Teenage Exorcist (1991)

Trailer:

*Spoilers Throughout*

What’s It About: A young grad student rents a home that has a demon in the basement and is quickly possessed. After a failed exorcism by a Catholic priest, he attempts to call a higher authority for help but mistakingly calls a local pizzeria. The delivery boy is Eddie Deezen. Based on a true story.

Here are some of my observations as I watched the film:

• Film opens with a stereotypical Latina maid entering this nice house and saying “¡Hola!” And all I’m thinking is Consuela from Family Guy.
• Eddie Deezen in Teenage Exorcist! It took many years of playing second-tier dweebs, dorks, nerds and geeks but finally Deezen is a top-billed star.
• This movie has a theme song and it’s spectacular!
• Michael Berryman! When I was younger, I always thought that he wore make-up or prosthetics in every movie he was in to look the way he did. But after the 3rd movie or so with him looking the same, I finally caught on that he’s just always odd-looking. 
• “Never look a gift horse in the mouth.” More like “Never look a Berryman right in the eye.”
• Diane’s talking to a framed photo. Diane’s already showing signs of being crazy.
• This is Diane, played by Brinke Stevens, Linda from Slumber Party Massacre. Brinke also wrote this screenplay. She was also wrote the screenplay for Dr. Horror’s Erotic House of Idiots.
• I’m 9 minutes in and already I’m regretting this film choice.
• I think I’ve seen this “boyfriend” fella in a porno sometime ago.

• She was just on the phone with Jeff, her boyfriend, and now she’s on the phone with her sister, Sally. That’s one way to give exposition into this lady’s back story is her explaining everything on the phone to other people.
• She tells this “joke:” A guy asks his doctor if its true that if you don’t drink, don’t smoke, and don’t fool around that you’ll live longer? And the doctor says ‘I don’t know, we’re still waiting for someone to try it!’ I literally had to stop the movie because I was laughing so hard.
• She’s slicing a head of lettuce and it’s “bleeding” for some reason. She’s so distracted by her phone call with Jeff that she doesn’t notice the blood and eats it anyway with no ill effect—she barely even notices a difference when she put in dressing. What was the point of that?
• Jeff’s on the phone again with Diane?! How much is this going to happen?
• A Ouija board right there already on the table. Diane just moved in that day. Freaky Deaky!
• Her milk turned black! But she didn’t drink it nor see it anyway. Again, what was the point?!
• I think I’m seeing bewbs but it’s just quick jump cuts.
• Now some old kook (probably a demon or something) is yelling that he’s going to live here forever and some electricity effect jumps into Diane’s mouth. I’m assuming that’s this farce of a flick’s way of saying she’s possessed now.
• First of all, why is Sally’s husband conducting business in their living room if he’s an important business man and second, why is his phone one of those antique princess phones with the curved mouth-piece?
• Diane is already spooked yet she goes down in the basement when she loses power. I have no sympathy.
• Plus wasn’t she already possessed? What’s the need for this one little spook scene of her in the basement?
• Diane has suddenly transformed into Julie Strain!

• I initially thought this was a movie about high school kids and demonic possession since the title was Teenage Exorcist but now I’m thinking that the only worthy exorcist in town just so happens to be young and Eddie Deezen. Hey, look they all can’t be winners!
• “I can cut a tomato, chop an avocado, slice some cheese and peel an onion’s skin.” Now I’m just getting hungry for guacamole.
• Sally goes into the kitchen to make some food and the vegetables are already on the counter top. I’m remembering that it’s close to midnight since she called her sister and husband to come over at 11:00.
• Jeff’s calling again. I sure hope Jeff never appears in the same room as Diane but is only shown on the phone.
• Jeff starts lewdly describing what he wants to do to Diane even though Sally’s husband answered the phone with a distinct “YeHel’low!” Jeff’s an idiot, despite him having a small Rodin’s “The Thinker” on his desk.
• Diane tries to kill Sally with a chainsaw in the backyard but the cord unplugs when she gets too far from the outlet. Sally’s husband, Mike, then cold-cocks her in the mush and knocks her out.
• “Well you know after you tried to seduce me and hack up Sally with a chainsaw, I had to slug you.” That was the only reason? I can think of some more.
• Sally’s tush is gratuitously shown as she goes in the shower. Why is she showering here in Diane’s house at this hour with her sister tied up and gagged after she tried to kill her?
• There was just a-“lower”-to-reach-something-and-Mike-lowers-his-voice-instead joke. What is going on here?!
• Sally is getting groped in the shower by demon hands. After she realizes it’s not her husband it goes away. There was a cut away shot to the drain just to show a rubber duckie. This movie is all over the place.

