Someone should have given the Razzies a Razzie for
nominating Elvira the “worst actress” of 1988 for her “acting” in Elvira: Mistress of the Dark. Firstly, Cassandra
Peterson does no act in this film. She just delivers 90 minutes of her Elvira
character and all of the sassy one-liners and double-entendres that come with
it. Her performance requires no more acting than she was expected to bring to
an episode of Elvira’s Movie Macabre.
Secondly, Elvira is awesome: as self-aware and
self-possessed as Mae West, as quick-witted as Bugs Bunny, and as tough as Rosie
the Riveter. Throughout Elvira: Mistress
of the Dark, she dispenses with leering sexists, exposes the hypocrisy of
conservative Little Town USA, and disperses her one liners with equal aplomb. Plus
director and SNL-veteran James Signorelli does a fine job of playing Tim
Burton-on-an-extremely-tight-budget and the script by Peterson and John “Jambi”
Paragon piles on the one-liners so high that it’s fairly pointless to gripe
about their quality. Also: Edie McClurg. If you don’t agree that Edie McClurg
makes everything better, I don’t want to know you. Her performance during a
scene in which a magic casserole transforms a church potluck into a Roman orgy
is worth the price of admission alone.
Look, I’m not arguing that Elvira: Mistress of the Dark is the Citizen Kane of horror comedies, but I will argue that it’s the
best Elvira: Mistress of the Dark it
can be, and a much more agreeable shot of retro-eighties fun than Top Gun, Sixteen Candles, Red Dawn,
and a dozen other poorly-aged artifacts wrapped up in one, great, walloping
cheeseball.
I’ll also argue that it may be somewhat pointless to gripe
about the quality of RLJ Entertainment’s new Blu-ray edition of Elvira: Mistress of the Dark. The image
is on the soft and dull side with a palette that should pop like a bag of Skittles
but looks a bit muted and grey; however, it’s very clean. Audio lacks range,
hovering somewhere in the middle. Extras are non-existent aside from a trailer.
Nevertheless, this is still a presentable and extremely affordable edition of a
movie that is—I reiterate—not Citizen
Kane. Diehards may hold out for a more luxurious edition, but this one will
probably get the job done for most fans.
