With: Dan Byrd, Alexandra Adi, Denise Crosby, Courtney Peldon, Bug Hall, Stephanie Patton, Tarah Paige, Rocky Marquette, Greg Travis, Michael Shamus Wiles, Adam Gierasch, Price Carson, Lee Garlington, Christy Whisner
Written by: Jace Anderson, Adam Gierasch
Directed by: Tobe Hooper
MPAA Rating: R for horror violence and gore, brief sexuality, nudity and language
Tobe Hooper’s late career film Mortuary apparently received some kind of limited theatrical release (Fangoria reviewed it on January 13, 2006), though I have no memory of it ever playing in a theater near me. It’s a shame that such a master filmmaker was so neglected; to compare, in 2005, Hooper’s contemporaries Wes Craven, David Cronenberg, and George A. Romero released Red Eye, A History of Violence, and Land of the Dead. Certainly Mortuary isn’t exactly as good as those other films, but it’s very entertaining, and it has the marks of Hooper’s directorial touch.
Denise Crosby plays a widowed mom, Leslie, who moves with her teen son Jonathan (Dan Byrd) and young daughter Jamie (Stephanie Patton) to the titular mortuary, an inheritance. The place is in disrepair, so Leslie sets to work getting things ready while Jonathan goes exploring. He runs afoul of some obnoxious locals, Cal (Bug Hall) and his two girlfriends, Tina (Courtney Peldon) and Sara (Tarah Paige), but also befriends Liz (Alexandra Adi) and Grady (Rocky Marquette) and gets himself a job in the local diner, run by the snarky but kind Rita (Lee Garlington), Liz’s aunt.
Rita and Grady tell Jonathan about the legend of horribly disfigured Bobby Fowler, who apparently still walks the mortuary. Meanwhile, black stuff begins oozing in the basement of the mortuary, and people become possessed, or something. To be honest, it’s not clear whether Bobby Fowler is a supernatural character, or what the black stuff really is, or anything.
The movie also has a weird comical tone that sometimes doesn’t seem to fit. But the spooky, cluttered set design is pure Hooper, and his skill with pacing, composition, and tone is fully on display. I guess if you make The Texas Chainsaw Massacre as your first film, everything after it will compare badly, but it’s high time for a Hooper reassessment. This was his last American film; his next and final film Djinn (2013) was produced in the Middle East.
