MOUSE OF HORRORS (2024)

Streaming on Tubi!
Directed by Brendan Petrizzo.
Written by Harry Boxley, Marc Gottlieb.
Check out the trailer here!!

A group of teens send off their best friend Chloe (Natasha Tosini) who is soon to leave the UK for the US. They travel to a local amusement park that happens to be the hideout of the evil Dr. Rupert (Chris Lines) and his monstrous creations The Killer (a monstrous man—sized mouse that vaguely resembles Mickey Mouse played by Lewis Santer) and the Bear (a Winnie the Pooh-monster played by Stephen Staley). As the night goes on, Dr. Rupert suggests a challenge between Mickey and Pooh to see how many people they can murder and bring back to him to use as parts to make the perfect mate for them both. This prompts the two blasphemous representations of beloved cartoon characters to go on a rampage and stalk and kill Chloe and her friends for parts.

Again, I’ll start with the good. This version of Steamboat Willie at least tries to utilize the aspect of him being a sailor on a steamboat. While the scenes are limited, the film does start out with a series of murders on a boat and then returns to that boat later in the movie. So kudos, I guess, for actually using Mickey Mouse’s Steamboat Willie persona in the proper context. I also thought that this version of Mickey was brought to life in a more interesting way than simply being a mask, as in THE MOUSE TRAP. This Mickey has a workable jaw and though the character doesn’t talk, he is able to open his toothy, rat-like mouth wide which he often does in order to lick the blades he is using while stalking menacingly. And while I can’t say that this is a good performance, at least Lewis Santer puts some gusto in the way Mickey prances around and playfully stalks his victims. Sure, it’s reminiscent of the Jester-like way Art the Clown moves with a sense of style, grace, and performance, but at least it differs from the Michael Myers trance movement of Pooh, which I found to be pretty underwhelming.

The rest of the film is bad. The acting is rough from pretty much all of the cast, especially the two actors playing Chloe’s parents. These actors simply function as bowling pins to be toppled by the two killers. And while most slasher films at least put some time and energy into the kills, MOUSE OF HORRORS basically has Mickey slit throats and stab people. Using a singular weapon can be vivid and scary, a la the SCREAM franchise, which mainly uses a hunting knife, if some thought is put into it, but MOUSE OF HORRORS didn’t seem like it wanted to be bothered so it’s just Mickey killing people in the same way over and over. The film culminates with a big battle between Mickey and Pooh and the two “brothers” competitive nature gets the better of them and they fight. Unfortunately, it was just two guys in bad costumes swiping at each other for way too long like Peter Griffin and the Chicken from FAMILY GUY. I wish more thought would have been put into some fight choreography and variation of kills, but MOUSE OF HORRORS doesn’t have it.

I guess MOUSE OF HORRORS is building towards something. Some kind of mega-crossover with various monsterized, public domain, cartoon characters. But this one really didn’t give me anything to spark my interest. The storyline was pretty straight forward, which is more than I can say for THE MOUSE TRAP, so I guess there’s that. But this feels like another rushed script and production that again simply took advantage of a public domain character in the most unimaginative of ways.