Pumpkinhead: Blood Feud (2007)

Who says that movies can’t teach you anything? Pumpkinhead: Blood Feud is a veritable Encyclopedia Britannica of cultural insight. For instance, did you know that the Hatfield/McCoy family feud began not over a pig in the late 19th century, but over the running over of a Hatfield by a McCoy & the subsequent gypping of the Hatfield’s their due restitution? Me neither! I also didn’t know that people in the Deep South have the worst Southern accents ever!

We start the movie with a little prologue involving two guys on dirtbikes being chased by a red-tinted, grunting & snarling POV shot. Having not seen the previous installment of the Pumpkinhead series, I don’t know if this was one of those wrap-up-of-the-end-of-the-last-movie deals, a la some of the Halloween movies; it really doesn’t matter all that much in any case. Anyway, back to the action – the two guys are ripping their way through some woods in a desperate attempt to flee an irate POV shot. Motorcycle Guy One (MG1) makes his way through the trees without incident. Unfortunately for Motorcycle Guy Two (MG2), a log teleports its way onto the trail, causing him to endo & land on his back; the dirtbike, apparently made of nitroglycerine, explodes after ejecting its rider. The now poorly rendered CGI Pumpkinhead then lands near MG2 & proceeds to pull his head off. Upon seeing his cohort being viciously mauled by a killer POV, MG1 rides back to stave off the demonic collection of pixels & save his friend.

Nah, just kidding.

MG1 sees what’s happening &, despite MG2’s screams for help (before having his head removed, of course), hauls butt out of the woods to the house of the guy who requested the assistance of the demon. MG1 begs the guy to call off the demon, but is told that he can’t, that Pumpkinhead will keep killing until it finishes the job (that’s some real job loyalty, there). Upon learning this, Pumpkinhead bursts into the cabin & slashes MG1 across the chest, resulting in a variation of the Hero’s Battle Death Exemption (usually, this exemption means that the hero will be able to take about ten times the abuse that the other victims in the movie were able to withstand; in this case, MG1’s not really the ‘hero’, so much as a plot conveyance mechanism that must survive long enough to fill in the others later in the movie as to how to take out the monster before buying it himself – oops, hope I didn’t spoil anything for you!). MG1 takes a shot at his otherworldly assailant, finding this to be less than effective. What he does find effective, though, is shooting the guy who called up Pumpkinhead in the first place & in dispatching him, he also dispatches the demon. At this, Ed Harley (Lance Henriksen), the man who called upon Pumpkinhead in the first movie, shows up to tell MG1 that he’s basically screwed for the rest of eternity, that he’ll end up like Harley, unable to cross over to the afterlife. (Why this is, as MG1 didn’t call up Pumpkinhead, is unknown; I’ve not kept up on my Pumpkinhead lore, unfortunately.) MG1 looks away for a moment & then back to where Harley was standing, finding, instead, empty space. Aaaaand, fade to black…

We now find ourselves, five years after MG1’s encounter, outside of what looks to be the Boar’s Nest. Outside, a huge banner proclaiming the current festivities to be the McCoy Wedding (it just occurred to me – there’s only one name on the banner & this is taking place in some inbred section of the Deep South; you don’t suppose the reason for there only being one name on the sign is because the bride won’t be having to change her maiden name, if you catch my meaning, do you? Ewww!!!). Inside, the shindig is in full swing, complete with a jugband right out of the Country Bear Jamboree show at Disneyland. Pa McCoy looks over at his son, Ricky, sitting sullen & not out dancing. He’s worried that his boy might not be right in the orientation department. My initial thought was just that he didn’t think any of his sisters were purdy enough to dance with (maybe he’s a tooth man & none of them have enough for his liking). Right after thinking that, Ricky’s little sister, Sara, dressed like she shopped at Walton’s Mercantile, asks him why he’s not dancing, at which he offers to dance with her.

I then felt the sudden need for a shower.

She rebuffs him (wow, how sad is that?), saying that she asked him why he’s not dancing with a girl, by which she meant one not immediately related to him. Still sullen, he replies that he’s already spoken for & that even though his beloved wouldn’t know, nor probably care, if he danced with someone, he’d still know.

Three guesses as to the surname of his girlfriend…

Outside, a few drunken rednecks pull up, looking to start trouble. They’re greeted by someone who I initially thought was a bouncer of some sort, but instead ended up being Little John McCoy. A fight is averted when Jodie Hatfield gets in between the two parties & shoos off her intoxicated brothers. This goes over none too well with the Hatfield boys, who return with even greater numbers & crash the party. (Perhaps, if the McCoy’s hadn’t advertised when & where the wedding reception was taking place, this whole terrible thing – by which I mean this movie – could’ve been avoided.)

