Demons 2 (1986)
When in Italy, do as the Italians do. And if the Italians are doing Demons, then you better for damn sure be doing Demons 2. And how best to make Demons 2? In spite of the “Zombie” formula , Demons 2 is actually connected to the first one! The downside? It pretty much plays like, “Remember that movie we did last year? Let’s make it again!”
This seems strangely familiar.
Premise: 2/5
It’s easy to be cynical about Demons 2, coming out as it did just one year after the original and, well, being Italian—however, this had both Lamberto Bava and Dario Argento back, masterminds (if you want to call them that) behind the original. Thing is, instead of doing something new or building off the ending of the original, it just tries to remake the first movie, only putting it in a ultramodern apartment building instead of the much creepier theater locale. The prompting of the outbreak is even more lunatic than the first one, though—in Demons 2, a bitchy girl who’s hiding out in her bedroom because some douchebag invited somebody she hates to her birthday party, is watching a TV show about the events of the first movie: apparently, Berlin was completely walled off and dubbed “The Forbidden Zone” after people united to fight back the demon horde from the first movie, and nobody has gone into the place since. Until now, where we have four journalist types scaling the wall and exploring the ruins of Berlin (ignore all the logical inconsistencies of this: such as why the demons suddenly could not climb the walls, why the city is not guarded from the outside, and why the fuck one of the reporter types, when they find a demon corpse says, “we’re probably the only people alive who have actually seen one of the demons!” kinda confusing the fact that somebody must have survived to build this wall and . . . and . . . head . . . hurting . . . Italy . . .). One of the doomed (omg spoilerz! You thought they were going to survive?) reporters accidentally cuts herself on some debris, causing her blood to fall into the open mouth of a demon corpse they just found, and it doesn’t take a rocket scientist to see how that means nothing good for anyone.
What a cute doggy! Does he bite?
Meanwhile, back in Sally’s bitchy boo-hoo party temper tantrum, the TV is showing all this stuff, possibly as it happens. It’s kind of unclear how any of this works, since it seems obvious the four journalists would have all been killed (though you only see one of them die onscreen), and though nobody’s been in the Berlin area since the first movie somehow there’s a camera framing the crew of four from the perfect angles . . . anyways, forget all that. I suppose it’s just possible that what everyone in the apartment building is a re-enactment, or a fictional movie built off the real events from the first (which seems like it would be a touch callous, but still makes more sense than the live TV crew thing). Either way, Sally is watching this after her hissy fit in her room, but the oddest thing happens: the demon that was chasing the remaining three folks through the Forbidden Zone, turns around and appears to be staring right through the TV at Sally. Of course this freaks her out a little, but it doesn’t really start making her go ballistic until the demon begins coming through the screen to get her, in what can best be described as a Videodrome moment. Soon Sally is possessed and slashes up all the less-than-lucky-partygoers who hadn’t ditched out yet, and, with that out of the way, she starts bleeding acid blood all over the place that eats through the floors and cuts all the power lines, locking all the tenants in with a party full of newly-made demons looking for some good ol’ fashioned mass murder. This one also has the apparently-requisite group of “bad kids” driving too fast (although they’re not coked up, just horny and reckless), but instead of serving any purpose to the story like they did to the first movie, these guys just get into a bit of an accident with some other incidental characters and then . . . vanish from the movie altogether?
This poor little guy was voted "Least Likely to be as Marketable as Gizmo" . . .
Cast: 1/5
Remember how in the review of Demons I said that none of them were very good, but I didn’t feel like smacking the shit out of any of them? Pretty much everyone in this one sucks and makes me want to smack the shit out of them. From the first five minutes I couldn’t wait to see every last one of these losers get slaughtered. Even the ones you’re supposed to care about are so vapid and uninteresting that them being killed is the only thing about them worth noting.
Oh, and Tony the pimp from the first movie is back, only this time he’s Hank the Gym Instructor. Functionally the same character, only in this movie he gets more screen time and doesn’t carry a switchblade. Whoopee.
. . . especially after this happened.
Technical: 3/5
Special effects in this one are generally better than in the first movie, although there’s far less gore, sadly. It’s so toned down that there isn’t even ONE eye-gouging in the whole thing, which is kind of tragic, considering. Oddly enough, though, this movie shows more polish than the first one, but at the price of the first movie’s trippiness. The soundtrack isn’t as wacked-out, either, and more just sort of “gets it done.” I can’t say that there’s anything bad here, but I prefer the tech stuff from the first movie even if it was more crudely done.
High points are the acid blood boiling through the ceiling and the demon effects, low points are the demonified dog and a baby demon puppet that can best be described as “retarded.”
This is the sort of stuff Dario Argento's daughter Asia had to go through as a child. I am not kidding.
Popcorn Factor: 2/5
Ehhh . . . while this isn’t a horrible movie by any means, it’s not what many people would consider good. With so many monster attack scenes basically cribbed directly from the first movie, so much stuff you can just see coming a mile away. Maybe I shouldn’t compare this so drastically to the original Demons, but if I don’t I can’t really come up with a single reason to see this movie. It’s not too over-the-top or surreal, so the stuff that doesn’t make sense in the plot stands out pretty starkly and might make a more casual viewer just turn the flick off. There’s an action scene where Hank the fitness guy and whatever survivors they got together are fighting off the demons in the apartment parking garage that is pretty cool for sure, but overall you can pass this one up without missing anything.