Saturday, January 23, 2021

Shock 'em Dead (1991)

Geeky Martin works in a pizza shop and loves to play guitar.  When he gets a call from a kid offering him an audition with a band who has a showcase the next day, Martin quits his job to go to the audition.  Sadly Martin's guitar playing is just as good as everything else in his life - which is terrible.

After being roundly humiliated by the flouncing lead singer of the Spastic Colons, Martin runs into the local crazy voodoo lady, (who walks as if she's desperately trying to get to a toilet without pooping her pants.) The woman tells him he can have everything he desires, and he says he wants to be the biggest rock star in the world.  Easy, she says, he just needs to sell his soul to Satan.  Martin seems unconcerned about this aspect, although she neglects to mention it involves a stab in the heart.

After a surreal dream in which he wears a stupid hairy mask and meets a demon playing a double neck guitar, Martin wakes up with a big hairdo in a swanky pad with three women who attend to his needs. No one shall ask why Martins chosen path to rock stardom is to audition again for the same band that dissed him and is still practicing in the basement. Perhaps Martin should have aimed higher.

Now calling himself Angel Martin, he manages to take over the band during a showcase by knocking pain in the ass, lead singer Johnny off the stage.  The audience loves it and the record executives want them on the label.  Things are looking up, except that Martin won't be happy unless he gets his bass players fiancé played by Tracy Lords, who is the least sleazy character in the film.

Another unmentioned part of his deal with the devil, is that he can't eat or drink anything because it will kill him.   He can only eat souls.  Not sure why the devil is giving up souls, but there you go. The lesson of this film is never make a deal with the devil because it's a hassle trying to figure out what to do with the dead bodies of your soulless victims.


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