• “I have a feeling this is not the last gag we’re going to see tonight.”  ZING!
• Oh good Jeff’s here.
• Diane is tied to the bed but still in her sexy evening dress and pumps. I can understand the dress but why is she still wearing shoes?
• “She reminds me of Regan from the Exorcist.”
  “Reagan wasn’t in the Exorcist. He was in Bedtime For Bonzo.”
  SMH.
• So Sally and Mike allow Jeff to go see Diane alone, despite them never meeting him before and that Diane is very obviously possessed.
• Brian would be happy to know that Jeff played Paul in Hard Rock Nightmare!
• Is this movie trying to pass off ferrets as rats? Because thats what those animals are on the staircase no matter how much Sally says that they’re rats. Even if this is a joke it’s not funny.
• OK, this movie genuinely made me laugh. Sally is looking for Mike when she bumps into a zombie. She screams and scares the zombie.
• Diane tells the priest: “Your mother sews socks in Hell!”
• The priest says some exorcism rites and it turns Diane into a dog. That’s actually kinda funny. Then Sally says that her sister is “a total bitch.” This film has more corn in it than Iowa.
• Even though there’s been evidence of zombies in the basement, there’s also zombies approaching the house from the outside. I’m cool with it if you are.
• Father McFerrin tries to call a Monsignor Connolly but he fudges the phone number and calls a pizzeria who thinks he’s ordering cannoli. But he says they need help and the surfer pizza dude thinks he just needs food, takes down the address and says he’ll send “Eddie.”
• So after 54 minutes Deezen finally makes an appearance.

• Why is there a porn magazine in the kitchen drawer? I know it’s for a gag but c’mon, that’s juts over the top!
• Eddie Deezen is a national treasure. No doubt about it.
• Another laugh from me! The priest is trying to ward off the zombies outside and nearing defeat stops the zombies by asking “Is it anyone’s birthday today?” I don’t know why but that made me chuckle.
• I’m afraid to look up what Eddie Deezen’s age actually is when he made this movie. I’m guessing 36. (so close, 34)
• Seriously who thought that white ferrets being mistaken as rats would be funny to use more than once?
• The jokes are getting stale but at last Brinke Stevens is wearing a thong.
• So Diane’s possessed but there’s also a horned demon also in the basement. I thought that demon was the one who possessed her.
• The demon needs a virgin sacrifice and instead of getting Deezen she grabs her brother-in-law Mike and while he’s tied up, she dresses him up in a dress and puts make-up on him because the Demon also demanded a woman sacrifice. This movie isn’t even trying to be effectively funny at this point.
• Idiot Stevens thinks the heart is on the left breast.
• I’m getting grossed out by watching Eddie Deezen getting excited with a foot rub.
• CAT-FIGHT!!!!
• There’s also a fight between Diane and Sally.
• I just remembered that there was a Leslie Nielsen spoof in the early 90s called Repossessed about him playing an exorcist and he has to help a grown-up Linda Blair! I haven’t seen it since the 90s but I’m sure it’s way better than this.
• Jeff pulls the ‘ol pouring water on the floor and placing a cut wire on it to fry the demon, killing him.
• So that renders the title completely moot since Deezen did jack shit in the way of an exorcism. He didn’t even assist in defeating the demon, zombies or saving Diane! This is the worst case of blatant false advertising I’ve ever seen!

• “Bulgarian Head-cheese.” That would’ve made a better name of this movie.
• Here’s Berryman again playing a pizza chef. He also had zero reason to be in this. It’s not like a “special appearance by Michael Berryman” is going to drive the masses to check out this piece of shit.
• Speaking of Berryman, I’m looking at the movie poster and he has devil horns on implying that he’s a demon or something when he’s only in 4 minutes of the movie and isn’t a demon at all. AT ALL!
• Here’s the awesome theme song again though. Now I’m content. The title still means jack shit though.
• “Coming soon from Wald-Way Films: Sextalk” It’s too bad Eddie Deezen died shortly after making Teenage Exorcist to star in that too.
• I just looked it up. Walt-Way Films never made Sextalk. More lies!!!

Scare Level: Eddie Deezen still playing the archetypical nerd well into his late 30s is scary.

Gore Level: Tipper Gore!

Nudity Level: At least the movie has this going for it. The actress playing Diane’s sister, Sally shows her tushy and bewbs. And Brinke Stevens is wearing a scantily clad dominatrix outfit for the last third of this turd. So it’s not a total waste of ones’ time.

Best Line: I’m still embarrassed to say that I found the priest asking zombies if it’s anyone’s birthday today to stop them from attacking funny.

Best Scene: I’d have to really say the theme song. But honestly, there’s not much going for this flick in terms of “best.” Even when Deezen’s on screen they never really give him anything good or funny to say. 

Worst Scene: Eddie Deezen getting a foot rub and the film making it seem like he’s getting head and hearing Deezen in ecstasy. I went 38 years not knowing what that sounded like and I was cool with that.

Level of Hell: While not the worst “demonic” flick this month for me, it definitely is a terrible movie. This “horror-comedy” had some laughs but not enough for me to want to watch again.

Overall: What an oddity. To be honest, the whole first third is not played for laughs as the rest of the flick and I wasn’t sure what the tone was and it threw me off, hence my notes sounding like I was taking the movie more seriously than I should have. Sure, I knew it was a horror-comedy because Eddie Deezen stars in it but it was more of a dopey attempt at a spoof with some of the lamest jokes I ever witnessed. The screenplay felt like it was written by some high school adolescents that just happened to see The Exorcist and wanted to throw in my low-brow humor. But that’s neither here nor there because it’s a terrible movie anyway. Plus the fact that Eddie Deezen is only in it for maybe 20 minutes of screen time and he doesn’t do any “exorcism” stuff is insulting and disappointing. I mean, it’s really all my fault for picking this movie. It did have a decent theme song though.

Score: 3 Is This Month Over Yet? (out of 10)