Clown (2014) Review – A Coulrophobic Nightmare

Last night, I had the opportunity of viewing Jon Watts‘ latest film, Clown, produced by Eli Roth. Before I even begin, I would like to give this horror a huge Hell Yeah! Now, I know the whole clown thing tends to unsettle a lot of people, because let’s face it, most people don’t like clowns. But I’m here to tell you that this movie is definitely worth the watch.

Let’s start with a small but interesting comparison to Stephen King‘s It, one of my all time favorite horror flicks. The clowns in both of these movies kill and eat children. However, Watts’ clown only needs 5 children each time a host is possessed, while King’s clown surfaces every 30 years to feed and then goes back to hibernating. Watching Clown, it clear that Watts paid considerable homage to the modern master of horror.

To give you a quick synopsis of Clown, while not spoiling the whole movie, Kent (Andy Powers) is asked to be a clown for his son’s birthday party because the original clown never showed up. Coincidentally, Kent finds a chest containing a clown costume in the basement of a house that he is trying to sell. Needless to say, shit hits the fan. Kent soon discovers that he is unable to take off the costume, suit, clown wig, and nose, because it’s all made the hair and skin of some ancient demon clown. Basically, Kent is changing into the very demon that feeds on children.

If you have ever seen an Eli Roth movie, then you know that he likes to cross the line to push the boundaries of what is acceptable. You saw that in Hostel with the whole torture idea. Well, in Clown, and I shouldn’t be surprised, things are no different with Roth as producer — and you actually see child gore. Seriously, you see blood and guts of children several times. Hell, Kent even bites a kid’s fingers off in one scene. Skip to the end of the film, and you’ll see that Kent isn’t really Kent anymore; he’s more like the demon clown seen in the historical texts shown in the movie.

The Verdict:

Clown is very much worth the time if you love this kind of horror, and it's about time a good clown film was made after all these years. The effects were great and the plot was pretty solid, but the movie could have been about a half an hour longer, even if it was already 10 minutes longer than the typical 90-minute horror movie. Go check this shit out and let us know what you think in the comments section below.