The Munsters – Film Review

Lily is a typical 150-year-old lovelorn vampire who’s looking for the man of her nightmares — until she lays her eyes on Herman, a 7-foot-tall green experiment with a heart of gold. It’s love at first shock as these two ghouls fall fangs over feet for each other in a Transylvanian romance. Unfortunately, it’s not all smooth sailing in the cemetery as Lily’s father has other plans for his beloved daughter’s future, and they don’t involve her new bumbling beau.

Words cannot even begin to express how miserable I was when watching Rob Zombie‘s The Munsters – a genuinely maddeningly annoying and completely stupid horror-comedy that consistently fails at being even remotely funny. Instead of rolling on the floor laughing (like the film wants you to do), you’ll find yourself rolling your eyes every other minute.

It’s actually kind of difficult to talk about a movie like this one because this barely even felt like a movie. It felt like one of those incredibly boring SNL skits you’d watch on YouTube and shake your head at because it’s just so absurd and stupid. The only difference is that The Munsters actually is a movie. Technically, at least.

Every single line of dialogue in this movie is a complete disaster and shows just how unfunny this franchise has always been. It may have been hailed as a big thing back when it was originally released as a television program in 1964, but Zombie’s new adaptation shows that maybe, sometimes, it’s best to leave things in the past. After all, they were buried for a reason.

The biggest problem with the movie is Zombie’s script and direction. It feels unbelievably outdated and doesn’t come equipped with any clever jokes whatsoever. It would have been nice to see this movie perhaps poke fun at certain things regarding this franchise, but that doesn’t happen here, unfortunately.

Perhaps this movie would be funny for a young child or something, but other than that, I cannot think of anyone who would genuinely laugh at the jokes presented in this script. Zombie’s direction also feels so lacklustre and lazy which is shocking because he’s a director who’s practically known for his extremely stylized movies. This does not feel like a Rob Zombie movie at all.

The actors involved in this project do a fine job, most notably Jeff Daniel Phillips in the roles of Herman, Shecky Von Rathbone, and Zombo, respectively. Although the rest of the cast seemed to enjoy being in this film, it’s Phillips who clearly brought forth the most effort.

Unless you’re a diehard fan of The Munsters and all that it stands for, you definitely shouldn’t be checking this film out under any circumstances, unless you like to suffer by watching poor quality “entertainment.” There are far better viewing options out there right now. Heck, there are far better Rob Zombie offerings out there than The Munsters.

Rob Zombie’s The Munsters is an absurdly unfunny mess of a comedy, complete with a painfully weak script and disappointingly weak direction from a typically stylish director.