Couch slouch Anton Tobias seems content to waste his time doing nothing but channel surfing and smoking weed. His plans for laziness are interrupted by one tiny problem though: his right hand becomes possessed and begins to go on a killing spree. First, his parents meet a grizzly demise while attempting to go to sleep. Next, his fellow marijuana enthusiasts and confidants Mick and Pnub are horribly butchered, even after trying their damnedest to restrain the rogue body part. Feeling hopeless, Anton does his best to keep this evil obstacle under control, especially since he's just getting around to pursuing and talking to Molly, the girl of his dreams who happens to be his next door neighbor.
With all due respect to the recently-deceased pioneer that was Wes Craven, Scream may have hurt horror just as much as it helped it. Well, at least in the latter half of the 1990s. Waves upon waves of new, tepid slasher pictures came out that seemed to not only miss the point that Craven's film was not just meant to be another entry in the "dead teenagers" genre, but also a satirical/meta take on scary movies as a whole. Which is why I think that it's a shame that something as amusing as 1999's stoner-horror-comedy Idle Hands did as poorly as it did.
For starters, Devon Sawa (Final Destination, SLC Punk!) seems to be having a ball with his portrayal of the incredibly awkward, yet relatable Anton. I found him to be eerily reminiscent and similar to people that I've known for a good chunk of my life, be they friends or just mere acquaintances. Sure, he's a slacker. And yeah, I didn't ever see guys like him snagging women as attractive as Jessica Alba (Sin City, Fantastic Four), but the same could be said for flawed protagonists such as Rupert Everett in Cemetery Man, who I'm convinced Sawa was trying to channel for some of the more macabre coverups he has to do, though by way of the over-the-top antics of Bruce Campbell in Evil Dead II. But by god, you still want to root for him. Seth Green (Ticks, Family Guy) and Elden Henderson (Daredevil, The Mighty Ducks) play his equally-lethargic best buds (pun possibly intended), and attempt their best to channel a bit of David Naughton from An American Werewolf In London by playing the victims who just won't stay dead, though in this case it's just because they think that heaven will be a bit on the boring side. A good half of the jokes they spout don't necessarily work, but I'd say that was more due to it being a product of that time rather than due to weak parts in the script.
Despite all of that, the film isn't exactly a masterpiece by any stretch of the imagination. In fact, it's got a lot of little issues that seem like they could have been fixed with just a quick scene rewrite. The problem of Mr. and Mrs. Tobias' murder is just kind of ignored after their son's initial freakout and discovery, and judging by the lack of so few other adults in their world, you would think that it's perfectly normal for older people to just not have any friends other than themselves. There's also the supporting character of Randy, a nearby resident metalhead who apparently knows everything there is to know about satan and the occult, yet seems to listen to nothing but Motley Crue's "Shout At The Devil" every time that he appears on screen. Maybe it's just the nitpicker in me, but why not something a little more fitting? Perhaps a black metal band like Mayhem, or a death metal band like Deicide? Eh, I guess you need something more easy to digest for those who want to buy a compilation of the songs featured in the film. Vivica A. Fox (Indepence Day, Kill Bill) also shows up as a rather dumb deus ex machina, but thankfully she's only in the flick for approximately a combined ten minutes.
After Idle Hands wrapped up, I found myself wondering if it would have done better business-wise during this new decade. Then again, unless your motion picture was named The Blair Witch Project, the chances of your product being lost in a sea of mediocrity were quite high. If you dismissed something like Idle Hands as just another dumb teenager film that would appeal to a crowd that most likely dissipates once the decade was over, you may want to give this one a shot. There's a good chance that you'll find some amusement in its underrated and well done makeup, fun story, homages to classic scary movies of yesteryear, and characters that you may swear that you know in real life. Oh, and it contains one of the most distinctive soundtracks of its era that I've seen in a very long time, including a cameo from ex-punk band The Offspring. If none of those appeal to you, one still gets to see a very young Jessica Alba look quite fetching dressed as an angel for a Halloween dance.
Tomorrow, the 90s are over. Thank god. Now it's time to move onward to the new millennium and....watch a movie that's set during the 1920s.
Dafuq?
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