Seems like everything in the horror section of the video store I worked at back in the day skipped the theaters and went straight to VHS. It was a way of life for a whole horror generation. So let’s get into this trio of sci-fi/horror monster movies everyone watched at home back then.
SPLIT SECOND (1992)
The director of the 1981 slasher The Burning came back to do this futuristic sci-fi film in 1992…that takes place in 2008. Trippy.
THE SETUP: global warming has created major levels of pollution and flooding in London. Amazing how these “woke” themes in sci-fi and horror movies didn’t get everyone all worked up back then.
Rutger Hauer plays a hardened cop who lost his partner to a killer that is still on the loose.
It seems Rutger has some sort of psychic link with the killer, so his new rookie partner is told to stick close to him and make sure he hasn’t just lost his mind.
As they investigate, Rutger also has to contend with and keep safe his dead partner’s wife, played by Kim Cattrall.
The film is very uneven. There are occasional action shootouts with a less than human killer we only catch glimpses of, some sexual tension between Kim and Rutger, and hints of buddy cop movie humor, but it’s still a rather poorly paced film until the final act.
That’s when it all comes together. The buddy moments are amplified and finally become more fun, we get a suspenseful battle with the creature (which totally looks like Venom), and Kim suddenly drops the helpless femme fatale act and becomes a brave bitch, joining the final fight in a subway tunnel. Awesome ending.
CARNOSAUR 2 (1995)
I covered the original Carnosaur a while back after inheriting the DVD from my brother, and now I’ve finally added the two sequels to my collection to complete the trilogy. However, these aren’t really sequels, for each movie has its own story. In this one a team is sent by the government to find out why communications have been cut off from an underground facility.
The place seems abandoned, and when the Black guy in the group gets the computers up and running he goes for the ultimate nineties reference: Whoomp! There it is!
There it is indeed. The group soon discovers there are cloned Velociraptors running around the place, making this your standard 90s sci-fi creature feature plot—small team must try to get out alive!
Luckily for them, one teenager was left behind from the original crew, and he knows the place forwards and backwards. The characters are as typical as they come from that era, making this a definite nostalgia comfort flick.
The dinosaurs are cheesy fun if you’re into that sort of thing, and there’s some good, goofy gore along the way later in the film when it finally kicks into high gear. And naturally there are scenes that mimic moments from the Jurassic Park films.
And the other important 90s reference? When the kid is battling a T-Rex with a forklift, his one-liner is: Eat this, Barney!
CARNOSAUR 3 (1996)
This third film in the series feels like a SyFy original. It’s short on substance, big on action.
Horror cutie Stephen Lee has a small role as a military man at the beginning, when his transportation team is shot by terrorists—after some watersports fun.
Then those terrorists discover the cargo they’ve intercepted—Velociraptors! Bye bye terrorists.
Finally, Scott Valentine, best known as Mallory’s man Nick on Family Ties, is in charge of a military team that is ordered by a pretty blonde government scientist (shocker) to capture the dinosaurs alive. They’re going to need to have some eggs for breakfast to keep up their strength…
It’s just mindless shooting, running, screaming, and dinosaur attacks as this silly end to the trilogy delivers big on the monster madness and nothing else. And yes, T-Rex returns to join in on the fun.
