Critics,are you kidding us

Instead, you get a movie that's enjoyable enough, but leaves you feeling like it could have been much, much more.

The film creates a perfect balance between action and depth of basic needs, in the midst of an infertile atmosphere.

There are moments that feel comical, some horrific, and some downright inspiring but the tonal shifts hardly matter as the end results come to a film that's perfect for this time.

This movie had me reminiscing about my youth and before we get onto the review I will admit I've added a point for the warm feeling the film left in my soul. This is the type of movie we would walk miles for on a Friday night back in video's heydey. I even know which of my friend's house I originally watched this movie at because his mum loved horror films. God bless you Mrs A.This is not a great horror film and came at a time when the industry was asked to cut down on the graphic violence so most of the nasty stuff is done off-camera and your imagination has to do some "fill-in-the-blanks" work. This isn't usually a bad thing as it can have the ability to bring the audience more into the story, however, here the director doesn't do such a great job and at these time the film feels dislocated and disjointed. Especially with the fan scene and the torn in half shot of a student, this mainly due to not knowing how this exactly happened. One shot and he's whole, the next and he's been halved... by what and how?I am unsure if this is how the director, Tom Daley, filmed it or if the special effects ended up on the cutting-room floor, as the cuts are so sharp it feels as though there was more to the scenes. Quite a few films of this period have this kind of feel and is one of the reasons Friday 13th VI wasn't as visceral as it's predecessors.These cuts harm the film in a way which could have been fatal, had the story and the direction not been enough to keep it alive... though not kicking so hard. That said there are quite a few interesting kills... the skeleton scene is pretty well done and the axe to the head is inventive.The opening scenes on a steamboat and then at the estate of an heiress as she is murdered and robbed are nicely done and give the backstory of the how The Lamp finds it's way to the museum. Most horror films just get on with it and fill the audience in vocally, should there be a history to be told.The acting isn't too bad. Most of the time it's wooden and the stereotypical baddies are portrayed in the usual style of the time - over-the-top, we're bad... but we're only having fun... No Oscars were ever going to find themselves into any of the actor's homes on the basis of this film. Though I have seen much worse.On the whole, the special effects are good, though I do feel the better scenes may have been cut. The worst effect it the computer program used to decipher the legend on The Lamp. Why it had to be prettied up I have no idea, but in today's gadget and app tech-age, this looks dated and laughable... I think it was laughable even then. If you like 80's horror films then this could be for you, but if you like the Jinn mythos then do yourself a favour and watch the wonderful and brilliant Wishmaster. If this film had that type of Jinn and half the humour then it would have been a much better movie.

Here's another unknown little horror gem from the glorious year of 1987 starring unknown actors and an unknown director whose contributions resulted in a messy but entertainingly campy film originally titled "The Lamp". For its U.K release in April 1987 during the peak of the worldwide VHS revolution, this received European distribution for six months until the U.S decided that the most popular films at that particular time dealt with horny teenagers meeting their grisly demises while sneaking off to overnight destinations, Therefore the title was changed to "The Outing" for its American video audience. This is the typical cheesy 80s slasher-type flick with amateurish acting, bad dialog and downright cheap special FX. Everything from red flashing jewelry, neon green eyes and blue lightning represent the strange paranormal activity that results from a monster-like "genie" that torments a sympathetic young heroine "Deborah Winters". Its your classic "Aladdin" story line combined with gory murders and annoying characters. The "genie" of the lamp eventually materializes into a terrible looking demonic creature obviously thrown together with cheap prosthetics and stalks the surviving cast through a museum after-hours. This movie falls into the "so bad its good" category, because there is a certain charming quality to it. The lead characters aren't unsympathetic, and the overall cheesiness, style of dress and weird aura has that 1980s ambiance that newer films lack. Fans of the 80's will love it, but modern era movie-goers would consider it boring and dated. Ultimately, its an unforgotten VHS cult-classic amongst the few and the proud.

"The Outing" is supremely cheap 'n' cheesy, crude 'n' clumsy, no budget horror entertainment. Granted, it's slow to get started and the good stuff is mostly saved for the second half. But once the mayhem begins, it proves to be quite amusing. The actors aren't the most professional one will ever see, but who would choose to watch something like this and expect any different? The important thing is that the movie *does* entertain the viewer, if on a somewhat modest level.A trio of rednecks attempt to rob an old woman. They try to make off with her genie lamp, but they all get slaughtered. Eventually the lamp makes its way into a museum. The curators' daughter Alex (Andra St. Ivanyi) is possessed, or something, and entices her friends into spending some time after hours in the museums' basement. Soon the djinn, or genie, within the lamp is free to continue the body count.The action in the second half can boast showmanship. The swooping camera-work isn't bad at all and the special effects and gore are substantially enjoyable, no matter how tacky they may be. Among the highlights are a boy chopped in half, a girl attacked in a bathtub by snakes, an opera singing security guard impaled by a spear, and a scientist shoved through a ceiling fan.The movie also stars the bland James Huston as curator Dr. Wallace, Deborah Winters (from such pictures as "The People Next Door" and "Blue Sunshine") as his love interest,Eve Farrell (Winters also plays the young and old Arab women), and Danny D. Daniels ("Retribution") as Wallaces' colleague Dr. Bressling. Tom Daley handles the directing duties.All in all, this is diverting enough to appeal to die hard genre devotees.Six out of 10.

