Director	Thomas Robbins
Writers	Thomas Robbins, Jason Stutter, Paul Yates	Tweet
Starring	Cameron Wakefield, Georgia Tabish, Priyanka Xi, Max Blake-Persen, Thomas Williams, Nick Blake
Genre	Demonology
Tagline	None Listed
Country

Review

Charles Killian has founded a school in colonial New Zealand, that while being well received raises a few eyebrows due to the architectural style. Killian has an ulterior motive, he wants to open a portal to a world of demons and lost souls, not quite sure why. Anyways he enlists the add of pupils from the school for late night satanic ceremonies. This doesn't go unnoticed by the local townsfolk, who show up during one late night ceremony in time honoured fashion. Naturally it ends badly with Killian going up in the flames, no one going to his aid, and Killian placing a curse on the school. He requires eleven souls in order to be resurrected, the souls gained via demonic intervention, something adults will not be able to see. Naturally this all centers around room 21, where the ill fated ceremony took place. Thankfully the Colonials close and lock the room to avoid any post death manipulations.

Flash forward to the present and a new Headmaster wants room 21 unlocked, fitted out as a class room, and ready to rock, much against the advice of an elderly Caretaker. As day follows night the curse comes down with a vengeance as three students face their own personal demons. Let's open the textbook and see what The Killian Curse can teach us.

The Killian Curse ran for two seasons kicking off in 2006 in New Zealand. Each episode comprised three separate stories based around the central plot arc of Killian trying to resurrect himself via taking the souls of eleven pupils in room 21. The basic structure thus allowed for some exploration of horror themes and monsters, while the show being firmly set in kidult territory precluded anything resembling gore seeping in between the cracks. As a made for television venture there is also a lack of overall polish and some wooden performances from a predominately young cast.

Episode one naturally starts with The Beginning, a re-enactment of what went down during the final ceremony Killian attempted. It sets up the show nicely without over playing the budget via special effects or anything remotely resembling a pilot. Killian's body was never found, the curse is in place, hey ho let's go. Naturally a 100 or so years late the cursed room is re-opened and given a dust off in order to function as a class room. Strangely we get a reiteration of the events we have just sat through via the Caretaker, who in this school at least is allowed to lecture children and pretty much get away with assault. Anyway the episode ends with Killian going 1-0 up via David facing his own personal demons, and I guess being zombified? The plot isn't too clear on this point, but whatever, adults can't see the new and improved David as anything but normal. Good first stanza, we have our plot framework and a demonstration of what it's all about Alfie. I would have much rather seen a one hour pilot episode, the episode runs a scant 23 minutes, with more exploration of Killian's background and motivation, before a general nailing of the first score. The plot leaves a lot to be desired in terms of motivation, and strangely we get a narrator that starts off well but then disappears by the second story.

The show lacks respect for it's target audience, failing to match their more sophisticated requirements in the modern era.

Speaking of the second story, we are firmly out of the harbour here and things are cruising into normal viewing. Celia, who we know is the class brain due to her wearing glasses, faces the demon of possession in the aptly named Possessor. This demonic entity can jump from person to person via eye contact, say what! Our young Regan candidate dispenses with pea soup but manages to defeat the demon via doing a bit of research, study is good kids, especially if facing demonic entities intent on stealing your soul.

The final story in our trilogy of terror features a fat kid, who I guess represents the sin of gluttony, in Warlock. The charming tale of a Wizard who drains the fat from the appendages of weight challenged juveniles in order to cast flying spells and the like. The Killian Curse is starting to get all prim and proper with the narrative pointing out the dangers of over eating. Our pudding boy, Johnny Campbell, does eventually avoid being soul hostage number two, but I have to say the story was pretty much unappetising in it's blatant purloining of A Nightmare On Elm Street (1984) style trappings. A bigger budget and we would have had Freddy's surreal dream world I'm sure.

Director Thomas Robbins goes bucked naked crazy with the colour filters, primarily blue, but fails to achieve any level of actual “horror”. He may be aiming for a kidult audience, but come on put some oomph into things, this is all pretty much limped wristed in a horror sense to be honest. Even the use of fish eyed lens at one stage appeared to be just an attempt to do something interesting, rather than a filming technique used to raise the chill level or add tension to things. Yes we got the normal filming when things were from an Adult viewpoint, and the filters etc when only the kids could see demonic activity. Pretty second rate stuff nevertheless really, Robbins could have at least tried to elevate things beyond the small screen scale of a particularly bad soap opera.

I was left bemused by The Killian Curse's opening gambit, while clearly the show is aimed at naive teens it really does nothing to hold their attention. Maybe if this outing had of been considered in the 1960s it might have had something of an impact, problem here is Audiences by 2006 are far more sophisticated than the show allows them to be. No recommendation, a poor attempt at an anthology format.

If you really must score the DVDs for your viewing pleasure then I would suggest trying Mighty Ape, where for under $25 you can get your Killian on.

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