Do you like scary movies? How about scary, stupid movies? And if you like scary, stupid-smart movies, then absurd anthology Scare Package is the special delivery you’ve been expecting.
Conceived of by Aaron B. Koontz and Cameron Burns, Scare Package is both a tribute to the golden era of low-grade VHS horror and a comedy about the inherent nerdiness of VHS collectors. And, of course, when we say “golden age of VHS,” it’s not the era of mom-and-pop stores on every corner. The true golden age was the mid-2000s, when true lovers of the format – those that appreciated how fragile the archive of tapes in run-down strip mall stores was – gathered together the biggest collections imaginable and became havens for enthusiasts of C-level-and-below cinema; the era of Scarecrow Video in Seattle, Kim’s Video in New York, and Austin’s own spinning-head twins of evil, I Luv Video and Vulcan Video (where much of Scare Package was filmed). Only one of those, Scarecrow, survives, although the Alamo Drafthouse picked up the Kim’s and Vulcan collections, and I Luv Video has transferred its collection to the nonprofit We Luv Video.
Like all good anthologies, there’s a wraparound that creates an excuse for the mayhem – although, in an entertainingly tricksy fashion, there’s a cold open (appropriately titled “Cold Open”) directed by Austinite Emily Hagins that sets up the suitably meta comedy. Riffing in the same vein as serial killer satire Behind the Mask: The Rise of Leslie Vernon, it serves as the intro to “Rad Chad’s Horror Emporium” and the first sighting of Rad Chad himself: Jeremy King as the slightly snobby, slightly goofy, and a little bit emotionally needy owner of a video store with only one assistant, the newly hired Hawn (Tran), and one customer, the world’s most annoying movie geek, Sam (Brown, bug-eyed and infuriated that Chad won’t hire him). The trio interacts with tapes, cuing a cutaway to sketches of varying quality, cohesiveness, and entertainment factor.
It’s really a comedy riff on the roots of the V/H/S series, and it has the same strengths and flaws. Much as with the first mumblegore anthology, there’s still a sense of the franchise trying to define itself, and some elements fit more neatly than others. Courtney and Hillary Andujar’s “Girls’ Night Out of Body” (a sly homage to Nineties feminist horror like The Coven) is well-executed but feels a little tonally disjointed from the rest of the segments, while Baron Vaughn’s intriguing if convoluted “So Much to Do” is light on laughs and would arguably work better as a stand-alone short.
But when the segments do gel, they share a wickedly witty and suitably sickly, gory sense of humor that relishes insider horror jokes but never feels cliquey. Yes, you can check the box for the nods to the visual signatures of A Nightmare on Elm Street or the soap-esque convoluted continuity of the Halloween franchise, but even those with just the most passing knowledge of horror conventions will get a bloody thrill from Anthony Cousins’ suitably ridiculous “The Night He Came Back Again! Part IV – The Final Kill,” a short that answers so many questions about unkillable villains and why their repeat victims are never better prepared. Equally, Noah Segan’s excellent directorial debut “M.I.S.T.,E.R.” is both a smart swipe at men’s rights activists and a great prelude to his first feature, last year’s vampire family road trip Blood Relatives.
Scare Package almost commits the cardinal sin of anthologies by having its best short too early, and there’s no doubt that Austin’s master of splatter Chris McInroy’s “One Time in the Woods” is the peak of the stand-alone substories, a delicious mix of New Line Cinema slashers and Troma goop, all bound together by McInroy’s deliciously transgressive sense of humor. But luckily “Rad Chad’s Horror Emporium” metamorphosizes into “Horror Hypothesis,” a comedy take on those Platinum Dunes remakes of the early 2000s through the meta-on-meta instincts of both the most self-aware Scream films and The Cabin in the Woods. Koontz stays behind the lens for this, and the end result is deliciously ghoulish and inspiringly idiotic. That’s the balance that makes Scare Package the bleeding gift you’ll want in your mail.
Scare Package is available on Blu-ray now.
This article appears in Best of Austin 2023 (Insert).
