Wednesday, October 01, 2008

The Attic

(1980) **1/2



Due to my gross unpreparedness for Horrorthon ’08 (JPX, why didn’t you alert me that we were starting on October 1st this year?), I was forced to scour through the dusty nether regions of my DVD collection to find a suitable launching pad. I did see the Attic several years back and from what I remembered it was okay.

And ok it is! Not great mind you, nor unsatisfactory, but simply good. Nothing like a jolt of mediocrity to kickstart the festivities.

The Attic centers around socially awkward, sometime suicidal librarian Louise and her toxic relationship with her belittling , wheelchair-bound prick of a father. Since the mysterious disappearance of her fiancée on their wedding day 19 years ago, Louise has waited on Daddy Dickhead hand and foot. Pops constantly reminds her that she is a walking disappointment and not even half the woman her deceased mother was. The secret of this hate/hate relationship can be found in (wait for it…) the attic! I am obliged to mention that Louise buys a monkey (for reasons which are still unclear to me) who spices up the movie like only a monkey can.

Overall you have a mildly enjoyable and well acted if somewhat slow-paced story. The overly dramatic music (a la Incredible Hulk TV show) can be a little much at times but you could do much worse than give the Attic a friendly October spin. Lord knows I have.

And by the way, even the monkey was almost certainly able to predict the ending about seven minutes in…

12 comments:

Johnny Sweatpants said...

By the way Octopunk - you made me a contributor to the'Thon Score blog ('bout frickin' time) but not an administrator so I can't make any changes. Whaddup widdat?

Landshark said...

"like only a monkey can...."

Don't we know it. Friends never recovered from killing off Ross' pet monkey in season one. Wee-mo-way, wee-mo-way...

JPX said...

I informed Octo of the same thing and he's been strangely quiet about it.

JPX said...

I thought Ross eventually found his monkey in a later season acting in a film?

JPX said...

Nice review, JSP. Even I predicted the ending 3 sentences into your review> I mean, you're not going to find the missing fiance in the basement...

Octopunk said...

Whoops! Sorry guys! I just fixed it.

I just checked my email and I don't see JPX mentioning my oversight at all. He was probably about to and then started meditating on the inevitable mediocrity of everything...

Great review, Johnny! Yours always make me smile. If I was taking care of a wheelchair-bound jerk, they'd learn to be nice to me quickly. Step one would be the game "buckets," involving buckets of ice-cold water.

Johnny Sweatpants said...

Octo, you'll make a great elderly Japanese torturer a la Living Hell someday. And thanks for the compliment and the admin priveleges!

Whirlygirl said...

You're review made me laugh out loud, and because there's a librarain in it I'll certainly have to watch it.

DKC said...

"like only a monkey can..." is second only to the mediocrity quote from JPX. Which I mistakenly credited to Landshark.

Anyhoots - great review!

Julie said...

"who spices up the movie like only a monkey can"

I guess this made us all chuckle. I had to really hold it in so I didn't wake up Z! Nice review.

miko564 said...

Ah, monkeys. Monkeys and penguins make everything better. I want a monkey riding a penguin at my funeral...two minutes in nobody would even care I was dead.

Nice start JSP.

Catfreeek said...

I wanna watch it just because of the monkey.

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