Day Of Reckoning

It’s 1984. You’ve just rolled in from the pub with a four pack and a pizza. While the beer is warming and the pizza is cooling, you lazily scroll through the channels. All four of them. Finally, you hit pay dirt with a made-for-TV monster movie. The CGI is ropey. You’ve seen better in Ghostbusters. And the hero (Jackson Hurst) seems to be the love child of Michael Biehn and Arnold Schwarzenegger. But, what the hell? There are times when you’re in the mood for bit of schlock and Day Of Reckoning has just the right level of cheese.

In fact, as the film rolls on, you’re really starting to enjoy it.

Through the beer haze, you figure the plot goes something like this. Fifteen years ago, during an eclipse, demons poured from the bowls of the Earth, reducing everything in their path to bloody smears and brick dust. Ever since, the world has stood ready for round two – and today’s the day. Our heroes – including the inevitable feuding exes and lovelorn teens – head for Uncle Ted’s desert bunker to wait out the storm. However Ted has visitors, in the shape of a twitchy squaddie with end of the world issues. As the group wait for the demons to break through their defences, tensions rise and tempers begin the flare.

Ok. So maybe there’s nothing new here. Maybe the pacing sucks. Maybe the CGI really is shocking. But it’s 1984. Thirty years from now you’re going to be hunting this down on video and putting it in your collection right next to Monster Dog and Troll 2. Because sometimes a film doesn’t have to do anything more than it says on the tin. Because sometimes, just sometimes, you need an old school beer and pizza monster movie.