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John Hollenhorst reportingGet ready! The "worst movie ever made" is returning home to Morgan, Utah. Two decades after it was made, "Troll 2" is finally finding an audience, and the fans are not necessarily all completely crazy.
It's a phenomenon you can't explain. You just have to go with it. It's a movie so bad, it's suddenly a hit. Two decades after its release, or its escape, it's playing at sold-out screenings all over the world. Now it's Morgan's turn.
Two Utah actors are returning to the scene of the crime. The crime is a movie. In 1989, the men thought they were making a great film. "We failed miserably," actor Michael Stephenson said.
Stephenson played the main character, a 10-year-old boy, in what was allegedly a scary movie.
"It came out and was banished to late-night cable television," Stephenson said. "I was dreadfully embarrassed by this movie and hoped that nobody would ever see it."
Jason Steadman, who also played a role in the film, said, "We weren't kidding anyone. This was a horrible, horrible movie."
The plot? Well, it isn't exactly Shakespeare. "The goblins are vegetarians, and they turn people into plants and then eat them," Steadman explained.
The town of Morgan is called "Nilbog" in the movie. In a plot twist so brilliant it's still being talked about, Nilbog is suddenly revealed as "Goblin" spelled backward.
The movie's biggest fan is Blair Sterrett. "It's called the 'best worst movie' because it's possibly the most entertaining bad movie you that could ever find," he said.
Something crazy happened a couple of years ago: "Troll 2" suddenly caught fire. Not in Morgan, but around the world. There have now been 21 sold-out screenings for screaming fans in big cities.
"They see me and they're screaming, and I'm signing shirts and autographs, and I'm like, ‘I'm an actor in a crappy movie. What is this?' But it's been fun. It's just been fun. It's been a fun ride," Steadman said.
Yes, it's a bad movie by any definition. But is it also a good one? "This movie could be genius, really, because you couldn't have tried to make something so perfectly bad on every element of filmmaking," Steadman said.
Stephenson added, "I mean, how is 400 people in a theater laughing their heads off a bad thing?"
If you want to return with the actors to the scene of the crime, they plan to shut down the main street of "Nilbog," or Morgan as it is more commonly known, for a three-day festival the last weekend of this month. The worst moment, undoubtedly, will be an outdoor showing of the film.
For more information on the celebration planned in Morgan, click the related link.
E-mail: jhollenhorst@ksl.com
