Gate II 2007 Horror Movie Review

Remember The Gate?  A very fun and entertaining little horror flick that never achieved much popularity and was pretty much destined to show on HBO now and again back in the day.  Stephen Dorff’s film debut by the way.  Director Tibor Takács(who also made the underrated I, Madman) decided to bless us with another tale of The Gate, but unfortunately the (black)magic really isn’t all there this time.

Terry(the secondary hero from the first film) is obsessing over what he had experienced in his neighbor’s house two years earlier.  With his father on a downward slide of depression and alcoholism, he decides to conjure up the very same powers that nearly killed him and ask for help for his father, who needs to get a job and kick the sauce.  Along with two thugs and a new love interest, he performs the ritual in Stephen Dorff’s abandoned house(Dorff’s character had the smarts to move away after the incident.  Or maybe they just couldn’t talk him into doing a sequel).  The ritual is botched due to one of the idiot thugs, and one of the “minions”(those lovable little mini-demons we saw in the first film) ends up with a bullet in it.  Terry nurses the creature back to life and soon everybody involved in the ritual is getting everything they wished for!  But the problem in films like these is that getting your wish isn’t always a good thing.  The wishes literally turn to poopy after so much time.  Terry sees the error of his ways(he managed to reopen that damned gate through his meddling) and with his newfound girl, goes to do battle with the forces of darkness to close the gate once more.

Could have been fun, but ends up being merely so-so.  Maybe I was spoiled by pleasant childhood memories of the first film, but there was nothing all that exciting or interesting here.  The first movie had a small army of the evil “minions”, which was one of the best aspects of the movie.  Here we only get one.  Yes, only one.  Other than the four characters getting their wishes and having them “poop” out on them(one funny moment has one of the thugs leaving a tip for a waiter at a restaurant and the money slaps onto the bill as poop.  He’s seen a minute later trying to wipe it off with a napkin and smearing it all over the bill.), not alot seems to happen until the final act of the film where we’re treated to a bit of stop motion and rubber suit demons.  Too little, too late.

All in all, it’s rather harmless, but it’ll just make you want to watch the original again.