THE GINGERDEAD MAN

Written by William Butler and Dominic Muir, Directed by Charles Band

Hot on the heels of DOLL GRAVEYARD comes another action figure showcase that clocks in at barely over an hour. Made by Charles Band and his Full Moon Pictures company, this story of a psychotic biscuit whose one-liners are voiced by Gary Busey is so lacking in flavour that it doesn't even belong in BASKET CASE's picnic box.

Two years after robbing a diner and killing two patrons, the crazed Millard Findlemeyer (Gary Busey) is frazzled in the electric chair for his crimes. Shortly after his cremation, Millard's ashes are mixed with gingerbread seasoning and delivered to a bakery. This shop, run by the wife and daughter of the murdered diner, becomes the target of supernatural revenge plan, when a worker's blood accidentally drips into the mix and invokes an ancient curse. After baking the haunted gingerbread mixture, Sarah Leigh (Robin Sydney) and colleagues are attacked by a bloodthirsty cookie.

As with Band's previous entry, cost cutting is achieved by restricting most of the action to a single, this time threadbare setting. Taking place predominantly in the back room of a "run down" bakery, the film can almost be forgiven for its grey drabness. Practicality aside, GINGERDEAD MAN is an extremely listless experience, although coloured lighting, particularly from the oven (red), are used to colour in the action and at least assert a measure of pretence at cinematic style.

One would never be forgiven for expecting a film about a killer gingerbread man to be an intelligent and rewarding cinematic experience, but the film does seem to collapse in on itself very early. An amusing opening, featuring the twitchy and beady-eyed Gary Busey as a neurotic mother obsessive with a fondness for killing women, is betrayed by his reincarnation as a rubber icon spewing one-liners (when asked who he is, he replies "I'm not the Pillsbury fucking doughboy") that would embarrass Freddy Krueger.

With its 'unexpected' romance, between the pleasant Sarah and warm hearted thug Amos, and assorted obnoxious characters, this picture does follow in the vein of DOLL GRAVEYARD - an awful film that nonetheless delighted in ripping down values of happy families, and the like that are so frequently asserted in American sitcoms and family flicks. Predictably, the big business owner who stands as a threat to the family bakery becomes a casualty to the annoying cookie, and his heartless daughter is killed after being maimed in her conventionally pretty face.

What doesn't fail to amuse, however, is the near brutal treatment of Sarah's mother, a gone to seed alcy who has her wedding ring finger severed and is then thrown in the oven so that she can feel what it's like to bake, since Millard was forced to fry in the electric chair. It's good to see Brick, the prototypical Yankee obsessed with being number one, meet the nastiest end. Settings are used reasonably well, the bakery's clutter allowing the biscuit to jump out and surprise victims, gone are the stunningly immobile fodder of Band's last doll film. Both the oven and the freezer are used as death traps, which speaks quite well of the filmmaker's resourcefulness.

Although much of the acting is bland, Robin Sydney makes for a quite engaging Sarah Leigh, and some of the less appealing actors shows an awareness of the 'bad movie' situation that they're in - especially when Amos, having upset Sarah, says "I'm not very good at these kind of things, reading people's emotions. Why do you think I'm with Lorna? (the bitchy daughter of the capitalist)". However honest this 'bad movie acknowledgement' is, it's not exactly productive.

It's all very well having a giggle at a rubber gingerbread killer, but I'm thinking that THE GINGERDEAD MAN won't be selling like hot cakes any time soon.

Special Features

Behind the scenes featurette - info on the way the title monster was filmed, including a rubber hand puppet to integrate it in the action, as well as a huge mask for close ups of its face, when talking. A cooperative Busey tells us how he came to star in the film. Bloopers - we get to see the actors crack up amid some absurd lines. Full Moon Playthings Announces Action Figures - website link. Message From Charles Band - details of movie tie in figure releases, etc.

Review by Matthew Sanderson