Scott LeBrun Here's something to check out if you're sick of blander, more traditional Yuletide season fare. Scott MacDonald ("Fire in the Sky", "Jarhead") plays the title character, a prolific serial killer who finally gets caught, and tried. He's on his way to his execution when a traffic accident causes him to be doused with a cutting edge chemical. Then, when he lands in the snow, it allows him to be reborn as a killer snowman. A killer snowman with a horrible one-liner for just about any occasion. In his new incarnation, Jack slaughters the unlucky people of the town of Snomonton, with a bumbling sheriff (Chris Allport, "Dead & Buried", "To Live and Die in L.A.") as his nemesis.Written and directed by Michael Cooney, this is the kind of self-conscious cheese that cheerfully lets you know early on that you are NOT supposed to take it seriously. Cooney and company are clearly having quite a bit of fun with their patently ridiculous premise (which got recycled for a family audience a year later with the same named Michael Keaton vehicle). It's amusing to see blow dryers utilized as weapons against Jack, and what the ultimate means of slaying the beast turns out to be, but the biggest laugh of all comes from seeing snowman-Jack behind the wheel of a car. If your tastes are extremely twisted, you may be amused to witness the fate of a pre-"American Pie" Shannon Elizabeth (in her second feature credit). Once Jack is reincarnated as the snowman, his dialogue starts to consist almost exclusively of those howlingly lame quips. "Gosh, I only axed you for a smoke!" The special effects are primitive, and there's not a ton of gore, but comedy and horror fans will likely still be quite entertained by the killings.Some of the cast plays it appropriately straight; the late, handsome character actor Allport keeps his poker face on throughout. Stephen Mendel ("Scanner Cop II", 'Night Heat'), F. William Parker ("Revenge of the Nerds", "Lost Highway"), Rob LaBelle ('First Wave', "Watchmen"), and Kelly Jean Peters ("Little Big Man", "Pocket Money") are among the co-stars.Overall, this is good fun for people ready to embrace some utter silliness when it comes to their entertainment. It's paced pretty well, and leads to a reasonably rousing finale.Followed by a sequel.Seven out of 10.

breakdownthatfilm-blogspot-com Ever since slasher flicks became popular with the release of films like John Carpenter's Halloween (1978), many films have been produced that have been influenced from ones of the past. But then there came another wave of slasher films that occurred during the holiday season. The one's that viewers thought that no one would ever desecrate. This movie is apart of that family and it was released at a peculiar time as well. The title is the exact same as the Michael Keaton family holiday film a year later. However, this is the exact opposite of a family film.This horror slasher film is about a serial killer named Jack Frost who is caught by a town sheriff and sent off to death row where his transport crashes into a chemical truck. The chemicals are then absorbed by Frost and his surroundings (the snow) and become a mutant killer snowman, ergo his moniker. Is this the least bit scary? If you don't like evil looking snowmen I guess. Its genre is in horror but there truly isn't anything to be terrified of. Unfortunately, the film suffers from an over the top villain and too much campiness. I feel like director/writer Michael Cooney had intended this but think about it, who could take a killer snowman seriously? And Cooney has made better works, Identity (2003) is his best.However, this isn't to say that the villain isn't good. The actor who is originally on screen and then voices his evil counterpart, Scott MacDonald, is enjoyable as the antagonist. MacDonald's voice is dark, gruff and can sound very sinister and it makes that much more enjoyable when it comes out of an evil snowman. Sad to say, this is the only redeeming character of the cast. Christopher Allport as the troubled sheriff takes second place, but after him is hard to tell. The rest of the characters are so flat in dimension that it will be difficult for the viewers to feel anything for them.The violence and gore would also be more appreciated if it wasn't so quickly edited. That's not to say it was bad, and I understand the budget was low, but some of the kills were off screen and only the aftermath was shown which will disappoint the gore hounds. Also, the continuity isn't great - sometimes even the sounds are not properly aligned with the movements of the characters. For shame. The music on the other hand was good. Chris Anderson and Carl Schurtz produced a well-rounded creepy Christmas score that at least helped make this horror slasher film feel a bit better than its other average production elements. It's an OK film, just don't expect any bit of brilliance.The slasher version of Michael Keaton's family friendly film is fun trash thanks to the actor playing the villain, some good violence and appropriate music. Everything else however could have been improved upon greatly.

MRDA A straight-to-video release, this tale of a reincarnated death row inmate turns up the trash, and, with it, the laughs. People die in comically calamitous way, prompting some of the most hilarious support cast underreactions committed to home video ("I didn't do it!"). Our eponymous villain protagonist signs off each of his kills with an appropriately punny line, and the townsfolk he terrorises run and scurry around in half-clued-up Mystery Inc. fashion. One infamous scene, featuring American Pie eye candy Shannon Elizabeth, may just be THE most inappropriately side-splitting sequence of rape-and-murder committed to camera.If you're watching this, try not to take anything seriously - it's readily apparent none of the cast and crew did! Loud, dumb, brainless fun.

Sandcooler Not to be mixed up with the family film of the same name (though that would be friggin' hilarious), this earlier "Jack Frost" is actually a goofy offbeat B-movie parody. Everything is present to give you a fantastic evening filled with pointing and laughing. The plot is insanely moronic, so moronic that it needs a buttload of deus ex machina just to get on the rails. The acting is also terrible, and I'm not sure whether the actors are doing it on purpose on not. Scott Macdonald's over-acting is clearly intentional, but all the other actors probably can't do any better than this. You know you're doing something wrong when Shannon Elizabeth (who, granted, looks totally hot in this one) is among your best performers. The greatest source of entertainment are the one-liners though. Many filmmakers believe in the age-old "quality over quantity"-idea, but Michael Cooney wants none of that and just has Jack Frost firing wisecracks with every chance he gets. Some of these are funny ("I only axed you for a cigarette!"), some fall flat (pretty much all the other ones), but it gives the Jack Frost character sort of a Freddie Krueger-like quality that is really fitting here. "Jack Frost" is an awful movie, but somehow I just can't grade it accordingly.