This week's movie is the cult horror film Leprechaun. This is really a rare occurrence, me watching two horror movies in the span of a week. I think it helps that neither this or Proteus are really that horrorful. I feel that it is important to make a distinction of the horror genera since it is nearly dead. Typical movies that are called "horror" now a days really aren't that scary on their own. Most movies that get the blanket term horror attached to them fall under what I like to call torture porn. Movies like Saw and Hostel are scary because of the disgust you are supposed to feel at watching such gruesome acts. They are designed to make you feel uncomfortable both by a transference of the character's pain and also by making you feel guilty for watching. This is partly due to the naturalism attained by modern special effects. Mostly this shift is due to the discovery of the Japanese horror genera. Japan has a long history of publishing explicitly violent and gory material. In modern Japanese history this dates back to the print artist Yoshitoshi and his projects such as 28 Famous Murders, which only passes censors for their historical relevance. In 2002 The Ring, based on the 1998 film Ringu, became the first exposure to the style of Japanese horror that most Americans experienced. This style of film making was so extreme that it forced film makers in the horror genera to shift tactics to keep scaring audiences. This is the short story and I bring it up only to show that horror movies 20 years ago weren't that scary. I'll come back to why this is important later.
So! Where to begin with this film... Let's begin with our protagonist Tory, the hip young teenager from LA, and her father driving through New Mexico and complaining about how it's the middle of nowhere. We can already tell Tory is a winner because her father has to correct her that they are actually in North Dakota. From scene one I already want her to die. But it's not that kind of movie! The most Tory gets in this movie is a scratch on the leg while the demonic leprechaun kills not one, not two, but three people! Gasp! Granted he tortures them before they die and another woman's death can be blamed on him indirectly, but as horror movies go very few people die and out of the survivors stitches are the most any of them would need. Where I'm going with this is to say that Leprechaun is a tame horror movie. It's a movie about a leprechaun. Not much to it. Somebody takes his gold and he wants it back. He'll kill to get it back. He'll also kill you if he thinks you took his gold or look at him funny but as far as monster motivation goes, it's just a short temper and a single-minded devotion to the protection of his personal property.
The cast of victims runs the gambit of stereotypes. We have the big city girl, the kind rednecky love interest, the bratty child, the retarded friend/uncle... It's a varied cast of characters. And it's a good thing too because most of the movie is just them talking. Tory, the woman, is afraid of all manner of things and fulfills the shrieky woman in a horror movie stereotype, however as it was the early 90's they also had to establish her rugged feminist individuality. I get the sense from this movie that the film makers really didn't like California because most of what comes out of Tory's mouth is ridiculous. She complains about everything and constantly compares the current surroundings to LA. This gets old very fast and only made me hope she would die all the more. I did think it was cute how she was so nostalgic for beautiful LA, I don't think anyone checked a newspaper for about a year because the Rodney King Riots had been going on during filming. She is also obsessed with her "portable phone" (how's that for a dated movie?) and a vegetarian, because its required for California state citizenship. They pretty much slapped her with every California and horror movie heroin stereotype they could while still adding one scene to prove they are behind women rooting for their gender equality, it's just a really forced scene and you can tell they were laughing all the way through it. The pair of characters, Alex and Ozzie, the kid and retarded man give the movie most of the comedic relief. Alex seems to embody the bratty 90's generation kid who swears like a sailor and doesn't play by anyone's rules. This would be really annoying much like Tory's character accept for the pairing in most scenes with Ozzie who is the 100% pure good character. He's fat, stupid, and awkward, he always chastises Alex when he swears, he always tells it the way he sees it, especially when no one believes him. This pairing of opposites actually makes their eccentricities interesting by giving a variety of extremes that is not too offensive to the senses. Oh, and there's a cute Flower's for Algernon subplot.
Warwick Davis, who plays the leprechaun is a wonderful actor who got his start as one of the ewoks in Return of the Jedi. Chances are you have seen him in several roles but most are small or only have him animating puppet like costume. The Leprechaun movies really give him the opportunity to act crazy on screen. For actors, being the villain is always more fun because you get to play eccentric. Davis does not disappoint. From the very beginning we know the monster is a leprechaun, we know he's going to kill until he has his gold, and we see him through most of the movie. This is a major deviation from most horror movies of this type because the leprechaun, while magical, still seems to exist like a normal person, he uses a tiny car or a tricycle to get around, we see him wander around looking for things, he is not omniscient. This leads to a hilarious scene where he is tearing apart the kitchen of the farm house looking for his gold when he comes across a box of cereal labeled "lucky clovers" even written in the same font as Lucky Charms. On a side note, I feel like there was a scene cut right here or a scene changed from the original because later "Lucky Charms" was used in a one liner. It was a clear reference to the cereal but when they had the chance to make a cereal joke they changed the name on the box.