We then go to the Hatfield home, where we find the brothers a’whoopin’ & a’hollerin’ about their disruption of the party. It’s here that we meet sweet old Uncle Abner, relegated to spending his life in a wheelchair. It seems that, contrary to what I’d learned on the History Channel, the loss of Abner’s legs after being hit by a car driven by a McCoy, & the afore mentioned reneging on their agreement to turn the car over to the Hatfield’s as a form of restitution is what started the whole feud. According to Pa Hatfield, the McCoy’s owned the first ‘motorcar’ in town & drove around like they owned the place. Uncle Abner, only nine years old at the time, had the misfortune to become the town’s first speedbump when the McCoy Deathmobile came tearing through & hit him, cutting L’il Uncle Abner off at the knees.

Now, I want you to pay particular attention to that last paragraph, as we’ll be touching on it later.

Later that night, while everyone was sleeping, Jodie sneaks out of her room & down the stairs. Almost making her way out undetected, she’s startled when Uncle Abner comes rolling in. She begs him not to tell anyone about her sneaking out; he replies by asking her if she loves this boy, to which she answers, unequivocally, yes. He tells her to go on then, revealing that he, Uncle Abner, the one out of all of the Hatfield’s to be justifiably torque at the McCoy’s, doesn’t hold a grudge against them.

Oh, & five points to whomever can guess who Jodie’s beau is.

Jodie leaves &, just as we’re feeling all warm & fuzzy over Uncle Abner’s sense of forgiveness, Jodie’s brothers confront him about where she’s taken off to. They even threaten to bust up his wheelchair if he doesn’t tell them. The cads! Boo, I say! I say boo to you, sirs!

So, off to the woods, where we find Ricky & Sara running off to an apparent rendezvous, thankfully, we find, not with each other. No, Sara’s to act as lookout while Ricky & *gasp!* Jodie engage in some illicit tonsil hockey.

Bet you didn’t see that one coming!

Well, we all know that this scene of love in bloom can’t go on without some sort of tragedy befalling it, & befall it does, as Jodie’s idiot brothers come looking for her. First, they come upon Sara, who decided to set up her watchpost three miles from where Ricky & Jodie are making out. After nearly being raped by the brothers, Sara makes a run for it & probably wishes she’d set up camp a wee bit closer to her brother. She makes a few pitiful attempts at screaming, which Jodie hears. Ricky, of course, has other things on his mind & doesn’t notice it.

Back to Sara, who’s still trying to outrun her assailants. She ends up stumbling down a slope & inadvertently flings herself forehead-first into a tree. Exit Sara. The brothers find her &, without checking on her, leave to find their sister & that no good McCoy boy. Ricky & Jodie talking about running away, getting away from their families before they make them marry their cousins (Ugh! Shower time again!). Apparently, the Hillbilly Mafia has quite the reach, as Jodie can’t imagine a place where they could ever go & be safe from their families. Well, as it seems that none of these people have ever left Hooterville, I’m pretty sure that they could just go to the next county over & be safe, but, then, I’m not as cold & calculating as the Hillbilly Mafia. Anyway, their talking & making out session is interrupted by Jodie’s brothers, who don’t take kindly to seeing Ricky pawing their sister. They pull Jodie away & proceed to lay the smackdown on Ricky. When he comes to, he finds himself tied to the back of the Hatfield boys’ ’06 Chevy truck, just prior to them reenacting the scene from Raiders of the Lost Ark where Indy gets dragged behind the Nazi truck. This goes on for a little bit & then Ricky’s cut loose & left in the woods.

Pay close attention to the make & model of the truck. We’ll touch on that later, as well.

After being towed about half a mile behind the truck, as well as being dragged from wherever he & Jodie were getting’ it on, Ricky manages to stumble across Sara’s lifeless form. Grief stricken, he carries her to a secluded cabin in the middle of the woods. This, as anyone who’s seen any of the previous incarnations of the Pumpkinhead series will no doubt recognize, is the cabin where the witch who conjures up the demon lives. And anyone who’s seen any of the previous movies will also know where this is going. Ricky wants Pumpkinhead brought about to wreak vengeance against all of the Hatfield’s, except for Jodie, so that the two of them can be together. Before all of this, however, Ed Harley, whose curse is apparently to be a Jedi ghost for the rest of eternity, asks the witch not to do it, to spare the boy Harley’s fate. She replies that she can’t deny the boy his request, if it’s really what he wants to do.

