The Kiss (1988)

THE KISS starts off in typical American suburban territory with a normal family who you just know are going to be plagued by sinister events (just like the family in POLTERGEIST. And THE ENTITY. And THE GATE. And THE AMITYVILLE HORROR. The list is endless.) In the first half of the film, there is a lot of expository material like this, and it's quite boring indeed. A little boring and a little dull and even hard to sit through in places. Luckily, there are some meaty deaths to enliven the proceedings, which are pretty gory when it comes down to it. I wasn't expecting gore of this sort so I was pleasantly surprised. The film then takes an upward turn towards the conclusion, and guess what? It actually becomes quite good. Not amazing or ground breaking, but quite enjoyable. Lots of fighting and magic things and deaths occur and they blend together well, like a nice bowl of vegetable soup.The acting is all right. Joanna Pacula is splendidly evil, but not over the top. She also sheds her clothes rapidly too, another surprise. Meredith Salenger is annoying, yes, but not as annoying as her '90s counterpart Neve Campbell. thankfully. The gore really adds to this film and makes it pretty enjoyable. The plot is executed well too, and there are enough turns and thrills to keep the viewer engaged in the action. I had a good experience with this film. I didn't expect much from it but I found myself enjoying it. A big surprise seeing as I usually hate family-orientated horror films such as these, full of drippy sentimentality and obnoxious actors and actresses. THE KISS isn't anything brilliant, but it's good enough to be better than average. Slightly.

Suburban teen, mourning the recent death of her mother in a freak accident, is suspicious of her mother's estranged sister, an exotic model who comes to stay with the girl and her father; turns out this dangerous woman harbors an evil bloodline that must be passed down to a female relative by a kiss. Despite 'shock' deaths and a heavy-breathing feral cat (who pops up with alarming reliability), this entry in the '80s horror cycle is pretty bland. Director Pen Densham juices the proceedings with sex and voodoo--and a menacing mall escalator--but to no avail. Most of the cast is so laid-back, they evaporate on the screen, particularly young Meredith Salenger (a typical movie kid feigning a modern ordinariness that borders on laziness). As the villain, Joanna Pacula gives it a go, but the silliness of her role (and of the movie's entire concept) defeats her. *1/2 from ****

Well, I didn't go into this film expecting anything great; I was really just hoping for a decent timewaster along the same lines as Wes Craven made for TV opus 'Summer of Fear', and that's more or less what I got; though it cant be said that this film isn't as good as Craven's. The film is a mix of two very basic and very common horror themes; namely, the insider who works their way into a family unit, and of course the idea of witchcraft. After the first fifteen minutes, I feared the worst because = the way that the plot is set up is very messy; and that's never a good sign in a simple film like this one! However, it soon settles down and once I got an idea of what to expect, I found that the film became easier to enjoy. The film starts with two sisters in 1963 that get split up. One of them goes off with a relative who passes onto her a strange curse via a kiss. We then cut to twenty five years later, and the other sister has died in a car accident; leaving her husband and daughter behind. Then onto the scene comes the cursed sister, who wants her niece to bear her curse...It has to be said that this film could have been better if have handled by someone more adept, and if it had a better focus. The plot soon becomes predictable, and there are several things about it that don't make sense, and the film often veers off on a tangent with certain things that aren't really relevant. The Kiss seems to have taken a bit of influence from The Omen with regards to the way that the death scenes are carried out; mostly excessive and random, but also quite imaginative: the death scene on an escalator is well done...though the clues preceding it spoil the surprise. None of the characters are particularly interesting, which is a shame considering that the main one is a conniving witch. However, the film never becomes too boring. The special effects aren't over-used, but what we do get is generally quite realistic; the only exception to this rule being an aggressive cat, which looks like a stuffed toy. It all boils down to an exciting and explosive finale, which also happens to be the best ten minutes of the film. Overall, I won't be going round recommending this film to people; but there's worse ways to spend ninety minutes of your life.

I can't believe anybody gave this piece of crap a '10'. This is reutine horror which uses a thriller structure to try to legitamize the absurd idea of a woman possessed by a demon with a demon-cat to do her dirty work.*SPOILERS*The acting is pathetic and the suspense is workman-like at best. It really feels like made-for-cable horror with better film-quality. It attempts to be classy with a "historical" prologue in the middle-east.When we meet the leading girl (or favored victim) she is just another teenaged thing without any remarkable features and we are asked to like her and her bimbo friend. Her friend speculates about the possessed aunt "Screwing Mick Jagger and Sting at the same time", only adding to her valley-girl "cuteness". She is attacked by an escalator, but sadly we don't get to see her die. The rest of the film involves the demon-aunt seducing the girl's father and using her demon-cat to protect her secret. It all boils down to the same old tired, ancient-demon-stalks-present-day format which Lovecraft tried to make work back in the day.*End Spoilers*Don't bother watching this if you seriously want to be scarred or intrigued. There isn't enough plot, horror, or exploitation in this wreck to please any horror fan. This thing is purely for insomniacs or for people who have no discriminating tastes. THE KISS is just your typical waste of time.