The Gingerdead Man (2005)

An evil yet adorable Gingerbread man comes to life with the soul of a convicted killer - this real life cookie monster wreaks havoc on the girl who sent the killer to the electric chair. (Imdb rating 3.3)

Gary Busey is a living, walking collection of crazy. Over the last twenty years, I think he's personally gone out his way to attach his name to every single piece of released lunacy he possibly could. Even on the rare occasion he's not a complete fruitcake on screen (Predator 2?), you can see something lurking below the enormous teeth and messy white hair, a sense of some shoddy wiring and screws loose in that brain of his. Here, he's the titular character, a killer gingerbread man. He's so unglued normally that when we see him at the start of the movie, the fact that he needed no changes from his everyday appearance to look like a serial killer and he says "something in here smells feminine!" doesn't make me bat an eyelid.

And who comes up with the concept of a killer gingerbread man? That's hands down one of the dumbest villain ideas I've ever heard of. After coming to life, the Gingerdead Man (it repulses me to even say that) seems more intent on arguing with rats and delivering half-baked puns (ha!) then killing people. Even when he does decide to attack, he'd much rather booby trap building exits and run you over with your own car.

But the puns, by God, they are awful. The villain spouts them constantly after dispatching victims, but the other characters are worse. One character calls him the "Killsberry Doughboy", then suggests they take him on Letterman because "how much dough can you make from a talking cookie?" He then laughs at his joke, as every single person watching this movie groans in disgust.

That 'joke' did flip my insanity rating closer to the sacred level of 'Gary Busey'.

Even moving away from the killer cookie concept (hard, I know), the rest of the movie is just as terrible. We get random gun violence against banners, plastic revolvers that can shoot twenty bullets before reloading and the world's most tame catfight ever. It was like watching two blind guys grope each other in slow motion. The composer even feels the need to occasionally let us know that a pun was had by putting in a "BM CHK!"-esque musical cue afterwards. What was just said means two things at once, which is funny, I get it.

I've blasted this movie pretty much this whole review, but it was amusing and made me laugh at times. It's also ridiculously short, clocking in at 60 minutes (with 10 minutes of credits!). It's a piece of lightweight fluff, something that is designed to draw you in based on the inane title/Busey combo, make a few doughy puns, and leave. It can't rightly judge it too harshly based on that.

Things I learnt:

• There's a beauty contest called "Ms Pretty Face of Waco".
• Visions of killer gingerbread men are a common occurrence when drunk.
• Bakeries and chain restaurants are in direct competition with each other.