by and far, an insult to my horror-watching eyes.

The storyline, if you can call the bumbling plot that the wretched actors follow a story, is as follows:
We start with a fortune teller as he reads a client's cards. What he sees frightens him enough that he funnels her money back into her hands (plus thirty dollars), pushes her out the door abruptly to be killed, and then runs into a monster that couldn't rival most Halloween costumes. Cut to a foolish guy, joined by his pregnant girlfriend, his brother, and three others, as they meet at a cabin in the middle of nowhere to discuss his newest invention (an emergency grappling hook that straps to your wrist, the dumbest idea I've ever been privy to). Here, they get drunk, play cards, fire off some banter that does incorporate a bit of humor, and subsequently start the dying one by one. Still, he gets away and is hit by a car, landing himself in the running for the stupidest man alive awards and on the trek to torment some movie watchers. Later, skipping a heap of the bumbling plot, he is joined by a detective that knows something is going on, a lady that also lived through an attack by this presence by hiding under her porch for days, and a one-hundred year old dog that really didn't mean anything in the movie except that there was a way to burn more time. Together they find out that there is a ghost quasar pulsing to the murderous beat of the thing doing the killings, that some monstrous creature named Yog Kothag is trying to come back, that the Necronomicon only has a dozen pages, that you can add a zombie into a movie just because you feel like it, and that a lack of research before you make a movie can always be countered by a good ceremonial dagger.

Yes, this movie was bad. If you have to check it out because you have some Lovecraftian completionist need, you'll hate it. If you like cheap horror movies, you'll hate it. I don't even think the people who made it like it.

When an investigating official somberly invokes the name of Charles Manson, he inadvertently gives Manson credit for having enough taste to find this film appalling. Speaking for all humans, I strongly agree. "Forever Evil" is a marginally coherent low budget monster movie that not only features terrible acting, a dreadful script, and inept special effects, but it also succumbs to a numbingly slow pace that makes the four hours of "entertainment" featured here seem to take weeks to plow through. You may need external support to make it all the way to the end. Please drink responsibly.

The movie starts in an old cabin where several completely unlikable college friends are having an extremely lame party complete with horrid dialogue and subplots about a new invention and an unintended pregnancy. In the middle of the party, pregnant Holly (Diane Johnson) decides she can't live another minute without showering. As we all know, showering leads to murder. Holly is slaughtered in the bathroom by an unknown entity, and instead of calling the police immediately, these college graduates go hunting for the killer. The carnage that ensues leaves only Marc (Red Mitchell), Holly's ex-boyfriend alive, but hospitalized. Leo (Charles Trotter), the old crusty cop in the trenchcoat who responds to the scene says things like "It doesn't look like the head was cut off, it looks like it was pulled off". At this point you may note that you still have over an hour and a half to go. I feel for you. The film meanders over hill and dale for a while with Marc teaming up with a girl named Reggie (Tracey Huffman) who is interested in the case because she once had something similar happen to her. Whatever.

Through the magic of special effects, the evil of the title makes his first appearance as a pair of glowing red eyes in a black cowl. During the course of the investigation some creepy old witchcraft books are found, along with a story about a ceremonial dagger used for sacrifices that have been occurring for many years in a pattern only Marc understands. After a friendly black dog scares Reggie repeatedly, Marc gives the backstory about the party at the cabin. (Question: why does Marc wear a bathrobe with four stripes around the ends of the sleeves like a ship or airline Captain?) The reason for the party was to celebrate commencing the patent search for a device that Marc and his brother designed called the "Emergency Grappling System" (EGS). This thing looks like it just came off the utility belt of Batman, only it's far less plausible. Because it's such an otherwise pointless plot deviation, you know the EGS will play a crucial role later in the film.

Marc has also figured out that the evil creature kills when there is a huge pulse of energy from the "Q8 Ghost Quasar", a claim Leo is rightfully skeptical of. After zombie-Holly returns to haunt Marc with a self-Cesarean and red-eyed demonic birth scene (the special effects are beyond cut rate), Leo is killed by the evil. Marc and Reggie discover that the next Q8 quasar pulse will be "next Thursday", and engineer a plan to use themselves as bait, which, of course, succeeds. Marc astutely notices a pattern in the homicides on the map, which the trained professional law enforcement officials have not noticed despite it's being completely obvious upon first glance by anyone in the audience. Of course the pattern is a pentagram, which Marc immediately calls a "pentagon". The evil (with the worst rubber mask worn in any movie since at least 1950: think "Tales From the Crypt", only cheesy) finds the hapless duo and a lengthy rumble ensues. Obviously the EGS is employed to good effect, as is an ax, some gasoline, a gun, and the magic dagger. It sounds like it would be exciting, but don't believe it. The brawl moves to Marc and Reggie's motel room, where the now charred-to-a-crisp evil being stabs Marc with the magic dagger, although Marc turns the tables on him, and in a retaliatory strike, stabs the evil being.

So that's the end, right? So sorry, no.

It turns out that there's an immortal ghost Realtor (born in 1874) who is actually the mastermind in bringng evil back during the Q8 quasar pulses. He confronts Reggie and says things like "One of the requirements is that you die in terror, for which I really do apologize". He is quite proud of himself for recruiting Marc to be his new killer zombie. Because of their newfound and painfully expressed love, Marc saves Reggie in a startling conclusion that will surprise nobody, but is easily the best scene in the movie, as it is signals the film's end.

There are several versions of this available on DVD, and sadly mine contained both the "Director's Cut" and the "Home Video Premier Cut" as well as trailers, still photos, and a director's commentary that requires real mental toughness to get through. If you absolutely insist on seeing this film, I recommend the "Home Video Premier Cut" as it is seven minutes shorter. A better option, though, is to not watch either of them. Ever.