Brett Piper is the man responsible for one of my favorite crapfests, "A Nymphoid Barbarian In Dinosaur Hell". The reason I love that movie so much is because it's so bad you have to do a double-take to be sure you just saw it. Actually, I have seen that way more than two times, and that's not something I do if I hate a movie. It packs the charm of a chinaman (whatever that means). But that movie is old news, it's from 1990! So now I have watched Brett Piper anno 2009-ish and I can assure you that it's a lot more entertaining and solid overall, but still features the best of his old ways.
Starting off showing an unaired TV show about mythical creatures, and quickly revealing it all to be fake and staged, we're soon introduced to another TV crew that are hired to make a new show about the same creature - the Muckman. They're sent out to the woods to live in a cabin, and the hostess of the show has made sure that they will catch something on tape by faking it. As you would expect from any monster movie with similar plot lines, the real monster is out there and will be introduced, eventually! Mr. Piper and Mr. Polonia - you're in the clear, no one went into this hoping for a perfect plot scattered with originality. That we know these things from miles away doesn't hurt the movie one bit.
What "A Nymphoid Barbarian In Dinosaur Hell" (I keep coming back to this one) lacked was entertainment values other than the dinosaurs, and comedy. Luckily "Muckman" packs a crapload of fun, quirky moments that will either have you laughing or face-palming yourself delightfully. Some characters are introduced simply to make it more fun - I'm talking to you, inbred redneck brothers! Because the movie was written in such a unique manner by having Brett Piper and Mark Polonia write two different screenplays and then mashing them together, the comedy is very varied and that's a great quality for a movie like this to have as it keeps us from getting bored with it.
I'm very surprised to say that the film definitely lacks in terms of body count, but it's proof that the movie was entertaining when I never once stopped and wondered "Why aren't people dying?" during the actual movie. I was entertained even when the Muckman wasn't on screen, and especially enjoyed the Asia Buchanan character. But the real star isn't A.J. Khan, or even the very cute and clearly talented Alison Whitney. Not even Muckman is the star. Nope, the star of this film, the one thing that made me go "Hell yeah", was... Wait for it.. Pipermation! Yes, Brett Piper's stop-motion animation effects are introduced late in the movie, but holy hell what a joy it was! I would've wanted to see way more of it, though, but since I hadn't expected any big monsters in the one I was thrilled. It's one of those things that will make any Brett Piper movie worth watching. As long as his stop-motion is in there, it'll be fun in one way or another.
This review of "Muckman" might be surprisingly positive, but it is a flawed movie. You just have to understand what kind of movie you are going into with this one. It's a stupid movie and not once does it excuse itself, or ridicule itself, which is exactly why it entertains me. It's an honest film by people doing what they love, and what they love is cheap, fun creature films of yesteryear. My biggest issue with the film has to be the ending, which seems a bit weird. Maybe it was their way of doing something differently, and it doesn't really change what I thought of the film overall, but it ends a bit too quickly. If you love your monsters in suits and stop-motion rather than CGI, then "Muckman" might actually be for you. It's way more entertaining than any other film released by Chemical Burn, and very likely more entertaining than you expect it to be as well. More reviews can be found at FilmBizarro.com