On the subject of cereal this is a good time to explore the accuracy of this movie from a mythological standpoint. Everyone knows that leprechauns are jolly little fellows from Ireland. They wear green, hang out around four leaf clovers, and if you can catch one he'll give you his pot of gold. Sorry to burst your bubble but that is a very American conception of the leprechaun. Leprechauns of legend were far more varied based on the area of Ireland they were found and traditionally were dressed in red, something the movie gets wrong. Leprechauns are also known for being shoe makers, something the movie directly references. This is also used as a comedic plot device to slow down the little monster as if he comes across a dirty shoe, he must clean it before resuming his murderous rampage. The real crux of the issue is are leprechauns evil, because this one sure is. It really depends on the account your read. The earliest written account of leprechauns is from a medieval story where the king of Ulster falls asleep on a beach and wakes to find three leprechauns dragging him into the sea. Other accounts claim that leprechauns are neutral being neither good or evil. Another film Darby O'Gill and the Little People features leprechauns heavily. Here they are morally neutral but if you cross them they will ruin your life. After several tries the old man Darby finally catches O'Brian, the king of the leprechauns, by tricking him into getting drunk, a little trick they pull in Leprechaun 2. Another interesting feature of leprechauns are their wish granting abilities if they are caught. This however is not addressed in the movie Leprechaun. He is captured at the beginning but as the old man has already taken his gold it seems that he doesn't get his wishes, or something. Added is the leprechaun's weakness against the magical four-leaf-clover, not a traditional characteristic, but a necessary plot device.
As I mentioned earlier the leprechaun is in many scenes in this movie. In this way it deviates from the traditional monster movie. Traditionally the creature, whatever it is, is not shown roaming the hallways of the house pondering where the dumb teenagers are. This takes out a lot of the scare factor. There are a couple cheap tricks this movie uses to generate scares. First, the jump scare. Second, the monster is always behind you trick, not used much but it still makes an appearance. And Third, double takes. I don't know what the technical name is for this technique but it is deftly achieved here multiple times. It involves the characters doing something that the audience expects will lead to a jump scare or the appearance of the monster and then having nothing happen. Then the next time the characters do the same thing the monster appears doubly scaring the viewer. I had seen this done a couple times in the movie but it did not really solidify in my mind what they were doing until the end. Earlier, Alex opened the refrigerator to get some ice and the camera did a strange focus shot on his hand opening the door, BAM! cut to the next scene, sorry folks nothing happened. Then later he does the same thing but the leprechaun leaps out of the fridge when it is opened. You may think this is just a bunch of strange stuff going on that has no rhyme or reason but there you are wrong.
Leprechaun spawned 5 sequels each more ridiculous than the last, the strangest possibly being Leprechaun 4: in Space. The ridiculousness of the series in general can be linked to two things, contemporary trends in horror movies and the background of the writer Mark Jones.
The genera of comedy horror has been around since 1820 with Washington Irving's The Legend of Sleepy Hollow. However, the comedy aspect of this was rarely blended well with the horror aspect. This was tried in the 40's with Abbot and Costello movies where the comedic duo would have a crossover story with famous movie monsters such as Bud Abbott Lou Costello Meet Frankenstein or Abbott and Costello Meet the Invisible Man or Abbott and Costello Meet the Mummy. These attempts however were far more comedy than horror. Not until the 1980's did films start to appear that blended the two. Gremlins and Evil Dead 2 are examples of how a monster movie or zombie movie can be turned into a family movie or psychedelic comedy. Legendary B-movie star Bruce Campbell is forced to cut off his own demon possessed hand in Evil Dead 2. A similar scene in Leprechaun is when the leprechaun gets his hand cut off in a door, and the hand crawls up the doorframe to open the door and get to the leprechaun in a quirky stop motion scene very reminiscent of Campbell's experience. This movie is clearly going for the comedy horror genera and is very aware of its source material. Interestingly, for most of the production and writing staff, this was one of their first movies, so it is no wonder that they drew heavily from recent films that did well.
For writer and director Mark Jones, this was his first movie. He had however had a long career writing for television. His filmography includes The A-Team, Riptide, and Mister-T. However, soon after he got his start in television he gravitated to Hanna-Barbara where he was a long time writer for numerous cartoon series including What's New, Mr. Magoo?, Heathcliff, The All-New Popeye Hour, and 3 Scooby Doo series. This last category is important. Mark Jones had a career in writing for children's cartoons from 1977-1992. He clearly understands comedy or he wouldn't have been doing cartoons for so long. Also, his involvement in Scooby Doo is interesting in relation to a comedy horror film. Scooby Doo is at heart a comedy but the team goes off to find scary monsters and mysteries all the time. Mark Jones was drawing from his experience both writing for his Scooby Doo series, but most likely also drawing from other cartoon series as well when writing Leprechaun.
So far I have only seen bits of the sequels and from what I have seen I would agree with the rumors I have heard that each is more ridiculous than the last. I've also heard that this is a bad thing. From what I can tell, Mark Jones, who has been on the writing staff for each film, but only directed the first is simply trying to apply the comedic aspects from his Hanna-Barbara career to live action horror films to imitate the success of comedy horror in the 80's. I seem to be alone in this regard. To date, Leprechaun has made back $8,556,940 of its $9,000,000 budget from ticket sales. If you are interested in multiple genera movies or are just looking for a silly early 90's horror film I recommend Leprechaun.
Movies Referenced:
2002-The Ring
1998-Ringu
1997-Leprechaun 4: in Space
1995-Proteus
1994-Leprechaun 2
1993-Leprechaun
1987-Evil Dead 2
1983-Star Wars: Episode VI - Return of the Jedi
1982-Gremlins
1959-Darby O'Gill and the Little People
1955-Abbott and Costello Meet the Mummy
1951-Abbott and Costello Meet the Invisible Man
1948-Bud Abbott and Lou Costello Meet Frankenstein
