“Day of the Wicked” Now on DVD!
Down on his luck John Jones finds work at a special construction job, restoring an old Japanese school house in the outskirts of Hawaii. Excited to work with his longtime friend Chelsea, he arrives days ahead to stay in the old schoolhouse after going through an ugly divorce and losing his car to maintenance issues. Jones stumbles upon the book of the dead, the Necronomicon, and it consumes his soul to do the bidding of an evil Kane, the former school master who took the soul of 35 school children and looks to return to the corporeal realm to do more soul taking. When the rest of the workers arrive days later, Jones’s already peculiar behavior is magnified by call of the Necronomicon’s influence, and he is constantly bullied by the other workers to a breaking point of Jones using the book to summon demons from out the netherworld and possess them. All hell breaks loose on the school grounds and with bodies succumbing to evil possession, those left will have to stop Jones and Kane before it’s too late.
Borrowing concepts and ideas to integrate, pretty deliberately, into their own film, Blake and Brent Cousins, under their merged directorial title of the Cousin Brothers, director the demonic action-horror “Day of the Wicked” where a group of unfortunate souls find themselves isolated in the middle of the woods during the opening of a gateway to hell. In fact, the 2024 U.S. feature is a squeal or remake of their 1991 SOV debut film “Slaughter Day” that roughly follows the same plotline with construction workers in Hawaii. The two films are written by the brothers who have since specialized over the years helming extraterrestrial documentaries, such as “Who Saw Men in Black” and “Nexus to Disclosure: The Truth is Classified,” as well as navigating their own individual talents with Blake Cousins’ editor role on “Rising Dead”” and Brent Cousins taking on the cinematography role with mostly in the documentary field. Like its predecessor, The Cousins Brothers remake was too filmed on the Big Island of Hawaii.
“Day of the Wicked” is mostly filled with island locals who’ve only worked with the Cousin Brothers or haven’t seen the front end of a lens before. The story surrounds centralized sympathetic villain John Jones, played by Gabe Hernandez who last worked with the brothers on “Rising Dead” over 25 years ago, who must teeter the line on being the oddball punching bag for blue collar construction workers and the driving force that unleashes unholiness in dimension-splitting troves. Like the rest of the cast, Hernandez has forced articulation that’s more exclamatory than natural as he splices the efforts between good guy and bad guy. Jones serves the rousing Kane (Jean Louis Goff), a 3rd world knockoff of Julian Beck’s “Poltergeist II” character of the same name. Named the same and dressed very similar with long black church clothes and wide brim hat, Kane seldomly evokes the same sinister strength witnessed by a very feeble Julian Beck at the time of filming “Poltergeist II,” resulting in one of the most unforgettable and haunting characters haling from the 80s. “Day of the Wicked’s” Kane doesn’t have the lingering appeal and is barely skimmed at the surface, heavily relying on Gabe Hernandez to be the vessel of evil. The vessel of good is another story as there’s no real hero or protagonist for the role other than Gabe’s childhood friend Chelsea, a fruit stand shift worker who doesn’t express her qualifications working at a construction site other than her electrician friend Gabe. Actress Chelsea J. Schaffer, in her namesake role, has slightly better acting intuition compared to some of her cast mates but her primary objective in the movie is to defend John Jones against the bullies with her secondary objective to flee the quickly succumbing demonic supernaturality structure. The cast fills out with construction workers doing more horseplay and gossip than actual work with Cameron Cousins, Bryan Gazaui, Trent Carrier, Orlando Smith and rounding out with the local Sheriff in Doc Skinner with Guy Pohlman and Apolla Asteria as Hollywood-based researchers of the Necronomicon.
“Slaughter Day” draws from “The Evil Dead” series with unmistakable measure but it’s three decades later sequel and/or remake, “Day of the Wicked,” adds a plumpier version of “Poltergeist II’s” Reverend Henry Kane to the mix, down to the full black pastor suit, wide brim hat, and white hair, to be the in tandem driving evil force with the shoddily constructed, Temu version of The Book of the Dead, the Necronomicon, that supplies the unstable and unloved Joe Jones his sinister powers of conjuring and psychokinetic manipulation. From there, the Cousin Brothers’ endearing effort to re-envision their 1991 film, an endearing effort in itself, aims to reach a different, more contemporary, audience generation that make retroactively work toward their debut production. Another difference, and perhaps even a downgrade to an extent, is “Day of the Wicked” shies away from most practical effects for more visual effects that does no harm to structures, puts no actors in compromising makeup, sprays Coke can’s worth of blood, and looks about as authentic as a backwards Nike logo. Yet, with all the cringy acting and dialogue, the rehashed storyline, and little-to-no practical effects whatsoever, I’m not totally turned off by the VFX that involves large hands, monstrous heads, and opening fissures to be composited into the frame along with the actors and there’s an entertaining blend of the two images that so ridiculously bad, it’s good.
Wild Eye Releasing picks up “Day of the Wicked” for DVD release that’s been written onto a MPEG2 encoded, 720p standard resolution, DVD5 and presented in a widescreen 1.78:1 aspect ratio. “Day of the Wicked’s” digital image is clean, no surprise, but the what’s more amazing is the detail comes over nicely, especially on facial features and the dilapidated schoolhouse structure. In appraising facial features, the contours are greatly defined, sweat has isolating gleaming that doesn’t spread, and all the hair, pore, and distinct facial molecules are evident as well as their foreign bodies, such as piercings. The visual effects are the only exception to mastering details overall as they’ve been manipulated into the frame and can provide a blurry integration when in composite action. The uncompressed LPCM Stereo 2.0 is ample but not as refined with a subtle crackling breakage in the higher dialogue and action. Dialogue renders good with clarity but struggles within the hierarchy as the soundtrack can be absorbent. Not a ton of opportunity for depth as much of the narrative is held inside the old schoolhouse, which does manage flexing some echo here and there, and the range is plentiful between the composited effects busting out of the ground, walls, and ceilings with a few roaring exclamations from the demonic creatures. The only downside is there no punchy impact to these effects, limited by the dual channel output. There are no option subtitles. Essentially, the Wild Eye Releasing is feature-only except for a trailer for others in the Wild Eye Releasing catalogue. “Day of the Wicked” is not rated, has a runtime of 97 minutes, and has region free playback.
Last Rites: A remake of a film that was already pulling heavy influence from a cult classic. It’s enough to make your head spin like a Kandarian demon. “Day of the Wicked” doesn’t break the mold or redefine the narrative and is pretty careless with it but horror is supposed to be fun, inspiring, and outrageous and the Cousin Brothers check all three boxes.
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