Audience Member
Headcrusher (aka Broken Skull)
Starring: Paola Valdes, John Arreola, and Dominique Capone
Director: Richard Islas
When a construction worker unearths the remains of a soldier murdered by a vengeful mobster (Capone), a horror that is part supernatural, part bio-warfare is unleashed in Chicago. As the police, the mob, and a group of friends (led by Valdes and Arreola) attempt to find who is behind the string of bizarre murders, the mutilated bodies with crushed heads continue to pile up.
"Headcrusher" is a low-budget, shot-on-video horror flick of surprisingly high quality. While it shows many of the flaws of this kind of movie (bad sound, weak acting, cheap visual effects), there are more than enough strong points to make up for them.
First of all, "Headcrusher" has the benefit of a director who knows how to keep his movie going. We don't get the pointless, protracted scenes of actors wandering or driving around city streets, nor do we get establishing shots that go on and on and on. Instead, director Richard Islas has a firm handle on his film and he manages to dish up real tension, scares, and some nice kill scenes. Yes, the $1.95 budget that this film was made on is clearly in evidence throughout, but Islas manages to create a movie with more scares than some horror movies that cost one hundred times what "Headcrusher" cost. (I could have done without the bad animation effect when the mobsters crush the head of the man who will rise as the film's unstoppable monster, but it was so brief that it almost didn't call attention to itself.)
Next, "Headcrusher" is blessed with an honest-to-God script! So many of these low-budget flicks feel like they are 85% ad-libbed because the dialogue is so lame and heavy-handed with exposition, or that their scripts are written as filmming progresses because the story holds together so poorly. With "Headcrusher", every line of dialogue moves the action forward and what exposition we get flows naturally during conversations. Now, the script isn't perfect--there is a subplot about a doctor who is somehow connected to the government that doesn't really add anything, and there are some really irritating examples of "stupid character syndrome" in the Third Act, and I've rarely seen cops and construction site foremen portrayed in ways that rang so untrue--but it probably ranks among the best ones ever written for a low-budget gore-flick like this one.
Finally, "Headcrusher" features actors who can actually act! Some of the supporting cast is iffy, but the leads are great; I don't know if Paola Valdes has done anything else, but I hope so, because she did a great job. Plus, she's a fabulous screamer! Even Dominique Capone, who I imagine was partly in the film because he reportedly related to Al Capone [a gangster's relative playing a gangster... funny, huh? Huh?], but he is also quite good as the swaggering, bullying, and psychopathic mobster whose violent deeds triggers the events of the move. The actors in "Headcrusher" had an advantage over many of their fellow performers in these low-budget jobs in that they had a good script to work with, but I also credit them with more talent than is usually displayed.
For what it is, "Headcrusher" is a fine piece of work. From beginning to end, I had the sense that everyone involved had given this project all they could, and I think that translates very clearly to the screen. Between its decent script, its strong cast, and a director who understood what he could create within his limited budget, "Headcrusher" is a great example of what can be accomplished when talented filmmakers with a sense of reality set out to make a horror movie.
Rated 3/5 Stars •
Rated 3 out of 5 stars
01/18/23
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