The Movie:

Directed and co-written by Adam Fields, One-Eyed Monster is bring promoted as a comedic homage to Alien, The Thing and porn, and that pretty much sums it up. While the film actually features a few scenes of reasonably effective tension, more often than not this a movie that is played with tongue placed firmly in cheek.

The story follows the small cast and crew of a porno movie as they head up to a remote mountain location to shoot their film. Once they get there, they get stranded when a hefty blizzard moves in on the area, making it next to impossible to head down back towards civilization. If that weren't bad enough in and of itself, the lead actor, Ron (Ron Jeremy) has run into a little problem where his most famous characteristic literally runs away with itself when his schlong gets possessed by a strange being from outer space.

As this literal one-eyed monster runs amuck, terrorizing cast and crew alike, those who don't fall pretty to its deadly attacks most quickly formulate a way to not only make it out alive but also to kill the monster cock before it reproduces and brings the entire earth to its knees.

On paper, let's face it, One-Eyed Monster sounds terrible, almost like the type of material that even a studio like Troma (who made Killer Condom and have gloriously low standards - usually in a good way) would pass on. To be blunt, the plot sounds stupid, and, at its core, it really is. That said, to his credit, Adam Fields somehow manages to make it all work. Part of the credit for that though, has to go to Ron Jeremy and Veronica Hart, who haze sizable parts (no pun intended) in the movie. They act... well, they act like porn stars. Not young actors and actresses interpreting what they think porn stars act like, but how they actually do tend to appear on camera. There's some rather wooden moments (again, no pun intended) and some awkwardness to many of the film's finer moments that does manage to evoke the tone and feeling of the 'porno with a plot' films of yesteryear, though without ever getting particularly explicit (this is, after all, an R-rated picture and nothing harder than that). If the presence of Ron Jeremy, more or less playing himself, and Veronica Hart, still sexy after all these years, isn't enough to catch your attention, the film also features a few fun performances from none other than Charles Napier (he of some of Russ Meyer's best films), Buffy The Vampire Slayer's Amber Benson, Wicked Pictures' contract girl Carmen Hart (no relation to Veronica) in what appears to be her non-XXX debut, and a dude you've probably never heard of before named Jason Graham (who has popped up in Heroes and a Chevy Impala commercial if the IMDB is to be believed).

The script features some pretty clever (and genuinely funny) dialogue and the movie is crass enough to appeal to its target audience but never goes so far as to alienate those who might stumble across it out of curiosity. Horror fans will enjoy a couple of good kill scenes and fun homage or two to classic pictures from the genre, while the novelty of the concept goes a long way towards making the ridiculous enjoyable. This isn't a classic, but you probably didn't expect it to be - but it is a well directed, well shot, well acted, and entertaining little trash movie that's actually well worth a look for those who appreciate such things.

The Video:

The anamorphic 1.78.1 widescreen transfer on this DVD is pretty decent. The picture, which is interlaced, was shot on DV from the looks of things though generally the image is clean and clear. There aren't any problems with mpeg compression artifacts or edge enhancement to report and color reproduction looks good. For a low budget shot on video movie, it looks fine, if not a bit better than you'd probably expect it to.

The Audio:

Liberation has supplied two mixes, the first an English Dolby Digital 5.1 Surround Sound track and the second an English language Dolby Digital 2.0 Stereo track. Both are of decent enough quality. There aren't any problems with hiss or distortion to note and the levels are properly balanced. Dialogue is easy enough to understand and there are some fun directional effects in the more active scenes. There are no alternate language dubs or subtitles provided for the movie.

The Extras:

Liberation Entertainment have put a pretty substantial amount of extra material on this disc, starting with a commentary track from director Adam Fields and his two brothers, Scott and Jordan Fields who co-wrote the film with him. The three talk about writing the film, about some of the pre-conceived notions some of the cast members might have had working with porn stars, about how expensive helicopters are and more. They talk about the different characters in the film, where the concept for the movie came from ("It just seemed like a funny idea that Ron Jeremy's dick detaches and kills people.") and about some of the dry humor that the movie handles quite well. There are scenes where the three go mum and forget to talk, but overall this is a pretty decent track.

Porn Yesterday: A Conversation With Ron Jeremy And Veronica Hart (35:41) starts off with a fun clip featuring the two of them from back in the day before jumping right in and allowing the pair to share some memories of their time spent in the 'golden age' of adult filmmaking and comparing the porn of yesteryear to the porn of today. While the stories are interesting, equally interesting is the relationship these two share - the bicker and talk over one another like your grandparents over dinner and it's all rather hilarious and well worth a watch.

Spotlight On: The Dick Wrangler (6:59) is a great piece that starts off with Adam Fields very coyly discussing how he didn't want to use CGI and how he opted to the considerable talents of Harvey London, the dick wrangler, instead. From there we meet Harvey as he explains just exactly what he did on the film and how he made the phallic monster we see in the movie. It's all done very tongue-in-cheek and it's quite funny.

Rounding out the extras are four minor deleted scenes (available with optional commentary from the director), a hilarious collection of outtakes (1:14), a still gallery, three teasers, a trailer, animated menus and chapter selection.

Overall:

Adam Fields feature debut is a surprisingly well made picture that takes a ridiculous concept and an equally ridiculous cast and somehow manages to make it all work. Is it high are? Nope, not even close, but One-Eyed Monster is well shot, competently directed, and most importantly, plenty entertaining. Seriously, who hasn't ever wanted to see Charles Napier chocked to death by a monster cock? Libertation's disc is chock full of extras, it looks good, and it sounds good - recommended!

Ian lives in NYC with his wife where he writes for DVD Talk, runs Rock! Shock! Pop!. He likes NYC a lot, even if it is expensive and loud.