It's hardly Halloween without a killer clown movie, is it? This is a fairly slight import from Ireland but what it lacks in originality it makes up for in sheer gore. Young Tommy's (Tommy Knight) 10th birthday ends in tragedy when the hired clown, Stitches (Ross Noble), falls face first onto a kitchen knife. Unsurprisingly, Tommy is turned off the idea of birthday parties in general and doesn't have another until he is about to turn 16. It seems like it's going well until Stitches returns from the grave to murder all the children that contributed to his death.
Like I said, the clown-returning-from-the-dead thing isn't a new concept but I will give this movie credit for delving a bit deeper into clown lore, including the eggs painted with their faces and the traditional clown funeral, both of which have a role in the proceedings. Clowns are much maligned as performers but they do have an incredibly rich history that so often gets ignored.
It's a low-budget, low-key affair with mostly practical effects for the blood and gore. The cast of teens actually look like teenagers and it's filled with the kinds of jokes that teens would find funny, like turning someone's intestines into a balloon dog. A little low-brow for me but one takes what one can get with a killer clown movie.
I doubt this is going to spontaneously cure any sufferers of coulrophobia (that's fancy-talk for fear of clowns) but it's much more in line with Killer Klowns from Outer Space as far as the actual scare factor and would make for a pretty fun double feature with the right crowd.
Pumpkin rating: 3.3/5
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