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Reed Alexander's Horror Review of 'Gingerdead Man' (2005)

If you can't stand the horror, get out of the bakery...

By Reed AlexanderPublished 5 years ago 4 min read
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Look at that fucking DVD box art. Look at it! Take a moment to draw it in. Think about how fucking ridiculous that is. This is another movie where if you actively chose to watch it, and were disappointed with what you got, YOU are the problem. Just the fucking name lets you know, without any uncertainty, the producers of this movie weren't out to make serious cinema. If you didn't go into this with a group of friends, a ton of booze, and the intention to riff this movie back to the stone age, I question your cognitive capacity.

This movie is brain damage in motion. I mean that almost literally, considering that Gary Busey voices the Gingerdead Man. You know it's funny, his acting was actually kinda good for such a cheese ball movie. You really gotta appreciate the fact that Busey always goes all in. Probably doesn't know anything else because of the traumatic brain injury. He must have seen the script and just giggled like a little school girl. You know he must've had fun making this.

I digress. This movie is about a killer confection that stands only about a foot tall. They don't even try to set up an exposition as to how the black magic that summons him even works. Some random person in a black robe just dumps off gingerbread mix with the ashes of a killer, and BOOM! Killer cookie! There's no fucking incantation, no sacred symbols, no special reagents. The killer's ashes, a little blood, mix it all in some gingerbread dough, bake at 350, add an electrical short, and slather on the Gary Busey. Mind you, all of those things are pretty fucking random. It goes beyond Deus Ex Machina (Deus Ex Cookie lol), it all just falls together perfectly because, goddamn it, we're getting a fucking killer cookie!

What's really hammy about this is the ashes were added intentionally to gingerbread mix by the mysterious robed figure. That means this person, for whatever reason, actively wanted the killer to be reanimated as a gingerbread man. I mean, it seems like they could have simply raised him up as a zombie, or even used his ashes to possess something a little more threatening than a cookie. No, this person intentionally made a killer cookie.

Of course most of the acting was shit. Of course the plot was non existent. Of course the practical FX were a total joke. Jesus fucking Christ, the goddamn Gingerdead Man puppet looks like something someone pulled out of Fangoria Magazine. And all of that is exactly why anyone should want to watch this cheese ball movie. Watch it BECAUSE it’s fucking bad, BECAUSE it’s a fucking train wreck. These ARE the reason to love it!

All of those ingredients make for the perfect kind of silly, slapstick horror. You have abso-fucking-lutely no reason to be watching Gingerdead Man unless that’s exactly what you are craving.

Obviously, I can only really recommend this movie to Riffers and the most hardcore of Horror Heads, but I absolutely do recommend it.

SPOILERS!!!

You know, there was a lot of fun to be had that I sorta wished they'd gone after. There's this confrontation between the Gingerdead Man and a rat. I wanted a full on, puppet extraordinaire, no holds barred, knock down-drag out, brawl between the evil cookie and the rat. I don't know why I wanted that so damn bad. The Gingerdead Man starts talking smack to this rat and it just seemed like the kind of place they should go balls out. It’s the kind of shit the movie did right so it seems weird that they didn’t jump on that opportunity. If you're serving something up at this level of crazy, never hold back! How awesome would have that been?

It also could have followed up with another scene in spectacular fashion. You find out this evil cookie can possess someone if they eat him. One of the bakers tries to kill him by eating him and gets possessed. It would have been fun for the rat to eat the remnants of the baker and get possessed for a hot minute. They wouldn't even need to do a lot with the scene, just have the rat go all creepy red-eyed and maybe get thrown into an oven or something.

Even without these things, it was a fucking riot and I'd recommend this movie to anyone who's into that kind of thing.

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About the Creator

Reed Alexander

I'm a horror author and foulmouthed critic of all things horror. New reviews posted every Monday.

@ReedsHorror on TikTok, Threads, Instagram, YouTube, and Mastodon.

Check out my books on Godless: https://godless.com/products/reed-alexander

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