‘How To Kill Monsters’ FrightFest 2023 Review: An Instant Cult Classic
David Gelmini
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After impressing horror fans with The Creature Below and Dread’s very own Book of Monsters, director Stewart Sparke has once again delivered a hugely entertaining creature feature called How to Kill Monsters, which just premiered at FrightFest. Although it was not a sequel, most of the cast of Book of Monsters returned for How to Kill Monsters, with writer Paul Butler also once again penning the script alongside Sparke. So it would be more accurate to describe How to Kill Monsters as a spiritual successor to Book of Monsters. With so many talented individuals involved, How to Kill Monsters has all the makings of an instant cult classic. Needless to say, I certainly do not regret backing the Kickstarter campaign.
The plot of How to Kill Monsters starts off where most monster movies would actually end, with the final girl managing to defeat all the monsters after all her friends are killed. We’re then shown what would happen to the lone survivor in a situation like this. At one point, the end credits even start to play across the screen when the heroine, Jamie (Lyndsey Craine), is taken into police custody at the beginning of the film. The police clearly believed that Jamie was responsible for the massacre, and they dismissed her explanations about otherworldly monsters killing her friends as nothing more than nonsensical ramblings.
Jamie is then booked into a police station, where all Hell literally starts to break loose after the officers examining the evidence from the scene of the attack unwillingly use an ancient spear to unleash swarms of otherworldly monsters across the building. What followed was an absolute orgy of non-stop gore, practical creature effects, and enough hilarity to keep you roaring with laughter from start to finish.
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As the monsters proceeded to slaughter most of the people within the station, Jamie was forced to team up with her fellow prisoners and the few surviving police officers in order to combat the threat. Unfortunately for her, this also means joining forces with a horny female prisoner named Big Jenny, a group of egocentric and drunk women who ruined their friend’s pre-wedding dinner, and two police officer brothers who refuse to take their job seriously. You could interpret the way in which Jenny and her mismatched group of survivors fought their way to safety as an analogy for how anyone can become a hero in times of crisis. Or you could just laugh at the way in which these clearly unheroic individuals were forced to resort to desperate measures in order to defeat the monsters they faced.
Each of the individual cast members also does everything they can to help elevate the production into something truly special, with the dedicated supporting cast including talented performers such as Fenfen Huang, Daniel Thrace, Arron Dennis, Juné Tiamatakorn, Rebecca-Clare Evans, and Johnny Vivash. Hellraiser actor Nicholas Vince also makes a hilarious appearance as a seemingly tough prisoner who comes to regret being released from his cell.
Some of the most memorable creatures featured in the film included a giant slug-like creature that gets high after consuming a cake laced with heroin, a pair of screeching miniature monstrosities that are clearly inspired by the titular beasts from Joe Dante’s Gremlins, and a colossal Lovecraftian creature which clearly resembles Cthulhu. Most of the creatures were brought to life with practical effects, so fans of old-school monster effects are in for a real treat.
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Similarly, the gore was also practical. CGI was used only sparingly, with effects such as the gigantic portal in the sky clearly being created digitally. And the infrequent CGI looked decidedly retro, as if created in the 1990s. Everything about How to Kill Monsters was clearly designed to look old-school. In an age where blockbuster films spend hundreds of millions of dollars on visual effects, it was certainly refreshing to watch something that dared to look as if it came from a bygone era before CGI completely took over.
How to Kill Monsters clearly aims to be as silly and over-the-top as possible, making it the perfect movie to enjoy with your friends along with a few boxes of pizza and more than a few cans of beer. If you happen to be in the mood for an unashamedly old-school monster movie with dedicated performances, tons of practical creatures and gore effects, and enough jokes to leave you in stitches, this really is not a film you can afford to miss.
Summary
How to Kill Monsters is a joyously retro and over-the-top monster movie, making it an instant cult classic.
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