Ghouls (2008) (USA/Romania)

⭐️⭐️1/2

Something that looks like a cut scene in a PlayStation game gives us a glimpse of hell… I think… there’s mass graves and the landscape is kinda fiery. Anyways, when the realization hit that this was an actual scene and not an elaborate production company title card, I set my standards to where they needed to be. The old woman dreaming about the hellish landscape is at the center of a black mass (robes, chanting, digital spirits etc.) and it ends with what may be her soul trapped in what looks like a big green jellybean. Cut to Nu metal that really wants to be Powerman 5000 but is off by a couple thousand. It’s being listened to by a college girl who runs into her dad (holy fuck, it’s William Atherton) who lets her know her grandma just passed away and he thinks it’s time she travels to whatever backwood European place he calls the mother land and meets his side of the family. Cut to James DeBello (really?) and his father hunting those digital demons with grenades and a shotgun somewhat successfully, until his mentor gets mortally injured and hands off some holy macguffin (it’s a dagger because of course it is) to Mr. DeBello before calling it a day. We also see the demons in solid form and they look like mummy-monsters in tattered rags… I dig ‘em. The family (papa, his daughter Jen and his girlfriend) arrive in the Romanian town and papa lets them know the village is supposedly cursed. Creepy uncle Vladimir picks them up in his dinky cart and drags them to a bar to meet the whole extended family. They’re as Eastern European as you’d expect. DeBello wanders into the inn/bar where the family is staying, and he meets Jen but they get off on the wrong foot. Jen starts having odd dreams where she’s at the center of a black mass, the new family matriarch is a real bitch and at grandma’s funeral some creep warns Jen that she should not trust her family. Jen also goes to view her dead granny’s body and has a horrific vision where the corpse attacks her and spooky faces pop up. Her father reveals she’s the only female in the bloodline and the family views her as something of a miracle. They both agree that the family is full of weirdos and I agree with them too. While this is going on, James DeBello wanders around the Romanian village uncovering various secrets. The girlfriend reads something about a new vessel needed once the elder passes and now we know where it’s all going. Eventually those rag monsters start knocking off people, DeBello reveals he’s a monster-fighting Druid (a family tradition), Jen finds out that if she ends up being used for her family’s sinister purpose the end of the world will soon follow and my suspicions about Romanian customs and Druid culture are put to rest. Hilarious special effects and poor performances make it easier to digest than it should be. Also, the main villain is called the Ghoul Queen (and she’s the one in that big-ass jellybean) and that’s something I can get behind. It’s very dumb but I’ve liked dumber things and those things didn’t come to a close with demon-mummy-troll-hobos massacring Romanians and William Atherton getting his heart ripped out.