She takes Ricky on inside, where Harley tries to talk Ricky out of going through with it. The witch (who, while having a face that looks like she spent an hour too long in a tanning bed, has surprisingly young looking hands – she must moisturize) then proceeds to ask him if he’s sure he wants to go through with the ritual, to which he replies “yes.” She asks him again if he’s really, really sure about this, to which he again replies “yes.” After again making sure he really, really, really wants to do this, she gets things going, telling him that the price for this will be great.

Y’know what I’ve never understood about ghosts & old witches (with & without silky smooth hands) who’re trying to keep someone from doing something that they may regret? Why is it they never just up & tell the person what the consequence is? Much like Obi-Wan to Luke, Harley keeps trying to turn Ricky, but remains vague about this curse that will befall him will be. Is it that you’ll remain a ghost for all eternity? Will you become chronically vague for the rest of time? Will you be forced to reprise a role from twenty years ago every time someone decides to make another DTV sequel to the original movie?

Anyway, Ricky asks what the price is & the witch replies “Your soul, boy!” (See? Was that so hard, Ed?) Already swayed to the Dark Side, Ricky agrees to the terms & conditions of this contract with the devil. The witch takes him out to the old rotten pumpkin patch & calls up Pumpkinhead, who apparently resides about three inches below the surface of the Earth when not doing the bidding of distraught fathers & CW angst-ridden teenagers. Pumpkinhead reappears & is given his marching orders by Ricky, who disappears for a good portion of the movie.

Hijinx ensue as the demon cleaves his way through the Hatfield genepool. After two of the Hatfield boys are killed at their moonshine still (to be fair, one set himself on fire), a few more go out into the woods, setting bear traps, as they’re assuming that that’s what took out the other brothers (well, that & mass stupidity). Pumpkinhead starts chasing them, resulting in one stepping on one of the traps. His brother (geez, had their parents heard of birth control?), unable to open the trap, starts hacking away at the other’s leg, resulting in what is the lamest gore effect & acting in reaction to having a limb carved off that I’ve ever seen. I mean, really – if someone were going at my leg with a knife, I think I’d be doing a lot more than sucking my teeth & grimacing. Anyway, finding that he’s not making much progress on his brother’s leg with his buck knife, he leaves the knife & bails on his sibling. The brother in the trap commences to finishing the job, somehow managing to cut through his femur as though it were a cheese log. Dragging himself away, with his surprisingly bloodless stump (I always thought femoral arteries were notoriously bad about holding blood once they’d been severed), Stumpy finds himself in a worse situation, as Pumpkinhead pops up right in front of him & steps on his head, revealing the contents of his noggin to be nothing more than raspberry jelly. The monster then catches up to the other brother & eviscerates him.

Two other brothers (Good grief – are these people Catholic?) hear the commotion &, upon seeing the demon, begin running. One brother, apparently named ‘Grace’, trips & falls, face first, into one of the bear traps. Oh, but don’t worry! The trap doesn’t spring – until a couple seconds later, resulting in another shower of raspberry preserves. The last brother finally makes it out to the road – only to be hit by a truck. The driver runs to his aid, whereupon the brother reveals that Pumpkinhead, previously thought to be an old legend, is really real & really mad.

Y’know, stupidity & bad luck seem to be doing these people in more than Pumpkinhead. If I were Ricky, I’d see about getting a prorating on the cost of having this minion of evil doing my dirty work. Maybe only have it cost half his soul. Let’s look at this: of the six brothers killed, one immolated himself, one got his head squished in a bear trap & one got creamed by a truck. One of them would’ve bled to death before he got thirty feet, then had his head stepped on by the monster. Only two were actually killed by Pumpkinhead without any assistance from natural selection. That’s just lazy, O, Minion from the Underworld. I’d demand my soul back.

Jodie finally figures out what’s going on & pays a visit to the old witch with the Palmolive hands. Getting no answer, she decides to poke around a bit & finds the old rotten pumpkin patch, whereupon she meets up with Pumpkinhead. He gets in her face & then pulls back, as he’s not allowed to hurt her. Witchiepoo & Harley show up, explaining the situation to her. When she asks what can be done to keep the monster from slaughtering the rest of her potential breeding stock…um, I mean, kinfolk. Again, we get the vague “You’ll know what to do when the time comes” shtick, along with the warning that it’ll be the hardest thing she’ll ever have to do.

I wonder what that’ll be. *yawn*

And, not to be pedantic, but, would it really be so hard, if the two of them know what Jodie will need to do when the times comes (like we don’t already know what she’ll have to do), to JUST TELL HER.

Geez, they’re as bad as old Jedi ghosts…

Meanwhile, after six mysterious killings, the Sheriff finally shows up. Any guesses as to who he might be?

