Entertainment
Extremely R-Rated Sci-Fi Comedy Is A Sexy Genetic Experiment Gone Wrong
By Robert Scucci
| Published
Whenever I fire up a film distributed by Troma Entertainment, it means one of two things: I’m about to be thoroughly amused or thoroughly upset. 1986’s Nightmare Weekend somehow manages to fall into both categories while also making little to no sense. It’s one of those movies where you have to look up the cast and character names afterward just to keep everybody straight, and even then, you’re still left trying to figure out what the hell it was all about.
As a result, my interpretation of this film is going to be mostly vibe-based because I honestly have no clue what’s going on. Every time I think I understand what the filmmakers are trying to accomplish, I somehow end up even more baffled and confused.
Girls, Girls, Girls!
Okay, so here goes. In Nightmare Weekend, there’s a mad scientist named Edward Brake (Wellington Meffert) working on a groundbreaking behavior modification system. I think he wants to test it on his assistant Julie’s (Debbie Laster) dog, but the verdict’s still out on that one. Julie, meanwhile, wants to use the technology, which consists of a supercomputer that somehow turns found objects into silver balls that make people foam at the mouth and die, or something, to conduct torturous experiments on college girls.
Edward’s daughter Jessica (Debra Hunter) has her own high-tech computer named George that she operates alongside a talking puppet, not realizing she’s directly interfering with the experiments and causing all hell to break loose. She also goes roller skating whenever she needs to squeeze in some cardio, and I genuinely can’t think of any other reason for those scenes besides showing off some leg while getting her out of the house.
Bikers, college girls, and just about everybody else hang out at a bar/general store called Stage Stop, where people copulate on top of pinball machines while a chauffeur named Ralph (Scott Proctor), who’s explicitly told not to drink and drive while transporting test subjects to Edward’s house, spends the entire movie sneaking swigs liquor from a flask concealed between slices of bread.
As the film meanders along, Jessica falls in love with Julie’s assistant Ken (Dale Midkiff), but nothing really comes of it after she consults her computer and puppet friend for relationship advice, and then a bunch of people die. At least, I think that’s what happens in Nightmare Weekend, but please don’t quote me on that.
A Beautiful Trainwreck
Like most films distributed by Troma Entertainment, you have to be built for movies like Nightmare Weekend. It’s exploitative, violent, completely nonsensical, and endlessly amusing. People do things, things happen to those people, and most of the time they’re naked. Sometimes they turn into goo. There’s plenty of grinding and writhing to go around, but every 10 minutes or so, you’ll still find yourself asking, “What the hell am I actually watching?”
The 1-star and 10-star reviews I’ve read all seem to agree that Nightmare Weekend offers a truly one-of-a-kind viewing experience, and I’m inclined to agree. Hell, some of the 1-star reviews spend more time talking about how awesome the movie is than criticizing it, but the people writing them are self-aware enough to realize they enjoy something so aggressively inaccessible that they feel obligated to warn everybody else first. If that sounds like your kind of afternoon, you can stream Nightmare Weekend for free on Tubi as of this writing.
