Anytime you watch a low-budget horror flick you have to make sure you’re prepared for the worst: bad writing, bad directing, bad acting, bad anything and everything. So, it was with gritted teeth that I watched “Drainiac!”, a movie with a title that screams “Bomb!” at you.
On a personal note, I could’ve done without the huge caption “For Screening Purposes Only” that sat at the bottom of my television screen for the entire film. What other “purposes” could I have for this tape? Certainly not entertainment! And it’s not like people are clamoring to buy the goddamn thing. Maybe it meant I wasn’t supposed to hurl it into the nearest trash receptacle–which I soon found was its rightful home.
As for the story, it involves Julie (Georgia Hatzis) a pretty teen who must contend on her own with her obnoxious Jerky Boys-style father after her mother’s death. Our heroine gets together with a few geeky friends to help clean up a house her Mad Daddy just bought. How many teens do you know who would volunteer to help clean a house? Exactly. None.
After a few lame scares Julie has a nude bathtub scene which worked just fine for me (although I wasn’t that knocked out by the tattoo on her a*s). Unfortunately, as she’s soaking, some kind of pink gunk shoots out of the drain and envelopes her. But, thankfully, it’s all just an icky dream. This happens several times in the movie. (Note to the filmmaker: You’re lucky if this sort of “dream” gimmick works once in a movie. Repeating it over and over in a movie that’s well shy of ninety minutes may indicate a lack o’ ideas.)
Is Julie nuts? Will any of the other chicks get naked? These are the questions that haunt us. Into the fray leaps Plummer (Get it?! hee hee hee That’s a funny joke…) played by Philip Harbour. He’s a bearded old fart who finally manages to exorcise the demons from the house’s plumbing. But, sadly, he dies before he can overcharge them for his work, as a good plumber should. Was this supposed to be a comedy? Since it wasn’t funny, let’s hope not. Was it scary? Hell no! Totally imept on every level, “Drainiac!” was the longest eighty-one minutes of my life.
