Leprechaun 4: In Space

X- Entertainment had a review of this movie, and it looked promising. If you haven't read it, I encourage you to go there now. After reading the review and synopsis, it was, of course, my duty to watch it. I took over 2 pages of handwritten notes.

This movie was fabulous. The dialogue was witty. The effects were fabulous. The movie was creepy. This is how I would describe the movie if I lived in the early 1900's and had a frontal lobotomy. Unfortunately, that is not the case. There is no good reason for this movie to be. None.

If you've seen the Leprechaun movies (or any Lucky Charms commercials) you'd know all about Leprechauns. Well, you'd know enough to get by. This movie is the fourth in a series starring the great Warwick Davis, who has appeared in two Star Wars movies, Willow, and several others. You know how some guys get crap jobs in factories to get by and occasionally win some money on football bets? This is pretty much the same thing. Warwick Davis does the Leprechaun movies for a steady paycheck, and occasionally, George Lucas hires him.

Anyway, this is a movie review, so I may as well review the movie. Here's what happens, as I see it.

There's a platoon of Marines (by platoon, I mean about 6) on a ship. Their sergeant is a cyborg. We can tell he's a cyborg because he has aluminum foil on his head. Also aboard the ship is a scientist (whose only purpose is to lose her pants later), a weasely assistant, and Ernst Blofeld.

The ship is a bad 3-d graphic that looks like a rough draft from a Star Wars fan film. The acting was high school caliber. In fact, I was expecting to hear someone yell, "Cut!" and the camera panning to a guy in the audience talking about motivation. The dialogue contained lines like:

Who's driving this, Ray Charles?
I've seen worse. Y'ever been to Dee-troit?
Gold is power.

So anyway, Leprechaun, an Irish mythological figure, is on some sound stage in space (the sets all look like they're from Mystery Science Theater 3000). He has captured an alien princess who looks like Greenlee from All My Children dressed in a bad knockoff of Princess Leia's slave outfit. I think they mention her name once or twice, but I'll just call her Greenlee. Lep wants to marry Greenlee to get rich. To entice her, he chains her to a wall and makes costume jewelry appear from nothingness. I guess costume jewelry is valuable, which raises the question: If he can conjure up wealth from nothing, why does he need her?

Well, the Marines land, and Lep kills one of them using a lightsabre. A Marine throws a grenade, and Lep, rather than making it magically disappear or turning it into a lucky marshmallow, jumps on it. He blows up. No more Leprechaun. The Marine who threw the grenade walks over and pees on the remains, which send a bolt of green electricity up his urine stream to zap him. Oh, and they take Greenlee back to the ship.

To celebrate their victory, they all go to the disco mess hall (which is dimly lit, has one table, and a disco ball). The guy who peed on the remains runs off with the token large-breated female Marine. They hide in the toxic storage area to get naked. Things start getting pretty intense and the guy says the greatest line in cinematic history, "Oh baby, shake hands with the big guy." This, being in a guy movie, really turns her on. But they never get to do anything because the Leprechaunhas respawned inside "the big guy" and come out to show us all his John Wayne impression. Then he starts speaking in verse.

Meanwhile, there's white guys dancing with Token Black Guy making fun of them, and Greenlee's in a coma. Token Woman comes in. It turns out Mr. Big Guy was killed. They need to catch the Leprechaun. Logically, the first place they look is the toxic waste disposal. Since there's toxic waste there, they have to wear large trash bags. Wouldn't you know it, Lep is hiding there. He cuts open one guy's trash bag

Enter Blofeld. Until now, we've only seen his face. Now we see all of him. He's a cross between a man and a shopping cart. The animatronic version is thinner and has a tan. Some stuff happens here. None of it makes any sense. In my notes I have written:


Lep talks to the camera again.
Token Female's a slut.
Lep's powers are pretty much limitless.
AND
Lep appears in a safety video and starts cutting off his fingers.

Back in the science room (where they have all the science stuff), we learn that Greenlee's DNA is similar to Wolverine's, giving her amazing regenerative abilities. This comes into play later too. Meanwhile, the remaining Marines are hunting Lep, and Token Woman finds him and blows him up. Since that never works, Lep throws her over the catwalk. As she's dangling, he does This little piggy with her fingers. Here's a question, and a valid one at that. The little rhyme, as I and everyone I know learned it, goes like this:

This little piggy went to the market.
This little piggy stayed home.
This little piggy had roast beef.
This little piggy had none.
And this little piggy cried wee wee wee all the way home.

But when Lep does it, instead of having roast beef, the third little piggy has bread and butter. Is this a cultural difference or does he just not know what he's talking about? I'd really like to know. If you have any idea, drop me a line.

Back to the review, it turns out the Leprechaun is not only an Irish mythological figure. He's also a shapeshifting Vulcan Jedi, and he has gagged Blofeld with one of those S & M balls from Pulp Fiction. To make matters worse, he has a blender full of Greenlee's DNA, and he mixes it with a spider and a scorpion. Not their DNA, mind you, but the whole thing. Then he injects the concoction into Blofeld's head. Then the Marines show up, and Greenlee shows them her boobs. It turns out that when a member of the royal family from her planet flashes her boobs, it's a death sentence. Sounds like a poor excuse for a gratuitous boob shot if you ask me, but what can you do.

So, now the Sarge is dancing around in drag while lip-synching, so the scientist uses her karate skills on him. He runs into something electric and gets electrocuted. Elsewhere, Blofeld has turned into a giant spider/scorpion/Bond villain. He's hungry, and the flies on the ship are insufficient.

Also, Lep and Greenlee are in the cargo hold. Lep uses his magic to give Greenlee acne, and then he gets zapped with a growth ray. Long story short (too late), Blofeld wants to eat scientists, but of course there's liquid nitrogen tanks lying around. The scientist loses her pants and opens the door to the cargo bay. Lep gets sucked out and explodes.