Masterful Movie

Admirable film.

A Brilliant Conflict

It is interesting even when nothing much happens, which is for most of its 3-hour running time. Read full review

Sometimes, I watch movies in the middle of the night, after working long shifts of meetings, copywriting and brainstorming. Whatever brains that still exists in the mush and at this late hour are often exposed to sheer lunacy via films that I find on YouTube. When I awaken, my first thought is often, "Was that movie real or a nightmare?"Elves is one of those films.Kirsten and her friends innocently take part in an ant-Christmas pagan ritual in the woods, but then she cuts her hand and awakens a demonic elf who ends up being part of a Nazi plot to create the master race that Hitler always dreamed of. Yep, instead of the pure Aryan Nietzsche paradigm, the Fuhrer dreamed of a world where human and elf hybirds would populate the glove.Through one of those moments of perfect horror movie luck, Kirsten is the last pure Aryan virgin on earth. Nope, this isn't a post apocalpytic film. That's just the way things are these days. Her grandfather was once a part of all of this, but he's since reformed. Oh, he's also her father, because inbreeding was a big part of keeping the bloodline pure.But hey, Kirsten has no idea that any of this is going on. She's just trying to get through the hell of holiday retail, working in a department store. That's where she meets Mike McGain (Dan Haggarty, TV's Grizzly Adams), an alcoholic homeless ex-cop who takes over for the store's Santa Claus when the original is killed by an evil elf. Yes, I just wrote that sentence, perhaps the most batshit crazy one I've ever assembled in all my years of writing.Mike starts living in the store, living off of the food he steals from the snack bar where Kirsten works. One night, he saves Kirsten when the Nazis come to the store and kill all of her friends.Will Kirsten survive? What does her mom think about all of this? Have you ever wanted to see a movie where an elf electrocutes a woman in a bathtub? What the hell is an elfstone anyway? These and several other questions will and won't be answered.This is a film rich with purely inane and insane dialogue, including a lecherous, cocaine using Santa that states, "Santa said oral!" and our heroine bemoaning that her only friend is a cat. There's also a great scene where Mike goes to see a professor during a holiday dinner and the man describes how elves and Nazis are having this big ritual and incestual sex bloodlines in front of his children.Geek note: Mike goes to the library and asks what the Dewey Decimal System Number is for the occult. The answer? 666. Nope. The real number would be 130, the code for books on parapsychology and the supernatural.Is this film any good? No, it's horrible. And I loved it. It's my holiday gift to you and I'm so happy to share such a patently warped film with all of you.

After performing a ceremony in a graveyard, a group of teenage girls find themselves being stalked by a race of elves summoned by a Nazi scientist looking to create a master race by inbreeding one of them with the elves and must find a way to stop it.This here was quite a decent enough effort. One of the better elements for this one is the fact that there's quite a pronounced and distinctive atmosphere present here that runs throughout this one. Starting with the manner of how they manage to resurrect the creatures in the first place with the chilling cemetery scene in the opening sequence, there's a strong series of suspenseful stalking scenes throughout the first half showing the elves point-of-view scurrying along after their potential victims leading to some decent shots of them close to the ground which makes their creation a little more believable. That leads into the somewhat enjoyable action scenes here with the creature taking out the loner in the break room at the department store, the creature's first attack on the house where it stalks her family members which is written off as a dream and the more action-film centered attack on the friends at the department store which turns into a fine gunfight within the aisleways which is quite a nice feature which helps to make this one quite action-packed and pleasing. Likewise, the final half features quite a lot of enjoyable action here with the race to get away from the creatures and the Nazi agents leading into the solid finale in the woods which is a nice blend of surreal imagery and fantasy-based action that makes for a nice overall time to this and ends this on a fine note. The other good part here is the fact that this one did manage some nice effects work on the creature and the various kills here which aren't quite graphic but has a nice look to them. These here make this one quite fun, although there are a few flaws with this one. The film's biggest issue is the fact that it doesn't really know what it really wants to be as this one really seems to feature quite a scattered overall plot line. The notion of the girls' troubled home-life works nicely, but it doesn't match up to anything that comes later on, the sudden inclusion of the action-film scenario with the department store shootout is completely odd to randomly throw into the film and the utterly bizarre storyline about the occult Nazi experiments is handled with such ludicrous explanations and reasoning that the whole thing feels underwritten and half-baked. Forcing him to go running around to the various authority figures on the subject to get the whole story out makes no sense when it could streamline everything by making one person be the expert or at least have the team gathered together at one spot would've made much more sense beyond the sheer lunacy of the whole situation. The other problem with the film stems from the rather lax and stifling pacing that doesn't really have a lot of action throughout here as there's quite a lot of times featuring nothing of any real interest as it lets the mystery play out here which really keeps the action out of the first half for the most part. These here really hold it back.Rated PG-13: Graphic Language, Violence, Brief Nudity, drug use and violence-against-animals.

If you've seen Troll 2, then you already know what kind of an experience you'll have viewing Elves. Both have misleading titles (Elves only has a single elf, Troll 2 has no trolls), ridiculous plots, poor effects, and laughable dialog.This movie is really only for people who like to laugh at bad performances. It has incest, Nazis, a perverted department store Santa, and Grizzly Adams setting a record for the number of times a character takes the Lord's name in vain. I was entertained. Not at the blasphemy, but everything else.One other thing you might notice about this one: Whoever wrote this must have some family issues. The little brother is a perv, the mom hates everyone, and the grandfather is an incestuous Nazi. Less fun than even Tony Manero's dinner table.

"Elves" stars Dan Haggerty (TV's former Grizzly Adams) as a chain smoking ex-cop turned shopping mall Santa Claus. Grizzly apparently had a falling out with the force due to his insufferable boozing. The stress of his muddled life may play a role in the heavy smoking. This isn't mentioned outright, but I took a few film classes through correspondence school, so I have an eye for these sorts of storyline hints. Haggerty prepared for the role by yellowing the whiskers of the beard that made him famous to reflect the stain of cigarette toxins. Quite frankly though, the quality of his performance begins and ends with the yellow beard. One is forced to actually pause the film in order to ponder how in the hell this guy landed his own television SERIES. Ignoring the stench of Chesterfields on him, you might conclude that the only suitable gig for this actor is . . . well, a shopping mall Santa Claus. But I digress.--Potential spoilers-- I won't bore you with the long story, though it may sound intriguing at first—trust me, it's not. Grizzly takes on a troupe of trolls (the so-called Elves) created by a neo-Nazi mad scientist. These not-so-lovable little helpers are on a quest to mate with a virgin and create a master race. And if it weren't for one disgruntled black-lung copper, they just might have gotten away with it. The mall—scene of many a holiday season nightmare—becomes the stage for the final Good vs. Evil battle over Toyland supremacy. In the end we are left with two certainties: 1.) All the best mall action DOES happen after it closes, and 2.) Drinking your way out of a respectable job can, in fact, lead you to becoming a hero.