Horror On The Lens: Mazes and Monsters (dir by Steven Hilliard Stern)

Posted on October 1, 2025 by Lisa Marie Bowman

Hi there and welcome to October! This is our favorite time of the year here at the Shattered Lens because October is our annual horrorthon! For the past several years (seriously, we’ve been doing this for a while), we have celebrated every October by reviewing and showing some of our favorite horror movies, shows, books, and music. That’s a tradition that I’m looking forward to helping to continue this year!

Let’s get things started with 1982’s Mazes and Monsters!

Based on a best-seller by Rona Jaffe, Mazes and Monsters tell the story of some college students who enjoy playing a game called Mazes and Monsters. Now, I realize that Mazes and Monsters may sound a lot like Dungeons and Dragons but they are actually two separate games. One game takes place in a dungeon. The other takes place in maze, got it?

When the players decide to play the game in some nearby caves, it causes the newest member of the group (Tom Hanks — yes, Tom Hanks) to snap and become his character. Convinced that he’s living in a world full of monsters and wizard, Hanks runs away to New York. How does that go? During a moment of clarity, Hanks calls his friends and wails, “There’s blood on my knife!”

It’s all fairly silly. There was a moral panic going on about role playing games when this film was made and this film definitely leans into the panic. But, in its own over-the-top way, it works. If you’ve ever wanted to see Tom Hanks battle a big green lizard, this is the film for you. And I defy anyone not to tear up a little during the final scene!

From 1982, here is Mazes and Monsters! Happy Horrorthon!

Novel Review: Mazes and Monsters by Rona Jaffe

Posted on January 5, 2025 by Lisa Marie Bowman

The 1981 novel, Mazes and Monsters, tells the story of four wealthy college students who deal with the ennui of being rich and privileged by obsessively playing a role-playing game called Mazes and Monsters.

That’s right! The game is Mazes and Monsters and most definitely not Dungeons and Dragons, even though both games are basically about people wandering around in dungeons and fighting monsters and searching for treasure. (For the record, I’ve never played Dungeons and Dragons or any other role playing game and I’ve never really had any desire too. That said, I did enjoy those episodes of Freaks and Geeks and Community.) One of the four players is Robbie Wheeling, who has never recovered from the death of his brother. When the players decide to move their game into the tunnels underneath their college, Robbie has a total break from reality and thinking that he actually is his M&M character, he flees to New York and lives on the streets. Desperate for money and food, he turns to prostitution but ends up stabbing the first man who picks him up. Agck! He never should have played that game!

Mazes and Monsters is usually described as being one of the key works of the 80s Satanic Panic and there’s certainly an element of that to be found in the plot. But the game is actually a fairly small part of the book. The majority of the book just deals with teenagers struggling with the transition of adulthood and figuring out where they belong in the world. The book isn’t quite as hysterical as its been described. If anything, the book almost makes the case that the game is helpful to the players in that it gives them an escape from all the ennui. Robbie was mentally unstable long before he played the game and it’s hard not to feel that something would have eventually set him off.

This is a rare case where the movie version is better than the book, if just because the movie features Tom Hanks as Robbie. Robbie mistaking a man for a demon and stabbing him? That’s really sad. Tom Hanks doing it? That’s cinematic magic!

Horror on the Lens: Mazes and Monsters (dir by Steven Hilliard Stern)

Posted on October 2, 2021 by Lisa Marie Bowman

For today’s horror on the lens, we’ve got the 1982 made-for-TV movie, Mazes and Monsters!

Mazes and Monsters! Sounds pretty scary, doesn’t it? Well, have no fear. Mazes and Monsters is just a role-playing game, one that definitely should not be mistaken for Dungeons and Dragons despite the fact that it’s exactly the same as Dungeons and Dragons. Except, of course, for the fact that one game takes place in a dungeon and the other takes place in a maze.

