Rawhead Rex
Howard Hallenbeck (David Dukes) and his wife Elaine (Kelly Piper) take their two children on a vacation to Ireland to learn about their Irish heritage and roots. Little do they know that a construction worker has unexpectedly awakened an ancient evil. And no one in this small Irish village is safe!
Despite being on vacation, Howard is working on a new book and has been given permission to do
research at the local church. But he finds that Father Declan O'Brien (Ronan Wilmot) is not very friendly Luckily Reverend Coot (Niall Toibin) is friendlier
Strange things are happening in the village, and people are dying at the hands of a strange creature. If something isn't done about this thing, the death toll is only going to rise!
I'll be honest - this is an odd film. Evil priest and clueless villagers and of course the American tourists who end up in the thick of things! The father is played by David Dukes, and I recognized him immediately from an old episode of All in the Family. A rather disturbing episode I'll admit. One of the priests will be familiar to anyone who watches Ballykissangel, he plays Father Mac.
The creature in question who is causing all the havoc (I had to look this up as I wasn't sure and I just watched it) is a demon (or maybe the devil himself, not sure) who was accidentally freed from his burial site. The unpleasant comes under his control via something at the church. The creature is odd, to say the least, having what seemed to me an almost robotic face with glowing eyes that people were upset by (like the rest of him wasn't a reason to run away in fright).
The wife of David Dukes' character made me want to call CPS on her. There was a scene when the family was in the car, and they had like a half day's drive ahead of them. The little girl said she had to use the bathroom. It was too far to go back and they were too far from their destination, so Dad pulled over, near some kind of gates area, although the gate had seen better days. The mother turned around and told the girl to go on and do her business, but never offered to go with her. When the father suggested that, the mother said the girl would be fine. The girl was like 5 ot 6 years old maybe! So finally, Dad agreed to go with her. In another scene, when the siblings were arguing, she walked right past them as if she couldn't see or hear them, and then started whining to her husband about being bored.
That aside, this is a weird film, and I never understood how that creature was a demon (or the devil? still not sure). And why was he wearing pants? There is a certain amount of gore, so I wouldn't recommend this for kids. The mad priest is a bit too mad. David Dukes was fine and so was Niall Tobin. But on the whole, I don't recommend it very highly. I'll give this film 2 Stars.