Yup, MG1, here to enlighten everyone with the tale of Pumpkinhead (told ya!). Both he & Jodie try to convince everyone that this is really a demon brought to do the bidding of Ricky & are somewhat less than successful. They both walk outside, only to see some of the other thousand or so Hatfield brothers (Cripes! It’s almost like the Baldwin family!) making Molotov cocktails from the plethora of beer bottles strewn about the place. One of the brothers puts a shotgun to the Sheriff’s head, preventing him from interfering with the cocktail party. Then, in a move I’d not seen since Torgo took down Mike with a gentle tap of his staff, the brother taps the Sheriff on the shoulder & - plop! – down he goes! The rest of the inbreds take off to the McCoy family home for a little housewarming. Ha! I’m so funny!

Oh, & Jodie takes the Sheriff’s keys & follows them in his cruiser.

I’d like to take this moment to say that the Hooterville Sheriffs department has the butt-ugliest police cruisers in the country.

Back to our story. Ma & Pa McCoy are talking about how strange Ricky was acting at Sara’s funeral & how he took off, telling everyone to leave him alone. (Almost forgot – whenever Pumpkinhead checks someone off of its ‘naughty list’, Ricky is effected, physically reacting to whatever misfortune the demon metes out to whomever it takes out; if that’s the case, then, shouldn’t Ricky have had one wicked migraine when Pumpkinhead stepped on the one guy’s head?) Ma tells Pa to go out & find the boy, as he’s not like his brothers – he’s “sensitive.” As Pa & the boys are heading out, the Hatfield Housewarming Committee comes rolling up & starts launching Molotov’s. Apparently, the McCoy house was made from gasoline soaked wood, because it goes up in no time flat. The menfolk commence to beating the snot out of each other & it’s only Jodie (who pulled up just as the festivities began) who realizes that Ma McCoy is still inside.

As the men just stand there with their fingers up their noses, Jodie takes charge & rams the Hatfield truck through the front door of the house & into the parlor. Long story short, she succeeds in saving Ma McCoy, thus starting the healing process between the feudin’ families.

Back at the Hatfield’s, Pa Hatfield is giving the boys a dressing down for the whole nearly-bar-b-queing-Ma McCoy incident. After this, Pa McCoy drives up in an old, 1920’s Model T, the same car that just happened to knock poor Uncle Abner’s legs off all those years ago. He offers it to the Hatfield’s, doing what should’ve been done years ago & calling a truce to the whole silly feud.

Now, allow me to go off topic here for a moment, as here’s were all those points that I told you to pay attention to will come into play. We’re told early on that the whole Hatfield & McCoy thing started when Uncle Abner was nine & was hit by the McCoy’s in their fancy new motorcar, right? The car in question is, like I said before, a 1920’s Model T. Uncle Abner looked to be, maybe, mid-sixties (let’s just say sixty-five). Now, for the sake of argument, let’s just use those factors, we’ll say a 1926 car & Uncle Abner’s age at the time of the accident. In addition, let’s say that, since it’s mentioned that the McCoy’s owned the first car in the county, that the accident happened in 1926; 1926 + 65 - 9= the movie taking place in around 1982. However, recalling the scene where Ricky was dragged behind the Hatfield boys’ pickup, that truck looked to be about a 2006 model, which would set the movie a full twenty-four years later, meaning that Uncle Abner’s accident happened in 1950. So, if I understand this correctly, the movie’s trying to tell me that Hooterville County had no cars until the middle of the 20th century? What’re these people, Amish?

Stupid movie, making my head hurt…

*sigh* Back to the movie. Pa McCoy hands over the keys to the car to Pa Hatfield & the two start working to figure out how to stop the monster. Sheriff MG1 hops on the vague info bandwagon, only telling the two parties involved the bare minimum. Finally, he spills the beans about why he knows so much about Pumpkinhead. He responds by opening his shirt (a little something for the ladies!) to reveal the scars from his last brush with evil, five years ago; scars that look just as fresh as they did from the beginning of the movie. Needless to say, the news that they’ll have to kill Ricky doesn’t go over to well with the McCoy clan. Much is made about how it’s the Hatfield’s problem & if they just let the monster take them out, then it’ll go away, a total win-win for the McCoy’s. The Hatfield’s point out that, in addition to them not wanting to be gutted by a demon, they’ve also got innocent children & womenfolk in the house, a notion that falls on mostly deaf ears.

