Oh, I'm shocked alright...
Added 10/6/2009
I'm shocked that this tripe didn't derail Wes Craven's career forever! I'm also shocked that I sat through the entire thing without turning it off. Yet another movie in the slasher format that basically boils down to a special effects overload fit for a complete imbecile.
We meet our main character who keeps having vivid nightmares about a local serial killer (why?). The dreams are so detailed in fact, he is able to lead the police to the exact location of the killer, Horace Pinker (how?). However following Pinker's execution, we find he is able to transfer his soul to other people's bodies (how?). After using various bodies to continue his grisly work, it seems that Pinker is then able to travel through circuitry via electricity (how?). It seems to the only way Pinker can be stopped is with a necklace given to our main hero by his girlfriend (why?).
It's difficult to figure out what exactly they were going for with Shocker. It's far too goofy to be considered a legitimate horror or comedy movie, and it just doesn't gel as a horror/comedy hybrid. The acting is monumentally bad, especially the killer himself with one-liner's that make some of Freddy Krueger's seem genius in comparison. (One of my favorites: "Lets take a ride in my VOLTSwagon!"). I suppose if anything you oould give this a watch just for some laughs, but I wouldn't advise it.
What I find especially hilarious is Amazon's review for Shocker, describing it as a commentary on mass media! Seriously, if you were able to draw meaning from Shocker, you're probably the same person seeing messages in your bowl of alphabet soup. See a psychiatrist. In reality this is some of Wes Craven's absolute worst, if not THE worst movie he's ever made. Definetly take a look at his next, and far superior movie The People Under The Stairs.
1 out of 1 people found this helpful.
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Electrocuting nightmare
Added 5/25/2009
Wes Craven is probably one of the best movie makers in his field, in his genre. Horror does not have any kind of secret for him. But this undeniable quality kills the novelty a horror film is supposed to have in order to go beyond plain technical or even semiological excellence. And that is just the point here. We can recognize all the films that Wes Craven has made, and from each of which he has selected a little tidbit here and a small tiny piece there and then he has knitted everything together, with some loose moments here and there for the seams to be visible and people to recognize the borrowings. And he even managed to get some samples from films by other authors, Stephen King for example and his Green Line. But that is just the shortcoming of the film. It is nothing but knitted together borrowings and there is no new element, no new stuff, no new level of horror. It is déjà vu. The fear of television that invades our life, that manipulates our minds, that violates our virginity, all that is not enough to represent a new discourse. Because it is not. I am afraid this genre leads to repetition and Wes Craven take the sane decision Stephen King has taken, even if he took his time to take it, is the decision to retire one day and just stop always doing the same thing. And don't believe you can change styles. Anne Rice tried that but her life of Jesus is not convincing at all. Vampires are her real stuff. Messiahs are not exactly her cup of tea or should I say her glass of wine. In other words I don't think Wes Craven has reached a new level of extreme superb-ness. Just a well-crafted thriller and horror film. Nothing more, entertainment for sure, but nothing to put aside as the masterpiece you must not forget to take when you leave for the desert island to which we are all convicted to go after six, seven or eight decades of life. The Green Mile yes, Scream yes, a couple of others too, but not this one. It is not one of the five unforgettable ones.
Dr Jacques COULARDEAU, University Paris 1 Pantheon Sorbonne, University Versailles Saint Quentin en Yvelines, CEGID
0 out of 0 people found this helpful.
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Wish you could rate a movie 'below' one star
Added 11/3/2008
Anyone whose watched lots and lots of movies, always encounters some bad ones...it's the law of averages. But this movie, Shocker...was not just bad, it was horrible. No, horrible would be too kind. I was hoping it ended about 47 minutes before it actually closed it's final curtain. If you ever buy this movie in any format...remember...you were warned !!!!
1 out of 5 people found this helpful.
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Shockingly awful!.
Added 4/14/2008
I really wanted to like this film but I couldn't, no matter how many times I watched this I still end up being bored I'm not sure why some horror fans liked this as it seems to have a cult following and the film itself was a flop. The film had an interesting plot but somehow it just didn't work. Shocker is a very weak slasher film done by Wes Craven, the acting was really bad and not to mention the script was full of plot holes. The story's about a serial killer and television repairman named Horace Pinker (Mitch Pileggi) who is sentenced to die for a series of brutal murders, he is sent to be electrocuted with Jonathan Parker played by Peter Berg on watch since Jonathan sent Pinker away for killing some members of his family. Pinker though made a pact with the devil and had been increasing his own tolerance for electricity by jolting himself in his own prison cell and so the electrocution attempt fails when Pinker turns into a burst of energy and escapes through the electricity lines, he also has the ability to go from body to body which means that the main character has difficulties knowing whose body he has entered. This might sound like a fun and interesting horror film but its not its absolute rubbish, there aren't any scares in the film and its kind of hard to take seriously since the killer keeps saying awful oneliners and the overall tone of the film is very bright instead of being dark and gritty, the film had a few bloody death scenes but there was little gore and most of it was disappointing. Well there was one part that I did find interesting which was the chase scene in the park where Horace Pinker keeps switching bodies until he finds a little girl who starts screaming and cursing which was quite funny then she starts operating a bulldozer with an evil grin on her face trying to kill Jonathan but that wasn't enough to keep me interested cause half of the time I just thought it was a very silly and dull film and the special fx looked awful, the only good thing I could think of about Shocker was the great 80's metal soundtrack which totally rocked. Overall I would say it was a terrible film from Wes Craven who has made better films then this obviously but this one just stinks and I suggest you avoid it unless you wanna watch every film done by Wes Craven, now I know that Amazon are not going to post this review cause for some reason I wasn't allowed to review Shocker last year for some odd reason.
