Creepshow 2 4K UHD
directed by Michael Gornick
starring George Kennedy, Lois Chiles, Holt McCallany
Arrow Video
In 1982, two titans of terror, Stephen King and George Romero, joined forces to create a tribute to the E.C. horror comics that so influenced them in their youths. The result of this collaboration was Creepshow (1982), a brilliant mix of horror and humor across five short-lived stories shot like a comic book come to life. The success of the film demanded a sequel, and in 1987, Creepshow 2 hit theater screens. Clocking in at a half-hour shorter than the original and with Romero disciple Michael Gornick taking over the director’s chair, Creepshow 2 delivers a trio of comedy-laced horror tales.
First up is “Old Chief Wood’nhead,” where the elderly proprietors of a desert town’s general store (George Kennedy and Dorothy Lamour) are robbed and murdered for a cache of Native American jewelry (given by the local tribe as collateral for their debts) by a trio of hoodlums led by an impossibly young Holt McCallany (Mindhunter). The store’s cigar store Indian comes to life and takes vengeance on the thieves, then returns the treasure to the rightful owners.
The Raft is adapted from a short story in Stephen King’s collection, Skeleton Crew (1985). This is the segment of the film that everyone remembers. Four obnoxious college kids head out to a deserted lake that features a large wooden raft perfect for sunbathing and smoking weed. Soon though, the two couples notice a strange amorphous shape in the water that attacks and kills anyone who gets near, trapping them on the raft with no hope of rescue. The terror of being trapped with salvation just a few yards away is far more primal and terrifying than the actual monster that mostly resembles aggressive seaweed.
The final segment The Hitch-Hiker, travels through familiar tropes where a woman one her way home from an adulterous rendezvous is haunted by the hitchhiker she accidentally kills on a dark highway. The problem for her is two-fold. One, how does she explain to her domineering husband where she’s been, and two, how did her Mercedes-Benz get banged up? Turns out her husband is the least of her worries, as the hitchhiker won’t stay dead no matter how many times she runs him down with her car. The entire thing is heightened to near farce level by Lois Chiles’ (Moonraker, 1979) delightfully manic and unhinged performance as she loses the last threads of her sanity.
Creepshow 2 is very much a film of its time, when horror was seen as somehow inherently humorous. The mix of sophomoric humor and grisly violence certainly lends to fun party viewing and endless rewatches in whole or part on cable TV.
What the film really lacks is the verve of Stephen King and George Romero. They were both involved in the project, but Romero as the screenwriter is nowhere near the writer Stephen King is, and Michael Gornick is hardly a visionary director. Where the first film played like a comic book come to life, the sequel is far more conventional-looking, like any typical horror film from the late 1980s. What the stories all lack is a strong ironic twist, which was a defining trait of the horror comics that inspired the film.
Creepshow fans buckle up, because your pals at Arrow Video are giving you an amazing limited edition 4K UHD of Creepshow 2 that not only boasts a striking 4K transfer of the film from the original camera negative, but includes a ton of creepy extras, including director’s commentary, interviews with George Romero and special effect master Tom Savini, a comic adaptation of the unfilmed story segment “Pinfall,” and much more for fans to sink their teeth into.
