Review of Jack Brooks: Monster Slayer (2007) by James C — 15 Jun 2010

Take an episode of Buffy, replace the wisecracking heroine with an unkempt plumber with a rage problem, drag the story to feature length with a few boring psychotherapy and plumbing scenes, and you get "Jack Brooks, Monster Slayer.".

The film is not totally incompetent. The camerawork and photography are above average for a comedy-horror B-movie, and the special effects are very decent, especially if you want to see Robert Englund morph about half-way into Jabba the Hut (the result being a cross between Fizzgig and Marjorie the Trash-Heap, with tentacles added.).

But the problem is with the hero. How are we supposed to like or even root for a main character whose sole defining characteristic is his anger management problem? A hero, moreover, who only accepts his vocation and becomes the long-awaited "monster slayer" only about fifteen minutes before the end of the film? (until then, he's just "Jack Brooks, volatile plumber and evening classes student"...).

If you really want to see a slimy splatterfest, I'd recommend "Slither" are a superior film. And if you want to see teachers turn into monsters, even "The Faculty" is better. Apart from the slapstick and an atmospheric flashback, there is not much to enjoy in "Jack Brooks".

The film contains numerous instances of profanity (virtually all of them uttered by the protagonist in one of his fits of rage), drug references, gross-out moments (involving vomit and a blackboard) and some intense violence.