Very, very stupid straight-to-video horror from the eighties.
I’m all for the type of surreal weirdness this film provides, but
there’s no excuse for incompetent filmmaking.
The Package
The best thing about 1984’s THE JAR? The Magnum Video
box cover (it has yet to be released on DVD) with its irresistible
tagline “It Blows the Lid off Terror.”
Incidentally, the Colorado lensed THE JAR marks the
only film credit I’ve been able to locate for director Bruce Toscano,
writer George Bradley, cinematographer Cameron MacLeod and lead actor
Gary Wallace--and I can’t say I’m surprised!
The Story
One night a bearded dork named Paul picks up a severely
injured man on the road and takes him back to his apartment. The injured
man quickly disappears and in his place leaves a paper bag, which when
unwrapped reveals a jar containing a pickled monster fetus.
Over the course of the night Paul is assailed with
horrific hallucinations: his bathtub filling with blood, a stabbing, a
crucifixion, etc. The following day he disposes of the jar in a back
alley trash bin but the visions continue, and the following night the
jar turns back up in Paul’s apartment. He smashes it, which does nothing
to stem the flow of hallucinations.
Paul’s life falls apart, with his peeved boss visiting
his apartment to ask why he hasn’t come to work and a potential love
interest named Crystal put off by Paul’s weird manner. After
hallucinating that he’s on another planet manned by cloak-wearing
freaks, as well as the jungles of (I assume) Vietnam, Paul finally comes
to in the arms of Crystal…or so he thinks!
The Direction
I understand that one must be forgiving when viewing a
low budget horror film--especially this one, whose makers attempted to
create something unique and interesting--but here there’s just too much
to forgive!
Stilted acting is a constant in no-budget horror
movies, but the performances in THE JAR are downright appalling. Another
annoyance is the tacky synthesizer music, which is blared at full volume
over seemingly every scene. There’s also the fact that the whole thing
is extremely poorly photographed, with the protagonists always
positioned at the outer edges of the frame.
To be sure, the material is promising, and could have
made for an interesting surreal chiller. That, however, would require a
skilled director and a decent budget, and THE JAR clearly had neither.
Vital Statistics
THE JAR
Nocturna International Limited/Magnum Entertainment
Director: Bruce Toscano
Screenplay: George Bradley
Cinematography: Cameron MacLeod
Editing: Bruce Toscano
Cast: Gary Wallace, Karin Sjoberg, Robert Gerald Witt, Dean Schoepter,
Les Miller, Don Donovan
