"Troll 2" Notes

Using our streaming Netflix account the other night I cued up Troll 2, considered one of, if not the, worst movie ever committed to film.

Using the same Netflix account I saw Best Worst Movie, the documentary about the cult status of Troll 2 and how the movie affected the players in it as well as the filmmakers.

Let me start by saying that it is definitely not the worst movie ever made, er, Worst Movie Ever Made.

I'm a highly critical viewer of film, and there are plenty of movies that are less comprehensible, less well-executed, and less fun than this (have you seen anything by Ed Wood?).

Troll 2 was originally going to be called Goblins, as it has nothing to do with trolls, or the first Troll film, or ever even uses the word "troll" anywhere during its 94 minutes.

It's not a great movie, but it does create genuine tension, something a movie like Charlie's Angels can't even do. It's a low budget movie shot on location in the south and populated by real people who can't hide their inherent crazy. The main problem would have to be the lead actors, who run the gamut from B-movie silly to downright awful.

The main character is a young boy, Joshua, who still occasionally sees and converses with his dead grandfather. Written like that makes the're encounters seem silly, but they're played rightfully for spooky tension. That dynamic pretty much does work.

Josh's family is part of a summer exchange; they switch houses with a family who lives in the country. The grandfather tries to get Josh to stop the move, and failing that, tries to warn them about the food. All the food stuffs has a strange light green paste, like branding. It's pretty neat.

The town they're staying in for the summer, Nilbog (check ithe spelling backwards!), is populated by a gaggle of creepies, always pushing their green food crap on the family members. The main conceit of the film is that Goblins populate the woods around Nilbog, have a connection to the creepy townfolks, are vegetarians--almost--and the green pasty foodstuff starts a transformation in the eater.

After eating the food, they start to sweat green, chlorophyll laden sweat. Eventually they start to transform into plants, and that's when these veg-hybrid Goblins like to eat the stricken plant-man.

Vegetarian-like Goblins? Novel, at least. Josh's older sister, whom I think moved onto an actual career as an actor, is the weak link in the main cast. She's pretty goddamn bad. Their mom is, according to the documentary Best Worst Movie, is a little batshit crazy, and this comes out in her performance. The dad, George Hardy, the star of the documentary, is also pretty bad, but just a run of the mill B-movie bad, but remember, he's a dentist.

The youngster playing Joshua has flashes of competence mixed within B-movie typical. The best performance--from an actor anyway--has got to be from the maniacal dead grandfather. Other than him, the guy who tells the kid, "Coffee's the devil's drink!" is equally creepy and crazy looking, and after seeing Best Worst Movie, you see he's spent the majority of the years since Troll 2 institutionalized.

Watch Troll 2, then go watch the Wild World of Batwoman. Or Plan 9 from Outer Space. Or Charlie's Angels. The tell me that Troll 2 is worse than any of those three.