‘Whatever you do, don’t go into the…’
The Cellar is a 1989 American horror film directed by Kevin S. Tenney (Brain Dead; Night of the Demons; Witchboard and sequels) from a screenplay by John Woodward, based on screen story co-written with Darryl Wimberley and a short story by David Henry Keller M.D. Tenney took over as director from John Woodward eight days into the film’s shooting schedule.
A young boy finds an ancient Comanche monster spirit in the basement of his home. His parents don’t believe him, so he must kill the monster alone…
Reviews:
“ …The Cellar is a serviceable, and towards the end, even a gripping monster-in-the-basement film. The combination between the flaky, volatile dad and his son, who is a budding Thomas Edison, plays extremely well, provides 80% of the plot drive, and the performances are good. More subtle aspects, such as the interesting earth tone color scheme that matches the Southwestern landscape, also work very well.” Classic Horror
” …fails to deliver enough scary or suspenseful scenes to make this a believable top-rate horror thriller. Even the monster, which is supposed to be created from the most deadly parts of the most deadly creatures disappoints, turning out to be a cross between an alligator and a large rat.” Chris Miller, Chucks Connection
“The beast is pretty cool, but the characters are fairly lame. There is really meandering narration at the beginning and end that is laughable. But overall, it’s a passable 80’s horror outing.” Warren, Letterboxd.com
Choice dialogue:
Mance Cashen: “Looks like Dracula’s bedroom down here!”
Mance Cashen: “No! No monsters! They don’t exist. It’s silly to be afraid.”
Cast and characters:
- Patrick Kilpatrick as Mance Cashen
- Chris Miller as Willy Cashen
- Suzanne Savoy as Emily Cashen
- Ford Rainey as T.C. van Houten
- Lou Perryman as Kyle Boatwright [as Lou Perry]
- Michael Wren as Chief Sam John
- Danny Mora as Chilo
- Alex Pederson as Tommy Boatwright
- Don Collier as Sheriff
- Mindy Spence as Girl in Schoolyard
- Nick Gomez as Boy with Plane
- Irv Gorman as Tony Turner
- Bryson G. Liberty as Striking Eagle [as Bryson Liberty]
- Sid Dawson as Joe
- Patrick Wells as Earl
- Michael Crawley as T.C.’s Father
Release:
The film was released in the United States on VHS by Southgate Video in 1989 and in Canada that same year by Cineplex Odeon. As of 2017, it has not been officially released on Region 1 DVD or Blu-ray.
