Hello and welcome back to KID NOSTALGIA, your online guide to monster, science fiction and horror movies ranging from the oldies to more modern releases, from the classics to more obscure films – ones like this! Empire Pictures presents a Charles Band productions “GHOULIES II” an Albert Band film starring Damon Martin, Royal Dano, Phil Fondacaro, J. Downing and Kerry Remsen. They’ll get you in the end… AGAIN! Following the surprise – and I mean surprise – success of Ghoulies (1985), the first of several sequels was made and by far the best of the franchise. Ghoulies II stands out more as its own horror movie if you ignore the connection to the first movie, as there really are none, so let’s get into it. But first, I must warn you that, as always, this post will contain spoilers, so viewer discretion is advised.
A man carrying a bag is chased by cultists into a garage, and what’s in the bag? Ghoulies, of course. In the garage is a conveniently placed solvent barrel which he manages to throw the bag into before being knocked into it himself by a flying Ghoulies. Turns out though, Ghoulies are immune to solvent, so unlike the poor guy, they do not dissolve. A truck driven by the owners of horror attraction Satan’s Den stop at the garage to fill up, and the Ghoulies stow away in the back. The puppetry in this movie is far better than the first movie, as in the first movie they’re ugly because they’re not very well designed, but in this one, they’re ugly because they’re designed to be. There are also several stop motion sequences which like Gremlins (1984) and Charles Band’s future success Puppet Master (1989) combined with the puppetry which go together nicely.
The company that own Satan’s Den are threatening to shut down Satan’s Den if they don’t earn a certain amount of money in the next few days replacing it with… Women’s Mud Wrestling… eh. A woman drops her cat and loses it, but hears meowing coming from Satan’s Den and goes in to find her cat, but turns out she’s hearing the Ghoulie Cat that kills her with a razor blade. This one is a lot more violent than the first movie depending on the version you watch, but both are pretty sadistic. So, I’m reviewing the theatrical PG-13 cut, but there’s an uncut edition that’s R rated which is a little harder to come by. So, in the theatrical cut, you don’t actually see the Ghoulies kill anyone and it cuts away as soon as they injure them, but in the uncut version you see them graphically butchering people.
The owner of Satan’s Den, Uncle Ned (Royal Dano), discovers the existance of the Ghoulies and believes that they will help with the attraction and get back the money they need to keep the place open. Two kids get vomited on by a Ghoulie and they tell everyone when they leave making the place more popular. The Ghoulies also prank a few teens before killing one of them by stabbing them in the leg before strapping them down underneath a pendulum before mummifying his corpse and sticking it in one of the fake sarcophagus. What is it with these movies with amusement parks and movie sets with real metal pendulums?! More and more people start seeing the Ghoulies, but they think they’re just part of the attraction, as neither of the bodies have been found yet. Ned discovers the mummified corpse and takes responsibility as he believes he summoned the Ghoulies and looks for a way in his spell book to make them disappear, but they attack him. He starts the ritual to expunge them, but they maul him, stab him, and ultimately electrocute him. The next day, Ned’s nephew that is currently working there, Larry (Damon Martin), and the assistant, Sir Nigel Penneyweight (Phil Fondacaro), discover the Ghoulies and the massacre continues, but everyone thinks it’s still part of the attraction despite seeing several people get horribly killed. The corpse of the woman from earlier is finally found, and Hardin (J. Downing), the businessman who wants to close the place down, discovers the Ghoulies and wants to keep them alive because of the amount of money they’re earning the carnival.
The Ghoulies then begin wreaking havoc on other parts of the carnival, resulting in a chaotic last 20 minutes full of gags straight out of Gremlins. In probably the goriest scene in the theatrical cut, a Ghoulie bites off a man’s arm in a dunk tank with Jaws (1975) music playing. One then takes the wheel on a go-cart and runs someone over, while another one sabotages a ride sending people flying. Meanwhile, Larry, Nigel, and an on and off love interest, Nicole (Kerry Remsen), deduce that since they came from a spell, they can banish them using another spell, so they find Ned’s magic book. Meanwhile, Hardin gets on the toilet and a lot of squelching and crunching is heard. We never find out if he’s dead or not, but it’s likely he’s dead. Think of the news headlines for this – “Breaking news, carnival owner P. Hardin horribly castrated by unidentified lizard in toilet, likely to be a frog from DNA samples obtained from strange green slime discovered on the scene. This just in, the crime was more specifically commited by a whopping 1-foot-tall Gulf Coast toad with humanoid stature.”
The three try the banishing spell but instead end up summoning a human-sized Ghoulie in the form of a guy in a suit. In theory, the banishing spell works as it proceeds to eat all the small Ghoulies, but now they need to sort out this one. Larry begins looking for a spell to banish the big one, but if this proves anything, it’ll probably summon a 36-feet-tall Ghoulie, and then a 216-feet-tall one, and then – you get the point. And is someone gonna mention the fact that this thing looks like it’s out of a Charles Band knockoff of Creature from the Black Lagoon (1954)?!
The thing begins chasing after the three as it seems hungry for Nigel, so to kill it, they stick a bomb inside one of Nigel’s suits and feed it to it wit the greatest one liner ever “Bon appetit motherf***er!” That’s gotta be up there with Warlock (1989)’s “Try saltwater f***brain!” The plan is successful and Larry and Nicole leave together despite her sleeping with Hardin the day before yesterday as he promised her stardom, but whatever, and Nigel stays to run the place, but it turns out the toilet Ghoulie that killed(?) Hardin isn’t dead, and that’s the end. This one was pretty entertaining, and it didn’t seem so cheap like the first movie, which, may I mention, is put to shame by this. For those who want to watch this but not the first movie, you can, there’s no relation between the two. Although not as original as the first movie and more of a blatant Gremlins ripoff, it’s fun just the same, more so than Munchies (1987) or Hobgoblins (1988). For now though, that’s it for me. Later!
Kid Nostalgia 