5 out of 9 people found this helpful.
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Two Stars....For the Soundtrack
Added 2/18/2008
What starts off as a decent "slasher" movie, turns into prolonged "hair metal" video that Beavis and Butthead would laugh at. I did like Mitch Pileggi as "Horace Pinker", he was sufficently menacing, and came out with some decent one-liners ala Freddy Krueger. The overall storyline to "Shocker" is too similar to another 80's horror flick called "The Horror Show" which is much better. "Shocker" tries to go for some laughs (like the scene where Horace possesses a little girl who then jumps into a bulldozer to try and run down the hero...cussing all the while), but usually the humor falls way short. The goofy scenes with the hero chasing Horace through various television programs is just plain goofy, neither funny or horrific...just kind of blah!
The best part of the film for me was the hair metal soundtrack provided by 80's hair metal mainstay Desmond Child. Featuring Alice Cooper, Paul Stanley of Kiss and many others, the soundtrack is will run through your head long after the storyline of the film is forgotten. Pass on this one and get "The Horror Show" instead.
1 out of 6 people found this helpful.
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Oh, I'm shocked alright...
Added 10/6/2009
I'm shocked that this tripe didn't derail Wes Craven's career forever! I'm also shocked that I sat through the entire thing without turning it off. Yet another movie in the slasher format that basically boils down to a special effects overload fit for a complete imbecile.
We meet our main character who keeps having vivid nightmares about a local serial killer (why?). The dreams are so detailed in fact, he is able to lead the police to the exact location of the killer, Horace Pinker (how?). However following Pinker's execution, we find he is able to transfer his soul to other people's bodies (how?). After using various bodies to continue his grisly work, it seems that Pinker is then able to travel through circuitry via electricity (how?). It seems to the only way Pinker can be stopped is with a necklace given to our main hero by his girlfriend (why?).
It's difficult to figure out what exactly they were going for with Shocker. It's far too goofy to be considered a legitimate horror or comedy movie, and it just doesn't gel as a horror/comedy hybrid. The acting is monumentally bad, especially the killer himself with one-liner's that make some of Freddy Krueger's seem genius in comparison. (One of my favorites: "Lets take a ride in my VOLTSwagon!"). I suppose if anything you oould give this a watch just for some laughs, but I wouldn't advise it.
What I find especially hilarious is Amazon's review for Shocker, describing it as a commentary on mass media! Seriously, if you were able to draw meaning from Shocker, you're probably the same person seeing messages in your bowl of alphabet soup. See a psychiatrist. In reality this is some of Wes Craven's absolute worst, if not THE worst movie he's ever made. Definetly take a look at his next, and far superior movie The People Under The Stairs.
1 out of 1 people found this helpful.
|
Electrocuting nightmare
Added 5/25/2009
Wes Craven is probably one of the best movie makers in his field, in his genre. Horror does not have any kind of secret for him. But this undeniable quality kills the novelty a horror film is supposed to have in order to go beyond plain technical or even semiological excellence. And that is just the point here. We can recognize all the films that Wes Craven has made, and from each of which he has selected a little tidbit here and a small tiny piece there and then he has knitted everything together, with some loose moments here and there for the seams to be visible and people to recognize the borrowings. And he even managed to get some samples from films by other authors, Stephen King for example and his Green Line. But that is just the shortcoming of the film. It is nothing but knitted together borrowings and there is no new element, no new stuff, no new level of horror. It is déjà vu. The fear of television that invades our life, that manipulates our minds, that violates our virginity, all that is not enough to represent a new discourse. Because it is not. I am afraid this genre leads to repetition and Wes Craven take the sane decision Stephen King has taken, even if he took his time to take it, is the decision to retire one day and just stop always doing the same thing. And don't believe you can change styles. Anne Rice tried that but her life of Jesus is not convincing at all. Vampires are her real stuff. Messiahs are not exactly her cup of tea or should I say her glass of wine. In other words I don't think Wes Craven has reached a new level of extreme superb-ness. Just a well-crafted thriller and horror film. Nothing more, entertainment for sure, but nothing to put aside as the masterpiece you must not forget to take when you leave for the desert island to which we are all convicted to go after six, seven or eight decades of life. The Green Mile yes, Scream yes, a couple of others too, but not this one. It is not one of the five unforgettable ones.
Dr Jacques COULARDEAU, University Paris 1 Pantheon Sorbonne, University Versailles Saint Quentin en Yvelines, CEGID
0 out of 0 people found this helpful.
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Wish you could rate a movie 'below' one star
Added 11/3/2008
Anyone whose watched lots and lots of movies, always encounters some bad ones...it's the law of averages. But this movie, Shocker...was not just bad, it was horrible. No, horrible would be too kind. I was hoping it ended about 47 minutes before it actually closed it's final curtain. If you ever buy this movie in any format...remember...you were warned !!!!
1 out of 5 people found this helpful.
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