Freaked

Winter plays Ricky Coogin, a spoiled young brat pack actor who tells the story of a horrible ordeal to TV interviewer Skye Daley (Brooke Shields). Coogin is recruited to be a spokesman for the E.E.S. (Everything Except Shoes) corporation, which is facing widespread opposition for its manufacture of Zygrot-27, an allegedly toxic chemical. Fending off the pursuing Stuey Gluck (Alex Zuckerman), an obnoxious young fan, Ricky arrives in the South American country of Santa Flan with his buddie Ernie (Michael Stoyanov) for a personal appearance. There, he is smitten when he spots Julie (Megan Ward), a pretty environmentalist who's there to protest E.E.S., disguises himself in full-body bandages, and persuades her to travel with himself and Ernie.

In the course of their drive, Ricky's cover is blown, but Julie is distracted by signs for Elijah C. Skuggs' local freakshow. She persuades them to make a stop there, and they are greeted by Skuggs (Randy Quaid), a barker in the classic tradition who takes them inside. But Skuggs makes freaks (using the Zygrot-27 chemical) in addition to exhibiting them, and Ernie and Julie wind up joined together down the middle, while Ricky is half-transformed into a hideous, gargoyle-like beast. Imprisoned in the freaks' quarters, he meets Skuggs' other unusual creations, who have learned to live with their new identities. But Ricky will have none of it, and attempts an escape. He's captured, however, by Skuggs' giant, machine-gun toting eyeball guards, and taken to the barker's shack. There, Ricky learns that Skuggs plans to fully transform him into a horrific beast who will kill off the others before an audience the next night.

Returning to the freaks' quarters, Ricky tells the others what he has heard, and the group forges a plan to sneak into Skuggs' lab and create a formula that will turn Ricky into a superhuman good freak that will save the rest. They manage to concoct the potion, but it winds up left behind at the lab. The next day, several trucks arrive from E.E.S.--who are, in fact, in cahoots with Skuggs--and Ricky discovers, through a psychic bond he's acquired with Stuey, that the boy has been captured by them. He persuades the kid to retrieve the good-freak potion, but during the show, Stuey gets it spilled on himself instead and becomes an oversized creature. Skuggs transforms Ricky into the evil super-freak, but Stuey persuades Ricky to return to the side of good. Just as Skuggs is mutating the E.E.S. men, who have double-crossed him, Ricky tosses the evil monster-maker into his own chemicals. The result is a creature that looks just like Skye Daley--and back on the show, Daley/Skuggs attempts to kill Ricky (who, like the others, has returned to normal after unknowingly eating some cookies containing an antidote). But Julie arrives to shoot the creature down and run into the arms of Ricky, whom she now loves.

FREAKED, which Winter and Tom Stern (who collaborated on the MTV comedy show "The Idiot Box") directed and wrote with Tim Burns, plays as if they took every joke they ever wanted to put in a movie and threw them all into this one. The wacked-out plot is constantly punctuated with one-liners, non sequiturs, and comic jabs at all manner of cinematic conventions. In one scene, for example, several of the freaks indulge in flashback reminiscences of how Skuggs transformed them, and the camera then pans to a hammer--which has its own flashback about how it was once an innocent wrench. The result is a film that plays like a Mad magazine parody come to life and designed by bizarro comic artist Basil Woolverton.

At only 80 minutes (thanks to prerelease cutting by 20th Century Fox), FREAKED rarely flags, and most of the various freaky characters get a chance to shine. These include a worm-man (Derek McGrath), who talks like an English professor; a character with a sock puppet for a head, voiced by Bobcat Goldthwait; Mr. T as the bearded lady; and Winter's old BILL & TED-mate Keanu Reeves in an uncredited cameo as Ortiz the Dog Boy. Best of all is Quaid as the villainous Skuggs, a part he sinks his teeth into and plays to the hilt, yet never allows to go over the top into silliness. The makeup effects for the various characters, designed by a large team of artists, are all first-rate, never resorting to intentional tackiness for a cheap laugh.

Though clearly not for every taste, FREAKED aims for such a wide assortment of comic targets and has such a determinedly skewed sensibility that it could easily have become a major cult hit. Sadly, Fox dumped it out into only a handful of theaters, where it barely had a chance to make an impression before it was whisked away to videoland. Too bad--the film demonstrates that Winter and Stern, while undisciplined, are genuine comic talents in the making. (Violence, profanity.) leave a comment