The Devil's Father's Brother's Nephew's Cousin's Former Roommate: Bloodspell (1989)

Bloodspell (AKA 'The Boy From Hell', 'To The Devil a Son') (1989)
Rating: **
Starring: Aarin Teich, Anthony Jenkins, Twink Caplan

Ever wondered what The Omen (1976) would have been like if, instead of the baby Antichrist being taken in by a wealthy couple with ties to the government, spreading his influence across the world under the unholy ploy of the Devil himself, we have a teenager being dropped off at a care home for troubled kids by his frightened mother because his estranged Satanist father is looking to awaken his son's inner-devil and have him create the Anti-Christ with the girl of his choice by the time he turns eighteen?

If you answered 'yes', you're a weird lil' fella. And this is the movie you're looking for.

 

During his stay at St. Boniface Evaluation Center for Troubled Kids (where said 'kids' are played by actors pushing somewhere between late-20s to early-30s, acting like pre-schoolers), aforementioned bringer of darkness Daniel (Anthony Jenkins) is starting to show a lot of supernatural evil like causing windows to shatter to cut someone's face, making a remote explode at a kid's hand after they hog a TV, and murdering a pair of nasty bullies through grisly accidents. He's also been talking to the demonic apparition of his father who, after finally catching up to sonny, tells him of his destiny to sire the Anti-Messiah by the time he comes of age. Which, unfortunately for the residents of the center, is just a few nights away. 

Recognizing the danger after noticing that Daniel's present during these incidents too many times, jittery Charlie (Aarin Teich, in his late twenties) tries to warn the rest that the new kid is evil, but this is proven to be a lot difficult to do seeing he has the mental maturity of a tantrum-throwing twelve-year old who bonks his head on a tree-root when his suicidal girlfriend refuses to talk to him after, out of the blue, he asked her why she tried killing herself. Yeah. Is it any mystery, too, why he's also the butt of many jokes and bullying going around the center? When he gets upset, he gets intensely upset. Over-the-top and many screws loose.

Still, what remains of the group eventually figure out that Daniel is demonic when a visiting psychiatrist suffers a heart attack trying to run away from a session gone spooky. With Daniel's evil growing stronger, it's up to Charlie, House mother Jenny (Twink Caplan) and live-in guidance counselor Tony Montana (Edward Dloughy) to stop the Boy from Hell from bringing forth the devil's spawn, as well as killing anybody else who gets in his way.

As much as this movie is a laughable car wreck when it comes to acting and dialogue, the story does play around enough predictable horror-of-the-demonic tropes to make it an interesting watch. It's a terrible movie, sure, with cheap effects and cockeyed editing, but there's a charm to how well it wears its badness over the craziness of its story, making it quite easy to see Bloodspell (1989) as a guilty pleasure for lovers of bad cinema. Like, what other slashers out there have a finale overblown with cheese courtesy of a group hug and sappy end credit music right after divine intervention helped save the day? Not a lot, I imagine.

If you like your supernatural slashers absurdly ridiculous and fun for being that terrible, then seek out this hammy gem and enjoy!  

Bodycount:
1 female strangled to death
1 male set ablaze
1 male shredded through a woodchipper
1 male suffers through a heart attack
1 male ran through with a pike, struck by lightning
Total: 5