Jodie goes to comfort her sister, Jodie, who’s been listening in & is understandably unhappy with the situation. Jodie promises that she won’t let anything happen to her sister. She then goes back down stairs, only to hear Sheriff MG1 reiterating that the only way to stop this is to see Ricky off this mortal plane. Jodie begs & pleads with them, asking them if there’s another way; of course, the answer is no. Right about then, a bloodcurdling scream emanates from upstairs. Everybody rushes upstairs, looking out the bedroom window to find Pumpkinhead making his way to the house.

Pa Hatfield breaks out his shotgun arsenal & starts passing them around. While this is happening, Harley appears to Sheriff MG1, telling him that the Sheriff knew this wasn’t over five years ago &, again, starts in with the “you know what you’ve got to do” vague crap. (Apparently, this agent of evil keeps a tab for those that manage to escape him, which he collects on when he’s conjured up again.) Elsewhere in the house, more fighting about how the McCoy’s should leave the Hatfield’s to their fate ensues, when the demon starts its assault on the house, pulling people through windows & walls left & right. Sheriff MG1 confronts Pumpkinhead, shooting at it, even though he, of all people, knows that it’ll do nothing. Pumpkinhead finishes what it started five years prior & shows the Sheriff what his liver looks like. Jodie grabs the Sheriff’s gun & boogies on out with her sister. We then get a view of the carnage that’s gone on inside, seeing that, for some reason, the monster has apparently categorized all of the dismembered body parts of its victims. Also, in a touching moment, we see Uncle Abner’s blood spattered, overturned wheelchair, with one wheel still spinning.

Loyal Readers, let’s observe a moment of silence for dear, departed, dismembered Uncle Abner, who’s now up in Heaven with the legs that he lost in childhood. Fair thee well, Uncle Abner. We’ll never forget how easily you caved & spilled the beans about the whereabouts of your niece, sparking this whole mess.

*sniff*

OK, so, the sisters make it outside, only to be cornered by the titular beastie. Oh, & who should show up but Ricky! Hi Ricky! Welcome back to the movie! Anyway, as Pumpkinhead is about to do expunge one of the last of the Hatfield’s from the planet, Jodie jumps in between the monster & her sister, with the Sheriff’s pistol ready to fire. She begs Ricky to call off the monster, but he tells her that, even if he wanted to, he can’t & that Pumpkinhead won’t hurt her, unless she gets between it & its intended victim. Harley then shows up, telling Jodie again that she’d know what to do when the time came & that it’d be the hardest thing she’d ever had to do. (Geez disease, just tell her to shoot Ricky already! There, was that so hard?!?) It finally, finally dawns on her that she needs to kack her beloved if she’s to keep from being the last carrier of Hatfield DNA. Finally, with trembling hands & a quivering lower lip, Jodie pulls the trigger - & reveals that the Hatfield’s never taught their womenfolk how to shoot, as she manages to shoot Ricky in the side. Pumpkinhead reacts to this as one would expect a demon to & comes after Jodie

Fortunately, he moves slow enough for her to line up a better shot at Ricky, this time hitting him smack in the ticker. In a surprise variation of the Hero’s Battle Death Exemption, this time applied to the monster, Pumpkinhead &, by association, Ricky, prove to be pretty resilient when it comes to being shot & both stagger around a bit, but don’t go down. Ricky finally grows a pair & jumps on Pumpkinhead, pulling it backward & causing the two of them to tumble into a well. This is then followed by the requisite “I’m not dead yet” monster pop-up scene, with the demon clawing its way out of the well & then Ricky grabbing it & taking it down into the murky depths of the well. Jodie crumples into a blubbering mess & hugs her sister. Harley turns into a really bad blue screen effect & walks off, looking like a Jedi ghost whose corporeal form had spent one too many nights at the Mos Eisley cantina.

So, what’d you really think?

All in all, Pumpkinhead: Blood Feud wasn’t the worst thing ever to dance before my eyes. Even the terrible acting, ho-hum CGI (as usual, the monster costume looked far better & more realistic than the CGI version), the fact that almost the entire cast were dressed like they were picked from the rejects at a “Return to Walton Mountain” casting call, the apparent time distortion phenomenon that’s occurring in Hooterville & the lack of any appreciable police presence, other than Sheriff MG1 managed to elicit a few laughs from me

I haven’t decided if the writers of this were geniuses or just stoned when they came up with a concept as delightfully loopy as they did. I get the distinct feeling that they, after one too many bong hits & watching old Bugs Bunny cartoons, thought “Hey! Let’s put Pumpkinhead in the middle of the Hatfield & McCoy feud! Pass me the Doritos.” That’s the only way I can wrap my head around what I saw unspool on the screen before me.

Pumpkinhead: Blood Feud: 3.5 out of 5 Eyeballs