- Directed by Craig Anderson
- Written by Craig Anderson
- Stars Dee Wallace, Geoff Morrell, David Collins, Sarah Bishop, Sam Campbell
- Run Time: 1 Hour, 22 Minutes
- Trailer: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2TuvEsO5Dpk
Spoiler-Free Judgement Zone
Cletus the Fetus was aborted twenty years ago. Now he wants revenge on the family that thought he was dead. He stalks them down one by one, and proves that he’s still smarter than these idiots.
Synopsis
We start out with news footage related to abortion protesters. As this continues, we see a man carry a suitcase into a clinic. There’s an explosion. As the confusion continues, a man pulls a living fetus out of the trash bucket and walks off… Credits roll.
Twenty years later, Diane makes breakfast for her huge family of adopted kids who are all coming home for Christmas. There’s the kid with Downs Syndrome, the religious couple, the sex fiend artists, and Joe, Diane’s pothead brother. Diane is selling her house, and she gives Suzy a big check.
A man in the woods sees a strange figure in a black robe approaching. The robed man says his name is Cletus, and he’s looking for his mother. The man punches Cletus and then pees on him, but Cletus makes him pay.
Ginny gets angry that Diane is selling the house; she’s selling the family home. The doorbell rings, and it’s Cletus. He hands her an envelope labeled “Mother.” She invites him inside, still dressed like the Grim Reaper. It’s a very awkward Christmas party. He explains that the cloak “Keeps my skin on.” They give him a gift; a jar of peanuts. They can’t have them in the house anyway, as Hope is allergic.
Cletus reads his letter. Cletus’ father has recently died, and he was the abortion bomber twenty years ago. Cletus says he is Diane’s aborted fetus who didn’t die. Diane freaks out and tells him to leave. Joe literally throws him out the door onto the sidewalk. Suzy puts two and two together and comes to the conclusion that Cletus was Diane’s claimed “miscarriage” from twenty years ago. Cletus limps through the woods yelling “Mama!” And getting very, very angry.
The family has their Christmas party. Hope goes outside to smoke and finds the jar of peanuts out there. Cletus then cuts her in half with an ax. The rest of the family soon finds her pieces along with the jar of peanuts, so they know who did it. Joe calls the police, and then the lights go off.
The women all go and hide upstairs while the men search. Scott soon gets the ax. They all run outside and lock themselves in the shed, which is perfectly safe. Then they all decide someone needs to go back into the house and get the car keys. Joe goes back, but he has his gun with him. He gets the keys, goes to the car, and finds Cletus in the back seat and dies.
Ginny’s baby is coming, and that ratchets up the tension and the screaming. Diane admits that the baby was going to have Down’s Syndrome, so she aborted the baby. Diane finds a necklace she lost at that time, and it’s been left by Cletus. She admits Cletus is her real son.
They spot Cletus climbing up the lattice outside, so Diane decides to go outside by herself and pull down the lattice. The sheriff arrives, and he barely makes it out of his car before dying.
Cletus confronts Diane, and they talk. She probably could defuse the situation, but Peter shoots at Cletus, driving him off again. Diane spots the sheriff’s gun on the ground and points it at Cletus. She empties it on him, but he doesn’t die.
Peter is a priest, and he convinces Cletus to pray on his knees with him. Meanwhile, Jerry gets the shotgun and Peter reaches for a knife. He stabs Cletus, but Cletus finds a way to kill him anyway.
Jerry freaks out at hearing Diane wanted to abort a baby with Down’s Syndrome like he has. He goes downstairs and faces Cletus, giving him his Santa Claus hat. This lack of hat confuses Diane, who shoots Jerry.
Upstairs, Suzy and Ginny continue to scream incessantly as the delivery proceeds.
Diane runs out and sees Cletus with his bandages off. He’s Jason Voorhees-level special-looking. They talk some more, and fight some more, and then talk some more, and she passes out.
Cletus grabs a knife and goes upstairs for Ginny and the baby. Ginny hides in a really obvious place, and he gets her as well. Diane comes in with a boat anchor, kills Cletus and herself. No one is left alive but the baby. Since this is Australia, it’ll probably be eaten by dingoes by the morning…
Commentary
Cletus the Fetus? Really?
For someone who can barely walk, Cletus is agile enough to climb walls, run up stairs, and sneak up on just about everyone. Plus he seems to have inhuman strength and toughness.
I imagine the director had some kind of message going on here, anti-abortion, or maybe pro-abortion, I’m not quite sure, as the story kinda works both way.
These people deserved to die; no one should be this stupid. They were safe together in the bedroom or the shed several times, but always found some stupid reason to split up or go back outside. This is a common trope in horror films, but it’s really obviously gratuitous here. They had already called the police, and they would have arrived eventually if they had simply waited.
The deaths are all pretty good, especially the death by blender scene, although the umbrella thing is fun too. I’m not quite sure what happened in the end with Diane, Cletus, and the boat anchor, that was very poorly done. If you can look past the character’s ongoing stupidity, it’s— no, it’s just dumb. Let’s leave it at that.