The Rob York directed and co-written Curse of Crom: The Legend of Halloween gave off some real Stranger Things vibes to me, some of which just had to be purposeful. The cast of 'teenagers' may look like adults in their mid-twenties, but the film retained a fun charm to it, though its distinct lack of threat might put some people off.
Mary (Chelsea Jurkiewicz - Abigail Haunting) is a high school teen who does food deliveries as a way to earn money to get her into college. Fed up with her creepy Irish neighbour, Mr Murphy, (Cory Dangerfield - Templar Nation) ordering food that he then insists is left opened and uneaten on his doorstep, and then not tipping her, she gets into an argument with the man, and unknown to him dumps his order in the bin. That evening, Mr Murphy is attacked and killed by a spectral figure. It turns out that Mr Murphy's bloodline was cursed to forever having to appease an Irish entity named Crom with offerings of food, and now the man is dead the creature is given the opportunity to cause untold danger to the world if it isn't stopped before Halloween arrives. Mary, along with her friends, Harvey (Tanner Gillman), Steve (Halem Medina - V/H/S/99, segment 'To Hell And Back'), Georgia (Ariana Bagley), and Stephanie (Monica Moore Smith) realise it is up to them to try and find a way to banish this creature back to the world of the dead.
Any film that takes place around Halloween is welcome, and here that vibe is well represented with all manner of Halloween decorations and pumpkins, while the autumn leaves blowing around the town really gave me a vibe of the classic Halloween. In terms of the characters, outside of the blatant fact none of them were played by teenagers, they were a fun bunch, if reliant on stereotypes. Most distracting was Harvey who looked and acted like a cut-price version of Steve from Stranger Things. The fact that one of the friends was actually called Steve made me think this was originally meant to be his name, but it was felt that was a little too much on the nose. That isn't really a dig, Gillman's character has an impressive head of hair as that other character, and his unrequited love for Mary was portrayed well for what this was. Stereotypes are fine when going for a somewhat light hearted tone as shown here, I did think Georgia was the weakest of the bunch, her sullen and moody character really didn't do much. Smith was great as the princess of the group, even if the way she was treated was a little mean. Outside of the brief role that Cory Dangerfield played, the only adults of any note were Mary's parents, and with the dad (Colin Cunningham - Falling Skies TV show), I never felt like he really fitted the role well.
The actual moments of horror are the weakest element of this film sadly, with Crom looking decent enough for a Buffy the Vampire Slayer monster of the week, but not feeling like much of a genuine threat. It doesn't help that outside of Mr Murphy there isn't any death in the film. Each of the friends in turn find themselves in situations where Crom is after them, but none of them are ever in any real trouble. On the one hand I am glad that no one is killed off as the characters (with the exception of Georgia) were a likeable bunch. On the other hand though, the lack of threat became a bit of an issue, as did the muddy backstory and attempts to link the entity to Mary. It was the type of plot where the characters seem to invent the antagonists intentions and then act accordingly, with no real evidence to support their beliefs.
Curse of Crom: The Legend of Halloween was an enjoyable teen horror film that had a mostly great cast of characters. With a bigger kill count, and with a simplified explanation of what the monster was and its intentions this would have benefitted. As it was, this wasn't bad, but the weak antagonist isn't something that is likely to stick in the mind. The film is due for release on 11th September from High Fliers Films.
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