phancy.com - horror reviews - MOH 2021
Psycho Goreman
IMDb Info
Release Year: 2020
Runtime: 1h 35min
Country: Canada
Language: English
Genre Tags: Comedy, Horror, Sci-Fi
Plot Summary: After unearthing a gem that controls an evil monster looking to destroy the Universe, a young girl and her brother use it to make him do their bidding.
Poster - Title Card
phancy.com rating:
phancy.com notes: This seems like it would be my jam, but it was not. It started out well enough, but then every joke overstayed its welcome. I also don't understand why some people think obnoxious characters are entertaining. Sure, they can get a few laughs, but who wants 90 minutes of that behavior? Kudos for the fun rubber suits and practical effects, but there's not enough personality behind the writing for this to work as a loving homage, an ironic commentary, or whatever combo of the two it was aiming for.
Outside Reviews:
Simon Abrams
1.5 out of 4 stars -
rogerebert.com
I have to admit, I'm mostly disappointed by Psycho Goreman because everything in it is up proverbial alley, from the critique of action-figure-friendly superheroism to the nuclear family gone ballistic power dynamic of Luke and Mimi's family. I just wish that the movie was either funnier and/or more focused on a scene-to-scene or joke-for-joke level. There's some funny ideas here, like when the kids' dad Greg (Adam Brooks) receives a pestering, urgent psychic distress call from PG while Greg tries to use the toilet. But the execution of this gag is so characteristically flat and uninvolving that I often wondered what the point of this genre exercise was, apart from being the cinematic equivalent of a geeky mood board. I theoretically understand the appeal of Psycho Goreman - I just didn't see it on-screen.
Owen Gleiberman
A Cleverly Schlocky Evil-Alien-Out-of-Water Comedy That's Like Marvel Meets Troma
Psycho Goreman could have used more storytelling verve, and at times it's a distended one-joke movie, but it's peppered with funny bits, like the fact that PG can't remember Luke's name simply because the kid is so bland, or the totally gross way he'll provide one of his foes with "a warrior's death." The gross-out factor lends Psycho Goreman its note of midnight-movie depravity. Yet Kostanski, as a director, isn't just a schlock hound. On Gigax, he offers up a witty sendup of Jedi High Council fussiness, and the whole movie serves to take the hot air out of what blockbuster sci-fi has become: villains with robotized voices threatening to end the world in an endless rerun of inflated nothingness.