ChikPapa Very disappointed :(

Comwayon A Disappointing Continuation

Edison Witt The first must-see film of the year.

Celia A great movie, one of the best of this year. There was a bit of confusion at one point in the plot, but nothing serious.

BA_Harrison After his son is killed in a tragic accident, grief stricken Ed Harley (Lance Henriksen) visits an old woman with magical powers who summons a demon to avenge the boy's death.To be honest, the story to Pumpkinhead is no great shakes, a fairly routine horror tale of supernatural revenge with a group of cookie cutter teenagers as the victims, but sometimes all you need is a bloody good monster to carry a film and this one has a doozy, not all that surprising considering that the man behind the wheel is none other than special effects genius Stan Winston.Winston actually does a pretty good job overall considering this is his directorial debut, conjuring up a fair amount of creepy atmosphere and delivering quite a few striking visuals. At the end of the day, though, Pumpkinhead is all about the titular creature, a tall and very terrifying fellow with evil eyes, sharp jaws and long talons, all the better for slicing and dicing terrified teens with. With such a wonderful animatronic beastie, it doesn't even matter that the film is light on the gore and totally devoid of gratuitous nudity.

FlashCallahan After a group of bikers accidentally kill Billy Harley, his father Ed is devastated and the only thing he wants is revenge.He goes to an old woman who is said to be a witch, and conjures up the titular demonic creature and with revenge on his mind unleashes him upon the bikers.....It's not the breaking the mould for horror films, but Winston has crafted a fairly decent film, with wonderful puppetry of the titular character.When you can get over the fact that Billy looks just like the Milky Bar Kid, what you get is an enjoyable over the top horror film that crosses Death Wish with The Keep.Henriksen is wonderful as the grieving father, and puts in a really good performance in what could have easily have been a coasting role for him.The rest of the cast unfortunately, are nothing more than your atypical horror film teen fodder, and you can more or less guess which ones get killed and in which order.It's a pretty gory film considering when it was made, and how restraint horror films were because of the over the top censoring film boards were at that time (thankyou James Ferman), but they are inventive, and the film doesn't hide the fact that Pumpkinhead looks so good.There is a little twist at the end which is quite impressive, and a scene that refers to the cold opening, but other than that, it's just a perfectly perfunctory horror film with wonderful special effects.

Leofwine_draca PUMPKINHEAD is one of those distinctly lacklustre horror films that populated cinemas in the late '80s, marking the end of what I consider to be a boon for the genre in the first half of the decade. Come 1985, horror films just fell apart, with endless cheesy sequels and a reliance on special effects over genuine storytelling. This film is a case of the latter in point – a film hosting a decent monster in search of a decent script. The story involves the kind of rural witchcraft we're familiar with from the likes of CHILDREN OF THE CORN, with a curse revisited on the usual bunch of unlikeable overage teenagers who soon find themselves being offed, one by one, by the menace.Pumpkinhead looks a lot like the alien from ALIEN, but he's still the best thing in the movie – along with Lance Henriksen. The B-movie favourite has a great starring role as a father determined to avenge his son, and it's just a shame that his considerable talents are wasted here (as in so many of his movies). Henriksen and, to a lesser extent, George Buck Flower, are the only interesting actors in the movie. The rest give horrid performances.The first half of the film offers a lengthy set-up which might have paid off had the denouement possessed one ounce of wit, originally or intelligence. It doesn't, ending up as a typical stalk-n-slash outing – without any decent gore to recommend either. The presence of FX supremo Stan Winston as director is a novelty, but he really should have stuck to making monsters rather than trying to direct them; his task is doomed from the outset. It all ends unsurprisingly enough, leaving the viewer wondering why on earth they just wasted an hour and a half of their time on this. Incredibly, three sequels followed.

Jensen1998 I first found out about this movie in my local blockbuster. It was on the end of the horror movies section, full of dust and its cover was really messed up. When i saw the cover art, i was completely compelled to rent that creepy movie! So i came home, made some popcorn, got some beers and baaam...started watching Pumpkinhead. When i saw the setting, that is, a desert surrounded by some creepy woods, i knew the film would be good. I'm not going to spoil it, but a man who lusts for vengeance can do crazy things, just like Ed Harley did. This movie had a quite huge budget for a horror movie from the 80s, and that is well shown in the special effects and the devil's costume. The designers really spent a lot of time perfecting Pumpkinhead, and that deed will definitely leave you impressed. Ethical and moral issues are also debated throughout the movie : The characters start thinking about what is the right thing to do, and they all build a sense of community in times of danger. Horror movies are definitely lacking this nowadays. There's a group on facebook ''Pumpkinhead Fans'' full of horror maniacs, so you should check it out once you are done watching this flick! I'd also recommend Pumpkinhead two.