THE EVIL CLERGYMAN (1987)
We're smack dab in the middle of my Full Moon Five experiment. I knew I'd be employing a Blood Capsule amid this muddle, so I saw this as an opportunity to bonk one of the few short films on Full Moon Streaming (once again, I'm not being grease-palmed by the Band dynasty). Hopefully, you know the story behind Pulse Pounders, an anthology produced by Empire Pictures just as Empire Pictures was splintering. It was ultimately lost for 26 years until the workprint was found. Isn't it fucking enchanting how Charles Band manages to find stuff? Aw, I believed him. This time. Anyway, The Evil Clergyman is a vignette nicked from Pulse Pounders. Because for whatever reason, the whole assemblage couldn't be released as a conjunctive state of affairs.
That's dry information. What you need to know is that this 28-minute segment of Lovecraft-based (that's right, daddy-o) horror is startlingly good. It kicked my wheelchair's nugget! Fuck a synopsis. It has a plot, but the less you know, the better. Besides, the title is self-explanatory. The cast is iniminiminiminimitable. Jeffrey Combs, Barbara Crampton, David Warner, David Gale...I nearly spurted typing their names. Man, what do I say about The Evil Clergyman without spoiling the best shit? It's packed with twisted ideas, Richard Band's score is hauntingly serene and Crampton, well, she is at her absolute creamiest. My. God. Yes, that's a bovine, insolent comment to include, but I did notice her incredible performance. So there.
Let's say Pulse Pounders hit shelves on schedule in the late 80's. Granted, its insertion into an anthology would have clouded its visibility, but I believe that The Evil Clergyman would be seen as a cult classic in 2016. It's too rad.
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