This 'movie' is kind of two stories brought together by Ernest Borgnine telling his grandson a story. Basically, the film has an older film called, "The Devil's Gift" fused with newer scenes and is presented as a movie. The "Devil's Gift" portions of the film are at the very beginning of the movie as the film Borgnine's grandson is watching is from that film and the last portion of the film featuring the very early 80's household dealing with the cymbal thumping monkey toy which has me wondering if they took said story from a short story done by Stephen King that can be found within the short story collection, "Skeleton Crew" as both stories feature the same premise of an evil monkey toy. The rest of the film has Borgnine telling his grandson the story of some failed television show he once tried to write featuring Merlin, but the film just does not work at all for several reasons. First and foremost is the fact the Merlin shop thing just did not work. Both stories are more horror oriented than fantasy as both stories feature Satanic type vibes to them. Then there is the not so seamless blending of two different era films as the portions of the film featuring Merlin look vastly different to the one featuring the monkey toy. Just a huge mess, to be sure.
The story has the power going out in a house where a young boy watches the story of a woman using a Ouija board to contact a spirit from the other side. The boy's grandfather then proceeds to tell the child about Merlin and his mystical shop of wonders. We then enter Merlin's world where the first plot is that of an infertile couple where the husband writes reviews that have the ability shut stores like Merlin's down! Merlin gives him his spell book and the guy proceeds to get wrapped up in spells to summon demons and such while the wife plays with kangaroo toys because she so wants a baby. Then the story has Merlin's being robbed as the robber picks a cymbal banging toy monkey and seems fascinated by this very mundane toy in a shop full of numerous bizarre things. Well the toy ends up being given to a boy in the early 80's and it possesses the power to kill whenever it bangs its cymbals together. Merlin must track down the monkey, but it isn't going to be easy as he goes out in robe and beard asking women if they have seen his monkey. If that is not enough to make it difficult, he also has to contend with the fact the toy is in another era!
This 'movie' was featured as an episode of Mystery Science Theater 3000 and is the final new episode of the show that was presented of the Scifi channel. It was not technically the last episode as that was the one featuring Diabolic; however, do to some issues regarding the copyright this film would not debut till after the show's actual end. It was a great episode as there is a lot in it to riff. The strange fact the film seems like it wants to be whimsical, but is kind of dark and the fact that the portion of the film featuring the monkey is extremely dated are just two of the reasons this episode was very funny.
So, the film as presented here is rather bad. I would like to one day watch the movie, "The Devil's Gift" as I think that one might be interesting without the constant interruptions of a dude in a beard going around asking about his monkey. Granted, I do not think it is going to be a good film either, but the whole Merlin thing in this one was just a bit idiotic. One expects knights, swords and some magic when one hears Merlin's name. Here we get demons, satanic cats, killer monkeys and the like. It is less like Merlin and more like an episode of that old television show of the 80's, "Friday the 13th" where the show was about this group that had to retrieve cursed items, only that show was a heck of a lot better than this mess.
