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From award-winning directors Steve Balderson and Elizabeth Spear, comes this special presentation of three episodes from their never before released prime-time horror-comedy series “Hell Town.” These episodes are the painstakingly remastered episodes seven, eight and nine of Season Two. Seasons One and Three were completely destroyed in a studio fire. The executives suspected arson.
Filmmakers Steve Balderson and Elizabeth Spear sure know their corny, cringeworthy 1980s soap operas. With every scene that transpires in their ludicrous, so-bad-it’s-good horror-drama “Hell Town,” one cannot help but be reminded of that decade’s cumbersome and embarrassing TV spectacles, such as “General Hospital,” “As the World Turns,” “One Life to Live,” and any other daytime soap you care to mention. They also have the audacity to borrow from Robert Rodriguez and Quentin Tarantino’s “Grindhouse,” itself a throwback to the exploitation films of the 1970s, complete with missing episodes, which supposedly and mysteriously, perished in a studio fire.
In the community of Old Town, there are two distinguished, high-profile families, the Gables and the Manlys. As each family has competed with the other for years, it’s not long, and surprising, before people start mysteriously dying. In amongst all the murder and mayhem, we are introduced to father Manly, the patriarch of the family, and while his wife lies sedentary in a coma, he talks to his children about leaving the family business to one of them. Not mentioning names, each sibling assumes it will be them, all the while belittling each other in the process. At the local high school, football players start dying at the hands of someone known simply as the Letter Jacket Killer because after every murder, he tears the letter of off each of their varsity jackets.
The show is filled with love, betrayal, revenge, murder, incest, murder, reconciliation, sex, glory holes, murder, and suicide. And murder. To try and divulge every single storyline that permeates throughout the entire run time, would be a waste of time, sitting down and actually watching it would be a better choice and a lot more fun. You cannot take something like “Hell Town” seriously but thankfully, the very capable cast, who must have watched Leslie Nielsen in “Airplane” or “The Naked Gun,” take their roles and character motivations very seriously, otherwise, the film would not have worked. I give great kudos to directors Steve Balderson and Elizabeth Spear for taking a genre that has been done to death (no pun intended) and for turning it around and actually making it engaging and very humorous. You could do a lot worse than rent or buy “Hell Town.”
Available on VOD & Digital HD August 23rd
