SHAKMA (1990) * ½

Int.  Producer’s Office.  Hollywood.  Day.

Producer #1:  Killer Monkey movies all the rage with the kids today.  The box office returns from Link and Monkey Shines prove that.  We’ve got to strike while the iron is hot.  What do you have for me?

Screenwriter:  Well, I have a lot of ideas actually.  First, we can…

Producer #1 (Pours a giant pile of cocaine on his desk):  Hold up, before we begin, I’m not spending much on this thing.  What can we afford to put in this movie?  

Producer #2:  Well, I have a buddy who can give me the keys to the science building at the local community college.  Also, my kids really love that Dungeons and Dragons computer game crap, maybe we can work that into the plot somehow.

Producer #1 (Chopping up the coke with a razor blade):  What about star power?   

Producer #2:  We could probably afford that kid from The Blue Lagoon, although he’s not a kid anymore and is way too old to play a college student.  Maybe one of the girls from A Nightmare on Elm…

Producer #1 (Putting the cocaine into neat little lines):  Don’t give me that!  I need a big name!  

Producer #2:  How about someone like Roddy McDowall?

Producer #1 (Snorts a big line of cocaine):  He was just in those Fright Night movies.  I bet he’s expensive.  We can probably only afford him for one day.  Two tops.  What about the monkey?

Producer #2 (Snorts a big line of cocaine):  I have that all worked out.  A friend of mine runs a zoo and has a red-assed baboon we can use.

Producer #1:  Is it trained?

Producer #2:  All it knows how to do is run after someone who is about to close a door.  Then when the door is shut, it pounds its fists against the door and screams.

Screenwriter (Snorts a big line of cocaine):  Perfect!  I can write dozens of scenes where it’s chasing characters in the science building and just when it’s about the strike, the character shuts the door just in the nick of time.  

Producer #2:  Hmm… will it be suspenseful?

Screenwriter:  Hell no.  But it will pad out the film.

Producer #1 (Snorts a big line of cocaine):  So, wait.  Why are they in the science building again?

Screenwriter (Rubbing cocaine along his gums):  I have that all worked out.  Since we’re making the computer game a big plot point, the characters can be LARPing.

Producer #2 (Snorts a big line of cocaine):  What the hell is that?

Screenwriter (Snorts a big line of cocaine):  It’s like playing Dungeons and Dragons.  Except instead of being huddled in a basement, they wander around the halls picking up clues and…

Producer #1:  This sounds like nerd shit.  Where does Roddy come in?

Screenwriter:  We’ll just sit him at a desk for three-quarters of his screen time.  He can facilitate the game as the dungeon master and communicate with the students via walkie-talkie.

Producer #2:  That way we can shoot all his scenes while everyone else is at lunch.  Perfect.  So, how will it all fit together?

Screenwriter (Snorts three big lines of cocaine):  These nerdy med students lock themselves in a science building after hours so they can do live-action D & D shit with their professor, played by Roddy.  You see, he performed an experiment on the baboon’s brain to increase its aggressiveness.  His students were SUPPOSED destroy the baboon, but the dumbasses were so wrapped up with their roleplaying shit that they forget to cremate it.  Then, the pissed-off baboon breaks loose and begins killing the students.

Producer #1 (Reaching into his desk to get some more cocaine):  This is gonna be great.  This is gonna be a respectable picture.  Like all respectable pictures, it’s got to be over a hundred minutes long.

Screenwriter:  Sir, with this thin of a plot there’s no way we can make this thing last over a hundred minutes.  There’s barely enough plot here for an eighty-minute movie.

Producer #1 (Chops up a big pile of cocaine):  If that’s the case we have to pad out the movie a bit.  No big deal.  Most of these things are nothing but long scenes of people splitting up and slowly walking down hallways anyway. 

Screenwriter:  Even if I put in double the usual amount of those scenes, it still won’t be long enough. 

Producer #2 (Pulls out a glass vial of cocaine from his sportscoat and snorts the contents):  I know!  How about if every time the hero finds a dead body of his classmate, he picks them up and moves them around from room to room. 

Screenwriter:  Why would he do that?

Producer #2:  I have no idea, but it will eat up a lot of screen time. 

Screenwriter:  Roger that.  Speaking of bodies, how will the characters be killed if the killer is a baboon? 

Producer #1 (Snorts a big line of cocaine):  Well.  It’s a baboon.  Probably the only thing it can do is rip people’s throats out.

Producer #2 (Snorts a big line of cocaine):  Besides, we only have room in the budget for one cockamamie gore effect.  

Screenwriter (Snorts a big line of cocaine):  Well, at least let’s make that memorable.  How about if a guy accidentally pours acid in his face and it melts off. 

Producer #1 (Snorts a big line of cocaine):  Brilliant.  I think my face is melting off as we speak.  (Snorts another line of cocaine) So, do we have a title?

Screenwriter (Snorts an enormous line of cocaine):  Yes.  (Snorts another line for good measure) Shakma.

Producer #2 (Snorts massive line of cocaine):  What the fuck does that mean?

Screenwriter (Bleeding profusely from the nostrils):  I have no fucking clue.  I’m so high right now I’m just making words up.

Producer #1:  Great.  We start shooting in the morning.  Right now, we have to snort some more cocaine!

AKA:  Panic in the Tower.  AKA:  Nemesis.