It’s Saint Patrick’s Day and what does that mean in the horror world? Of course you know what it means. It means watch the only horror movie in the world dedicated to the holiday of the Irish and drinking green beer. Let’s watch us some “Leprechaun”! Oh the joys of “Leprechaun”. The basic plot? A really nasty leprechaun is robbed of his gold and forced to lie trapped in a crate for ten years thanks to a magical four-leaf clover. When the Leprechaun is awaken from his slumber, he makes a vow to kill everybody who stands in his way of his recovering his gold. Sound promising? I’d say your luck just ran out. In for a bad b-movie with a lot of charm and not a lot of brains? Well…your luck might be a little bit better.
“Leprechaun” is the sort of movie I might expect to see from someone who decided that there simply MUST be a St. Patrick’s Day horror movie. The movie does have one good thing going for it, though, a young Jennifer Aniston who is actually quite charming as our lead and ultimate “Final Girl”. Tory is a spoiled young girl from L.A. forced to spend the summer with her father and friends in an all but condemned house in North Dakota. The very same house the mean, old Leprechaun has been staying! Do you think there will be chaos? Yes. Do you think any of our major characters will die? Nope. Good…glad to see that we are all on the same page here.
Ugh…what movie was I talking about again? Oh yeah, “Leprechaun”. Seriously, is this movie over yet? There is a slight bit of blood and gore, but the leprechaun spends more time trying to be funny (his “jokes” make Freddy Krueger seem like Woody Allen on his best) than providing us with satisfying deaths. Far too many ridiculous sight gags are played, insulting the intelligence of even the youngest of viewers, and the climax (“FUCK YOU LUCKY CHARMS”) is too inane for words. In the world of horror movies, Leprechaun is typical B-rated horror….nothing more and nothing less. If you are in the mood for a dumb horror movie about a dumb leprechaun doing dumb things…well, you don’t do any better than this. And, with five increasingly awful sequels, the filmmakers have shown us that you can do worse…much worse!