BUBBA HO-TEP (2002; Released 2003)
SilverSphere Corp.

By Désirée I. Guzzetta

Based on a short story by Joe R. Lansdale, Bubba Ho-Tep has one of strangest plots I’ve ever seen, and I’ve seen Bubba director Don Coscarelli’s Phantasm--not to mention all of the Basket Case series! Now stick with me on this because there is a payoff: After giving us definitions of both “Ho-Tep” and “Bubba,” then some “old” newsreel footage of the discovery of Amen Ho-Tep’s remains, the movie jumps forward to the present where we find out that Elvis Presley (the very talented Bruce Campbell) is alive, not so well (he may have cancer of the penis and is impotent), and living in a rest home called Mud Creek Shady Rest in Texas.

Yes, I said Elvis Presley.

It seems ol’ Elvis got tired of the rigmarole of fame one day and switched places with one Sebastian Haff (also played by Campbell), the best Elvis impersonator he ever met. Haff was the one who died “on the crapper,” Elvis tells us, adding that the contract which proves there was a deal between the two men was burned up in an unfortunate barbecue accident. Of course, the nurses and such don’t believe Elvis is really Elvis; they think he’s just Haff gone halfwit.

But wait—there’s more! In the same rest home lives the John F. Kennedy (Ossie Davis).

Yes, I said Ossie Davis is playing JFK, or Jack, as he prefers to be called.

It seems that after that fateful day in Dallas, Jack’s brain was taken out and replaced with a sack of sand and his skin was dyed black to conceal his identity lest Lyndon Johnson finish him off. His real brain is kept alive by batteries and stored in the White House, and it occasionally sends him telepathic messages.

But wait—I’m not done!

At this very same rest home there’s a mummy, whom Elvis dubs “Bubba Ho-Tep,” preying on the elderly by sucking out their souls. Through their, um, well, there’s no quite polite way to say this: through their butts. Only Elvis and Jack know that Bubba is the reason so many of their fellow rest home denizens are dropping dead, whether losing their souls or having heart attacks at the sight of the ancient monster dressed in cowboy garb (they are in Texas, after all). Anyway, it’s up to our two heroes to defeat the soul-sucking jerk before he can claim more victims.

I told you it was strange.

Here’s the payoff: the film is rather good, even though Coscarelli can't quite sustain the conceit for 92 minutes; i.e., sometimes the film is slow to mirror the pace of life in the rest home, and other times, it’s just slow. As frequently happens in the best horror films, though, there’s much more going on under the surface than death and destruction. Bubba Ho-Tep says a lot about how our society hides and then discards its elderly. This attitude is personified by the two jackass funeral home workers who function as both comic relief and symbols of the callousness with which we can treat those we no longer see as useful. After all, a crusty, slow-moving mummy can prey on the residents of Shady Rest and no one notices except two ostensibly crazy old codgers.

Davis is awesome, and Campbell proves again that his excellent dramatic turn on “Homicide: Life on the Street” was no fluke—not to mention that his own Elvis impersonation is damn good. Both men are very effective at showing that even though advanced age slows one down, having to undertake a challenge can bring spryness back to the synapses.

Coscarelli uses interesting shots and cuts to show how Elvis drifts in and out of consciousness so that his days pass in drugged-out, almost incomprehensible moments. The rest home is appropriately dark and dreary, with sparse furnishings in Elvis's shared room, though Jack, being a former president, gets a better deal with his single room housing a double bed.

Despite the morbid topic, the movie is very funny. "How could I have gone from a rock ‘n’ roll star to an old guy in a rest home with a growth on his pecker?” muses Elvis at one point. If there’s any justice in Hollywood—although I don’t know who I think I’m kidding when I say that—both Campbell and Davis will get nominated for Oscars for Best Actor and Best Supporting Actor respectively because they are both fantastic in their roles. Also notable is Ella Joyce as Elvis’s feisty nurse.

Bubba Ho-Tep isn’t the best mummy movie I’ve seen, but it is highly entertaining, strangely thought-provoking, and all-around fun. Be sure to be lazy like me and stick around for the credits and you’ll be rewarded with a good joke, too.

All things Bubbarific: http://www.bubbahotep.com/

SilverSphere Corp.
Director/Screenwriter: Don Coscarelli (based on a short story by Joe R. Lansdale)
Starring: Bruce Campbell (Elvis), Ossie Davis (Jack Kennedy), Ella Joyce (Nurse), Reggie Bannister (Rest Home Administrator), Bob Ivy (Bubba Ho-Tep)
Running Time: 1 hour, 32 minutes
Rated: R

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