Nightmare Weekend
This 1985 Troma-owned film is about three teenage girls who are invited to a house on the weekend to have experiments performed on them. On the way to the mysterious house, they meet three men who they decide to bring along on the trip. One of the girls urged her friend Jessica Brake (Debra Hunter), the main character, to come but she wanted to spend some time with her professor father.
Along with her rich but loving father, Jessica also has a computerized puppet named George, who's been one of her best friends growing up. One thing Jessica doesn't like though is her father's colleague Lisa, who was the one that invited the other girls for experiments. Jessica's father and Lisa perform experiments, including their most recent one which involves some sort of metallic sphere going into Lisa's dog's mouth, which generates a change in mood and is immediately but falsely declared safe for humans by Lisa, who knows the fatal effects.
The tests prove deadly when the guests are transformed into bloodthirsty zombies who slaughter the living. While all of this is going on, Jessica falls in love with biker Ken (Dale Midkiff, Pet Sematary), who's friend was murdered accidentally by Lisa, who's trying to break into Jessica's dad's electronic system of some sort. The two have a romantic evening, Jessica unknown to this fact. Eventually, Jessica ends up in the mansion and discovers all of her friends now changed into demonic beings. It's then up to George to save the day in dreadfully bad taste!
Ah, Troma! They've brought out so many so-bad-it's-good movies, including this one which is pretty silly, Troma also well known for their Toxic Avenger and Class of Nuke 'em High series and more. George the puppet is definitely a comic factor of the movie, whether it was intended or not. One of the cheesiest death scenes I've seen yet involves a man choking on a woman's panties! There's also a demented scene involving a zombie hunched over a victim while another zombie stabs the attacker in the back!
Confusing, cheesy, bizarre, and shocking are only four words that describe this Troma schlocker. Obviously labeled a bad movie, I got some kicks out of this one. Some of the effects are so fake, you just have to loosen up and laugh, along with the horrible beginning and end theme. That's what Troma movies are all about, but if you're looking for straight-forward horror, then this isn't your movie.