The Outing is set in Texas & starts late one night as three hoodlums break into the house of an old lady (Deborah Winters under plenty of ageing make-up) in order to rob her money but are disappointed only to find an old Lamp with a jewelled stopper in it, trying to take the seemingly valuable stopper out the Lamp is rubbed & an evil Jinn is unleashed & kills everyone... The police send the ancient Lamp to the state Museum of Natural Science where foremost archaeologist Dr. Wallace (James Huston) takes an interest in it, apparently dating from 3500 B.C. the Lamp may be of significant historical importance & value. Dr. Wallace's daughter Alex (Andra St. Ivanvi) & some of her friends decide to spend the night in the museum & the evil Jinn from the Lamp starts to kill them off, Alex & her dad have to translate the engravings on the Lamp to discover how to defeat the Jinn & end it's ancient curse..Directed by Tom Daley I suspect that this was actually shot under the title The Lamp which it was released under just about everywhere apart from the US where it was retitled to The Outing & I suspect that the three prologue that was cut as mentioned on the IMDb's 'Alternate Versions' page was done so as the title The Lamp actually appears over this shot in the same font & style as the rest of the credits, anyway I have to say I rather liked The Outing or The Lamp or whatever it's called as it delivers in most areas. The opening fifteen minutes are fantastic with a deserted galleon strewn with dead bodies, a robbery, nudity, strangulation, axes in heads & a guy is torn in half but predictably the film can't keep the pace going like that forever & it does settle down into 80's teen horror clichés with ex-boyfriends, silly pranks & a daft idea with little to no motivation behind it to spend the night in the basement of a museum which takes up a fair amount of time but once the evil Jinn show's up again the killing starts it doesn't let up until the final credits with a death or a monster every few minutes. The kills are pretty good & gorier than expected to with some actual proper special effects used & the body count is quite high although we never see what happens to that black bird who was getting raped, do we? At less than 90 minutes it's short enough, it's to the point & has slightly more going on than you may expect with love triangles, romance, evil Jinn's, sex, death, demonic possession & there's even an opera singing security guard (stick around for the end credits as after they finish there's a somewhat random & very brief shot in which he takes a well deserved bow!). The character's are OK but nothing special, the dialogue awkward at times & you really won't mind seeing anyone in this die (in the context of the film obviously, not in real life).Another thing about The Lamp that I liked was that it's pretty original, in a decade that brought audiences many teen slashers with various masked killers the idea of an evil supernatural Jinn was quite cool & before anyone says it The Outing/The Lamp was made a decade before Wes Craven used the idea in Wishmaster (1997). The deaths are pleasingly gory, there's a guy ripped in half in a swimming pool & his legs sink to the bottom in a cloud of blood, people's get axe's stuck in their heads, there's zombies, bitten off fingers, bitten out throats, someone face is cut with a ceiling fan, someone is impaled with a spear, a naked woman is bitten to death by zombie snakes in a bath & a guy's head is crushed inside a helmet & his head is twisted right round plus there's a decent amount of blood splatter to go with the kills. There's a few scenes of nudity as well plus an attempted rape scene. The special effects are good too, when the evil Jin appears at the end it looks a little rubbery but is still a decent enough monster although it's silly voice makes it hard to understand at times. There is actually a bit of atmosphere here as well, the opening sequence set on an old boat one foggy night as in one long shot the camera moves onto the boat & moves around it is rather cool actually & sets the film up nicely.The IMDb says this had a budget of about $2,000,000 which I find hard to believe, that's a lot of money actually although it is well made with decent effects so it's possible I suppose. Apparently shot in Texas although there's some 'Californian Crew' credits at the end. The acting isn't anything special & most of the performances are stiff lets say although Andra St. Ivanvi pulls some odd faces at times which is quite unsettling.The Outing (The Lamp is a much better title) is a decent little hard to find 80's supernatural horror teen slasher with a good body count, nice gore, some nudity & an OK monster. The middle third drags a bit but the opening & closing twenty odd minutes are great, I reckon this ones worth tracking down & watching.