Frightmare (1983) – This Troma Team Release was one of legendary horror actor Jeffrey Combs first films.  I’ve been trying to see every horror film Jeffrey Combs has been in and Netflix instant streaming came to the rescue on this one. 

Frightmare centers around Conrad Radzoff, an invented horror movie legend perfectly played by actor Ferdy Mayne.  Radzoff has a commanding presence, but he’s not the nicest guy.  The old actor passes away and is kept in a mausoleum turned shrine complete with large TV screen inside and flashing neon lights on the outside.  A group of film students who are huge fans of Radzoff break into the mausoleum and steal his body.  Why?  They just want to have a memorable evening with the film legend.  The students sit Radzoff’s corpse at the dinner table with them while they eat, they dance with him, take photographs with him, one girl even lovingly kisses him on the mouth.  In the meantime, the police are looking for the missing body and Radzoff’s widow is freaking out.  In hopes of locating the missing body she has a psychic communicate to Radzoff from beyond the grave.   Up to this point the film has a pretty interesting storyline, I mean I didn’t really care a lot about any of the characters other than Radzoff but it was still keeping my interest.  The film then became a teeny bit sluggish.  Radzoff comes back from the grave for revenge and obliterates the students one by one.  The kills are not very gory, bloody, or terribly original.  My personal favorite involved a coffin floating through the air chasing a girl.   The ending of any horror film is huge for me, and I really liked how Frightmare ended.

“He was terrifying in life, but even more so in death.”

Overall, Frightmare is for B movie for horror fans who have not lost their sense of humor.  It’s also cool to see a very young Jeffrey Combs, even though his role was pretty small.

Check out these other Troma films!

The Children

Hellblock 13