The Outing is set in Texas & starts late one night as three hoodlums break into the house of an old lady (Deborah Winters under plenty of ageing make-up) in order to rob her money but are disappointed only to find an old Lamp with a jewelled stopper in it, trying to take the seemingly valuable stopper out the Lamp is rubbed & an evil Jinn is unleashed & kills everyone... The police send the ancient Lamp to the state Museum of Natural Science where foremost archaeologist Dr. Wallace (James Huston) takes an interest in it, apparently dating from 3500 B.C. the Lamp may be of significant historical importance & value. Dr. Wallace's daughter Alex (Andra St. Ivanvi) & some of her friends decide to spend the night in the museum & the evil Jinn from the Lamp starts to kill them off, Alex & her dad have to translate the engravings on the Lamp to discover how to defeat the Jinn & end it's ancient curse..
Directed by Tom Daley I suspect that this was actually shot under the title The Lamp which it was released under just about everywhere apart from the US where it was retitled to The Outing & I suspect that the three prologue that was cut as mentioned on the IMDb's 'Alternate Versions' page was done so as the title The Lamp actually appears over this shot in the same font & style as the rest of the credits, anyway I have to say I rather liked The Outing or The Lamp or whatever it's called as it delivers in most areas. The opening fifteen minutes are fantastic with a deserted galleon strewn with dead bodies, a robbery, nudity, strangulation, axes in heads & a guy is torn in half but predictably the film can't keep the pace going like that forever & it does settle down into 80's teen horror clichés with ex-boyfriends, silly pranks & a daft idea with little to no motivation behind it to spend the night in the basement of a museum which takes up a fair amount of time but once the evil Jinn show's up again the killing starts it doesn't let up until the final credits with a death or a monster every few minutes. The kills are pretty good & gorier than expected to with some actual proper special effects used & the body count is quite high although we never see what happens to that black bird who was getting raped, do we? At less than 90 minutes it's short enough, it's to the point & has slightly more going on than you may expect with love triangles, romance, evil Jinn's, sex, death, demonic possession & there's even an opera singing security guard (stick around for the end credits as after they finish there's a somewhat random & very brief shot in which he takes a well deserved bow!). The character's are OK but nothing special, the dialogue awkward at times & you really won't mind seeing anyone in this die (in the context of the film obviously, not in real life).
Another thing about The Lamp that I liked was that it's pretty original, in a decade that brought audiences many teen slashers with various masked killers the idea of an evil supernatural Jinn was quite cool & before anyone says it The Outing/The Lamp was made a decade before Wes Craven used the idea in Wishmaster (1997). The deaths are pleasingly gory, there's a guy ripped in half in a swimming pool & his legs sink to the bottom in a cloud of blood, people's get axe's stuck in their heads, there's zombies, bitten off fingers, bitten out throats, someone face is cut with a ceiling fan, someone is impaled with a spear, a naked woman is bitten to death by zombie snakes in a bath & a guy's head is crushed inside a helmet & his head is twisted right round plus there's a decent amount of blood splatter to go with the kills. There's a few scenes of nudity as well plus an attempted rape scene. The special effects are good too, when the evil Jin appears at the end it looks a little rubbery but is still a decent enough monster although it's silly voice makes it hard to understand at times. There is actually a bit of atmosphere here as well, the opening sequence set on an old boat one foggy night as in one long shot the camera moves onto the boat & moves around it is rather cool actually & sets the film up nicely.
The IMDb says this had a budget of about $2,000,000 which I find hard to believe, that's a lot of money actually although it is well made with decent effects so it's possible I suppose. Apparently shot in Texas although there's some 'Californian Crew' credits at the end. The acting isn't anything special & most of the performances are stiff lets say although Andra St. Ivanvi pulls some odd faces at times which is quite unsettling.
The Outing (The Lamp is a much better title) is a decent little hard to find 80's supernatural horror teen slasher with a good body count, nice gore, some nudity & an OK monster. The middle third drags a bit but the opening & closing twenty odd minutes are great, I reckon this ones worth tracking down & watching.
Directed by Tom Daley I suspect that this was actually shot under the title The Lamp which it was released under just about everywhere apart from the US where it was retitled to The Outing & I suspect that the three prologue that was cut as mentioned on the IMDb's 'Alternate Versions' page was done so as the title The Lamp actually appears over this shot in the same font & style as the rest of the credits, anyway I have to say I rather liked The Outing or The Lamp or whatever it's called as it delivers in most areas. The opening fifteen minutes are fantastic with a deserted galleon strewn with dead bodies, a robbery, nudity, strangulation, axes in heads & a guy is torn in half but predictably the film can't keep the pace going like that forever & it does settle down into 80's teen horror clichés with ex-boyfriends, silly pranks & a daft idea with little to no motivation behind it to spend the night in the basement of a museum which takes up a fair amount of time but once the evil Jinn show's up again the killing starts it doesn't let up until the final credits with a death or a monster every few minutes. The kills are pretty good & gorier than expected to with some actual proper special effects used & the body count is quite high although we never see what happens to that black bird who was getting raped, do we? At less than 90 minutes it's short enough, it's to the point & has slightly more going on than you may expect with love triangles, romance, evil Jinn's, sex, death, demonic possession & there's even an opera singing security guard (stick around for the end credits as after they finish there's a somewhat random & very brief shot in which he takes a well deserved bow!). The character's are OK but nothing special, the dialogue awkward at times & you really won't mind seeing anyone in this die (in the context of the film obviously, not in real life).
Another thing about The Lamp that I liked was that it's pretty original, in a decade that brought audiences many teen slashers with various masked killers the idea of an evil supernatural Jinn was quite cool & before anyone says it The Outing/The Lamp was made a decade before Wes Craven used the idea in Wishmaster (1997). The deaths are pleasingly gory, there's a guy ripped in half in a swimming pool & his legs sink to the bottom in a cloud of blood, people's get axe's stuck in their heads, there's zombies, bitten off fingers, bitten out throats, someone face is cut with a ceiling fan, someone is impaled with a spear, a naked woman is bitten to death by zombie snakes in a bath & a guy's head is crushed inside a helmet & his head is twisted right round plus there's a decent amount of blood splatter to go with the kills. There's a few scenes of nudity as well plus an attempted rape scene. The special effects are good too, when the evil Jin appears at the end it looks a little rubbery but is still a decent enough monster although it's silly voice makes it hard to understand at times. There is actually a bit of atmosphere here as well, the opening sequence set on an old boat one foggy night as in one long shot the camera moves onto the boat & moves around it is rather cool actually & sets the film up nicely.
The IMDb says this had a budget of about $2,000,000 which I find hard to believe, that's a lot of money actually although it is well made with decent effects so it's possible I suppose. Apparently shot in Texas although there's some 'Californian Crew' credits at the end. The acting isn't anything special & most of the performances are stiff lets say although Andra St. Ivanvi pulls some odd faces at times which is quite unsettling.
The Outing (The Lamp is a much better title) is a decent little hard to find 80's supernatural horror teen slasher with a good body count, nice gore, some nudity & an OK monster. The middle third drags a bit but the opening & closing twenty odd minutes are great, I reckon this ones worth tracking down & watching.