A group of rich kids love playing Mazes and Monsters but, when they take it a step too far, it leads to the newest member of their group having a nervous breakdown, fleeing to New York City, and fighting demons that only he can see. Our delusional hero is played by an actor named Tom Hanks. Hey, whatever happened to him?

Anyway, Mazes and Monsters is kind of silly. You’re going to get sick of Chris Makepeace’s hats pretty quickly. It imagines a world where the most popular and attractive kids on campus just can’t wait to pretend to be clerics and magic users. And yet, in its own melodramatic way, the film works. If you’ve ever wanted to see Tom Hanks stab a green demon, this is the film to watch! This was one of Tom Hanks’s first roles and he already looks a little bit too old to play a college student but his trademark likability is already evident. When Tom has a moment of clarity and desperately announces that “THERE’S BLOOD ON MY KNIFE!,” it’s impossible for your heart not to ache for him a little. Finally, as over-the-top as the moral panic about the possibility of LARPers going crazy in New York may be, the ending actually is surprisingly effective.

Enjoy!

https://youtu.be/FpcL-fQNPfQ

Embracing the Melodrama Part II #68: Mazes and Monsters (dir Steven Hilliard Stern)

Posted on May 11, 2015 by Lisa Marie Bowman

It’s amazing the things that you find when you randomly search the DVD section of Half-Price Books. For instance, I found a very cheap DVD of the 1982 made-for-TV film Mazes and Monsters and I simply had to buy it.

Why?

Well, just look at the cover above. Look at the ominous castle. Look at the shadowy dragons flying around it. Look at that Shining-style maze. Look at the ominous tag line: “Danger lurks between fantasy and reality.” And especially be sure to look at Tom Hanks gazing serenely over it all.

“Wow,” I thought, “Tom Hanks fights a dragon? This is something that I’ve got to see!”

Well, there are no dragons in Mazes and Monsters. There are a few monsters but they’re only briefly seen figments of Tom Hanks’s imagination. The film is about a group of college students who obsessively play an RPG called Mazes and Monsters. When one of the students (an annoying genius who wears wacky hats and is played by an actor with the surprisingly poetic name of Chris Makepeace) suggests that they play Mazes and Monsters “for real” in some caverns near the college, it leads to Robbie (Tom Hanks) have a mental breakdown. Soon, Robbie is convinced that he’s actually a monk. He breaks up with his girlfriend because he doesn’t want to violate his vow of celibacy. (Of course, the real fantasy is that a college student obsessed with playing Mazes and Monsters would have a girlfriend in the first place but anyway…) He keeps seeing imaginary minotaurs lurking in the shadows. Finally, he runs off to New York on a quest to find “the great Hall.” It’s up to his friends to find him and hopefully impart an important lesson about the dangerous reality of RPG addiction.

Or something.

Listen, to be honest, if not for Tom Hanks, there would be no reason to watch Mazes and Monsters. It’s poorly acted. It’s written and directed with a heavy hand. There’s some nice shots of downtown New York City but otherwise, it’s visually drab.

But, because Tom Hanks is in it and he’s playing a role that demands that he go totally over-the-top in his performance, Mazes and Monsters is totally worth watching. If you’ve ever wanted to see Tom Hanks wander around New York City while dressed like a monk, this is the film for you. If you’ve ever wanted to see Tom Hanks start to tremble while explaining that, as a monk, he’s not allowed to kill minotaurs, this is the movie for you. Most of all, if you’ve ever wanted to see Tom Hanks shrieking, “THERE’S BLOOD ON MY KNIFE!” while standing in an old school phone booth, this is definitely the movie for you!

Seriously.

Considering that Tom Hanks is currently viewed as being some sort of elder statesman of American film (and, even more importantly, Hanks seems to view himself as being some sort of national treasure), there’s something oddly satisfying about seeing him before he became THE Tom Hanks. It’s good to be reminded that, at one time, he was just another young actor doing his best in a crappy made-for-TV movie.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6XhxFVF9SZU