Bones

Bones

BONES features rapper Snoop Dogg in his first starring role as the benevolent neighborhood kingpin, Jimmy Bones, who is betrayed and murdered in 1979, and returns to get his horrific revenge twenty years later. Patrick (Khalil Kain), the son of one of the witnesses to the murder, Jeremiah (Clifton Powell), decides to turn the creepy abandoned brownstone where Bones once lived into a nightclub. He and his crew move into the building, where a terrifying presence makes itself known. Patrick also meets the beautiful Cinnabar (Bianca Lawson), the daughter of Bones' old flame, Pearl (Pam Grier). But the vengeful spirit released from the old house jeopardizes their newfound love, and their lives. Drenched in stage blood and sprinkled with sex, BONES delivers its gory chills in the style of Italian horror masters like Mario Bava and Dario Argento, with a touch of Clint Eastwood's Man With No Name thrown in. Director Ernest Dickerson proved his skill at horror with the entertaining TALES FROM THE CRYPT: DEMON KNIGHT.

Bones [VHS]

Sleepy-eyed hip-hop luminary Snoop Dogg stars in Bones, an energetic horror film about a hustler who returns from the dead. Jimmy Bones used to rule his street, but now his body lies in the basement of a gothic abandoned house. When a troupe of young DJs and promoters decide to turn the house into a nightclub, dark forces are, unsurprisingly, unleashed. Bones has a cutting sense of humor, and Ernest Dickerson's direction snaps, crackles, and pops. It's not exactly subtle--the opening scene launches into gore and special effects--but there is some evocative imagery, particularly a large black hellhound that the club kids foolishly adopt as a pet. Snoop casts an effectively spectral aura, and Pam Grier, as the hustler's psychically gifted former girlfriend, has her usual presence and energy. All in all, a dynamic and enjoyable horror flick. --Bret Fetzer