By Emi Gruender and Mia Hanuska
Welcome back to Groovy Movies, where The Shield writers Emi Gruender and Mia Hanuska scour Amazon Prime’s movie selection to find the most hilariously terrible movies! This episode, we tried to keep our toes from freezing and popped some popcorn, unaware of the jumpscares that awaited us. And thus: Crackcoon, a vicious and gory tale about a coked-up racoon, began to play.
**Disclaimer: This article discusses drug related and sexually explicit content and is not recommended for younger audiences. View at your own discretion**
Episode 9: Crackcoon
★★★★★★☆☆☆☆ — 6/10
*Beware! Spoilers below!*
From the director of Cracksquatch and Crackodile, Crackcoon stars a very chaotic Appalachian town (with no clear protagonist, though it’s half-heartedly suggested halfway through) and, of course, a raccoon on crack. We had sifted through a variety of other Groovy Movie options, intent on finding a low-budget spoof that wasn’t horror. But when Crackoon graced the screen, it was love at first sight.
Immediately, we’re introduced to one of the only redeeming cinematic qualities of the movie: gratuitous landscape shots from a Jeff-Bezos-Amazon-core drone. We descend over rolling Appalachia and meet our first characters—a couple of greasy stoners under a bridge. These two, portrayed by less-than-spectacular actors, have a pointless conversation about crack until they’re unceremoniously disrupted by their very sassy crack dealer, Denny. He tells them that he’ll hook them up with “the good stuff,” brandishing little Ziploc baggies filled with what appear to be little orange crystal candies. Once home safe and away from the authorities, one of the stoners lights up his crackpipe with his newly acquired “good stuff.” Instantly, his eyes gloss over into a pale orange as mandarin-marmalade-colored goop starts gushing out of his eye sockets and mouth. Much to our shock, he takes the end of his pipe and stabs his companion in the neck, causing her to gush blood and eventually bleed out. Less than 5 minutes in, and already one casualty! That’s how all great movies start.
We then meet the town sheriff and his inappropriately young wife—we’re talking at least 20-30 years age gap. The wife, Charlotte, cheated on her husband, Johnathan, in the past, but this couple (and the fling) aren’t important until much later. For now, we meet arguably the most important characters—a group of five young-ish adults who have rented a cabin in the woods for a week. Don’t ask us the names of any of them though, we’re not sure if we missed them or if they were just never stated. There’s an odd dynamic between these friends—it’s two couples and a fifth wheel—as the men in the couples keep referencing some…special experiences they had together. Anyways, as they get settled into the cabin, the men provoke the fifth wheel by making jokes about her dad who had just died two weeks prior. Understandably, she leaves, and the couples are left alone.
Back towards civilization, there’s a trio of druggies under another random West Virginian bridge who fall victim to the “supercrack,” as Denny describes it as he deals it to them. Unfortunately, they meet the same demise as the previous consumers; with one of the three going rabid and stabbing one of her companions with her crackpipe (how sharp are these crackpipes?!) and gouging out the eye of the other. If you’re keeping count, we’re currently at 3 casualties.
In a sharp transition, we now get to meet the men behind it all even better: Denny and his boyfriend (or husband?). They are driving in the middle of the woods to make another delivery of their supercrack to the aforementioned freaky friend group when they see they’re being followed by a Shinnston police cop car. Scared of being arrested for drug dealing, they have the genius plan of throwing their entire crack and weed stash out the window of their car into the forest, where absolutely no raccoons could possibly find it nor get into it whatsoever. The couple gets pulled over for recklessly swerving (although we both agree their driving was fine), but convinces the cops to let them go with the excuse that they just got married and are on their way to their honeymoon—and they really can’t wait.
Successfully clear of law enforcement, the two men venture into the woods to retrieve their bag-o-crack, yet when they find the bag, there’s one big problem: it’s empty. Now who could’ve taken their crack????? We quickly find out from a “POV: you’re a raccoon on crack” angle and filter, where we become the raccoon lurking in the woods, then jumping out to attack the couple. Much to our chagrin, Denny takes the most of the attack, and with a shot of his feet, they slowly stop moving and fall limp.
As the film progresses, we are introduced to character after character that eventually fall victim to the raccoon. There’s a church group of 7+ people and a former hotdog vendor with his girlfriend (who was quite pissed they were taking vacation in West Virginia and not at a beautiful beach), adding nearly 10 to the kill count.
Then, in the biggest jumpscare we’ve ever received in our 17 (18 for Emi) years on this Earth, the scene changes to an incredibly graphic sex scene between one of the friend group’s couples. Completely shocked by the full frontal nudity of the woman—especially because the movie is rated PG—we skipped through to try and find a spot to safely pause to register what we just witnessed. And because the director just couldn’t stop there, our unpause found us in a scene where the raccoon climbs into the bedroom while the boyfriend is away and harshly kills the girlfriend. Just for good measure, the raccoon kills the boyfriend too of course, by scooping out the man’s eyes. Ouch. Oh, and the raccoon manages to kill the other couple too. +4 points.
The rest of the film we have to censor very heavily due to extreme female full-frontal nudity, which we quickly skipped through but makes up a large portion of the last half. The sheriff’s wife cheats on him again, and with karma quickly catching up, both his wife and her lover are murdered by the raccoon. Pretty sure the raccoon kills a couple more people too, but we were so shocked half the time we had trouble taking notes. In the end, the final survivors, the fifth wheel, sheriff, and Danny’s husband, manage to shoot the raccoon’s head off and end his bloody rampage. Raccoon/crack: 21, everyone else: 1.
Ultimately, we cannot not recommend this movie enough. Not only is it weirdly fetish-y and has an uncomfortable amount of nudity, but it’s also just not…good. The killing scenes were incredibly repetitive, and the idea of the film got boring. Unless you want to fear your parents walking in on incredibly graphic scenes, don’t watch this movie. Funny? Yes. Worth it? No. Crackcoon: 1, us: 0.
Notable Quotes:
- “You got money h*? ‘Cause you know! I don’t take American Express.”
- “Super-charged crack”
- “S**t’s gotta be slammin!”
- “[Your mom would] have aborted you if she had the chance”
- “She tried. I was able to grab that coat hanger out of her hand just in time!”
- “You can’t stand here and tell me she doesn’t look like Bigfoot!”
- “Chest bump me, chest bump me!”
- “Where are you going, speed racer?”
- “I can’t go to jail! I’m too cute!”
- “Oh my gawdddddd, is this Kay’s Jewelery?”
- “Lord, I implore you… Cast the Rock-n-Roll-a from his soul-a”
- “A hotdog vendor IS a real job!”
- “Jeepers…Creepers… that guy ate my peepers…”
- “I hate being sloppy seconds”
- “What’s that? Another STD?”
- “You would know.”
- “A COON?! IT CAN’T BE!!!!”
- “Ugh now I really want a Reese’s!!!”
- “Can you do me a favor? Can we please go to the hospital?!”
- FRANKIE: “Ugh! No one ever listens to Frankie… 🙁”
- “We’re really looking forward to… consummating our marriage!”
- “He did not impregnate your daughter. That was Joey from the diner”