HALLOWEEN HANGOVER: DON’T KILL IT (2017) ** ½

Don’t Kill It is what happens when you let the director of The Convent, Mike Mendez direct a Dolph Lundgren DTV action movie.  That is to say, it’s a pretty junky, but sort of fun action-horror hybrid.  Mendez was also able to convince Dolph to give one of his most spry performances in a while, for which we should all be grateful.

A hunter finds a golden artifact in the woods and becomes possessed by a demon.  He then goes on a killing spree in his small town.  Every time the host body is killed, the demon hops into the person who killed it.  Hence the title, Don’t Kill It.  Dolph is the demon hunter who wants to trap the spirit permanently before it wipes out the entire town.

The plot is an awful lot like another Lundgren flick, The Minion.  At least this one has a sense of style, a handful of memorable moments, and some gory set pieces.  Mendez has a Raimi-esque way of filming the demon carnage.  He handles all the shotgun blasts, meat cleavers to the face, and heads shoved into boiling water with aplomb.  I also liked the way he edited in the little snippets of Lundgren’s past experiences as a demon hunter, which helps to jazz up what would’ve otherwise been a thoroughly ordinary exposition scene.

The centerpiece is the sequence when a possessed guy starts laying into people with an ax during a town meeting.  This scene is a lot of fun and features some over the top gore.  Not only does the demon change bodies, it changes weapons as the killers use axes, guns, chainsaws, and even a milk truck to take out their victims.

After a crackling start, Don’t Kill It begins to spark and sputter as it enters the second half.  The scenes of Dolph teaming up with an FBI agent to track down the demon are sort of rote.  The movie also gets a little repetitive as the plot keeps finding new ways of having stupid people interrupt Dolph by killing the demon and allowing it to enter their body.  The last act is also kind of weak, especially when you compare it to the stellar town hall sequence from earlier in the film.  

Dolph is quite good.  He’s looser, and more relaxed than usual, and can rattle off demonic exposition in an offhand, funny manner.  He gets a funny introduction scene where he beats up a guy in a bar and then buys him some ice cream.  There’s another memorable bit where the cops think he’s crazy and try to pull him out of the room, but he’s too big and strong to budge.  This is one of his best performances in a long time.  

I can’t say Don’t Kill It ever quite clicks.  I can say it’s just good enough to make me want to see another Mendez/Lundgren team-up.  I just hope the next time the script is a bit tighter.

AKA:  Dolph Lundgren:  Zombie Hunter.  AKA:  The Demon Hunter.