Review: ‘Skull: The Mask’ Have a Heart, or Ten in this Bloody Fun Brazilian Horror

I’ll admit, when I first saw the preview for Skull: The Mask during the intermission of Shudder’s the Last Drive in with Joe Bob Briggs, I was not enthused to watch it. But boy was I wrong. Secret Nazi occultists, a mysterious relic, decapitations, wrestling Ninjas, exploding heads, throat slashings and severed limbs, all before the opening title! You had my curiosity, but now you have my attention and I was ready to go on the journey with writer/ directors Armondo Fonseca and Kapel Furman.

Deep in the Amazon an expedition finds a mysterious mask from Brazilian mythology among the artifacts discovered. It’s said to be possessed by the god executioner Anhangá as explained by one of the diggers. The mask is taken to Sáo Paulo by a museum curator and held at her home before delivering it to its destination. When her curious girlfriend randomly decides to bust out the dark magic on the mask, she unwittingly awakens the demon inside, bringing about a horrific death to everyone inside the home.

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Beatriz (Natallia Rodriques), a hardboiled detective with more baggage than an airport terminal, is brought in to investigate the murders. Tack Wealder (Ivo Muller), a wealthy CEO who might as well just wear a name tag that says ‘BAD GUY’ on it, shows up at the crime scene demanding he be given his mask only to find out that it’s gone missing. It doesn’t take long for him to bribe Beatriz into looking for the mask for him as he needs it for a sacrificial ritual that involves some missing children.

There is an ancient order that is aware of Anhangá’ as well and has been tasked with stopping the resurrection of the beast. Manco (Wilton Andrade), the last of his order, along with the severed hand of his grandfather (literally has it around his neck like a necklace) start looking for the Mask too with the hopes of stopping it forever. 

Little do they know the mask has found a pair of arms and legs in the form of a crime scene cleaner (Brazilian wrestling champion Rurik Jr.) and in a scene reminiscent of The Thing, forcibly attaches itself to the man and all hell breaks loose. It’s not entirely clear what the motivation of the mask is, other than needing to rip out hearts.

After each kill, we cut to what can only be described as a blood chalice filling up more and more. Once it’s full Anhangá can awaken is the only explanation we can gather. There is a lot of backstory crammed into what on the surface is just an over the top slasher. It’s very confusing at times, but I welcomed them trying to make the mythology a little deeper, it made Skull: The Mask much more interesting.

The creature design for Skull is unique. You can almost image the filmmakers seeing the image of this creature and writing the movie around it. There are nods to Friday the 13^th, Halloween and Lovecraftian imagery with the overall look.  His weapons range from the Mask itself turning into a spider like creature and eating people, bare hands and knives that are attached by tentacles to the body and retract like Scorpion from Mortal Combat.  You can tell they really spent the time to make this a memorable movie monster.

Nightmare visions, silhouette sword fights reminiscent of Kill Bill, dance club massacre with guts-o-plenty in this practical effect extravaganza are all just weaves in the tapestry that is Skull: The Mask. The filmmakers are clearly are using every creative technique to tell their mystical horror tale.

Though extremely gory throughout, and not for everyone, there is a story there that will keep your attention. One can’t help but wonder if we’re seeing the birth of a new “slow moving” horror icon that wants to be in the same discussion as Mr. Voorhees and Mr. Myers.

Skull: The Mask is currently now streaming on Shudder. Be sure to follow ScaryNerd for more of all things horrors-fi and more.

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