Saturday, October 18, 2014

31 Days of Halloween - Day 18: Kiss Meets the Phantom of the Park

For the last few years I always do a 31 days of Halloween month. The past few years I re-read all the original Goosebumps books and before that I'd watch 31 horror movies. However I realized every single time I watched 31 Horror movies I exclusively picked ones I enjoyed. I decided to do something slightly different. I composed a list of every horror movie I owned and put them in alphabetical order. Then using a random number generator I generated 31 numbers and watched the movies that corresponded with those numbers. Some are great films and others… well… are less than fun let's say. I hope you enjoy!

Day 18: Kiss Meets the Phantom of the Park (Movie #296)

Kiss was and will always be non-stop marketing machines. They'll do absolutely anything to make a buck. So when Kiss is in something that you can almost only get via bootlegs … you know it's pretty terrible.

Kiss Meets the Phantom of the Park isn't so much a horror movie starring Kiss as it is a live-action Scooby-Doo episode with Kiss in place of the Mystery Team. I mean the villain is legitimately the old man from the amusement park.

The band was apparently embarrassed by the failed attempts at humor, the stupid plot and terrible acting. I don't blame them but I'll be honest… I didn't hate this movie. Maybe it's because I like Kiss so much that the live performances kept me entertained but I was charmed by the sincere attempt to make a fun made-for-tv movie.


I struggle to pick a favorite part but the general idea that each member of Kiss has some type of super power is so deliciously absurd that it's hard not to like at least a little. 

Calling this a horror movie is a bit of a stretch but since it oozes such a Scooby-Doo vibe (and I think every horror fan grew up on a healthy diet of old scoob) that I'm going to accept this as a fun Halloween treat. It's got Mad Scientists, Evil Robot Clones, A Sequence inside a Dark Ride and most horrifying of all an acoustic rendition of Beth (reportedly the only time we hear Peter Criss' real voice the whole movie). Call me crazy but I might even consider this becoming part of a yearly ritual. 

Matt Kelly is the host of the popular podcast The Saint Mort Show, a frequent contributor to Geekscape.net, the founder of Chords for Cures and the co-writer/co-director of the upcoming comedy Describing the Moon. He also loves it when people surprise him with purchases from his Amazon Wishlist… just saying.

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