The Monster Squad

More of a clever comic parody than a jokey pastiche, this lively kiddies' horror pic delivers frights and laughs which are rooted in a sure and sympathetic grasp of Monster Movie mythology. To take advantage of a confluence of evil that occurs only once every hundred years, Count Dracula (Regehr) flies to America, then summons the Wolfman, Gill-Man, Mummy and Frankenstein's monster. Alerted to Dracula's evil plan, The Monster Squad - a gang of pre-teen kids and their slightly older tough-guy pal - fashion stakes in woodwork class, melt down their parents' cutlery to make silver bullets, and give the monsters hell. Confirming the promise of his debut feature Night of the Creeps, Dekker plays around imaginatively with the genre while delivering several nice touches.