Friday, September 29, 2017

Movie Review: "Killer Pinata" (2015)

Director: Stephen Tramontana
Year: 2015
Rating: R
Running Time: 1 hour, 27 minutes

A possessed piñata goes on a murdering spree to avenge the destruction of his fellow piñatas.

"Killer Piñata" is a micro-budget horror film directed by Stephen Tramontana. He also helped write the film along with Megan Macmanus and Nick Weeks. It stars Sheila Edmiston as Gwen Goodman, Lindsay Ashcroft as Rosetta Stone, Nate Bryan as Chad, and Billy Chengary as Scott. These four people make up a group of college-age students getting together at Gwen's parent's house. The guys hope a little sex and debauchery will follow. What they don't expect is that one of the leftover piñatas from Gwen's little brother's birthday party is awakened as a possessed killer piñata ready to take revenge against the humans who have been murdering its fellow piñatas. Oh yeah, you read that right!

If you see a movie called "Killer Piñata," you kind of know what you are getting yourself into when you sit down to watch it. There aren't any big-budget special effects to create a special demon creature. The antagonist is a literal piñata, one you can buy at any Party City, that is puppeteered by someone off-screen. Much of the time, only half of the piñata is in the frame, but that's honestly part of the charm of this flick. Those behind the scenes are very aware of how silly the concept is and they make reference to the fact throughout its runtime. The shopkeeper who is trying to stop the piñata has a hook for a hand for some reason and is often wearing a trench coat and a fabulous hat. Like we said, quirky. When the killer piñata sees its fellow piñatas being destroyed for fun by the evil humans, it's played like it's watching a friend being slowly beaten to death with a bat. The dialogue is extremely cheesy and filled with corny jokes. The piñata poops toxic candy and has the ability to control the bodies of its victims to some extent. Sure, it's all sort of dumb, but it is all sort of amazing as well.

If you need high production values and seasoned actors, you aren't going to find those things here and you should probably avoid "Killer Piñata." But, if you are like us and can appreciate a micro-budget film for what it is and have fun with a silly concept in spite of all its cheesiness, a movie so silly that it's inexplicably good, then you should definitely give this movie a chance to impress you. We watched it with friends and had an incredible time.


My Rating: 7/10
BigJ's Rating: 7/10
IMDB's Rating: ~5.7/10
Rotten Tomatoes Rating: ---%
Do we recommend this movie: Sure, why not?

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