This goofy-as-hell cannibal comedy leads with a lamb to slaughter — namely, comely Sally Lamb — an innocent blonde murdered by the titular undertaker and his two pals, while the expression on her boyfriend’s nearby photo changes from smiling to horrified.

It’s just the latest in a string of senseless murders carried out by Shady Rest Funeral Parlor head Mr. Mort, who specializes in the $144.98 funeral, complete with Green Stamps, and shares half of each corpse with his friends who run the Greasy Spoon Café, where the day’s special is fresh from the kill — like, for instance, the “leg of Lamb.”

Looking for subtlety? It’s hiding somewhere with cleverness. So when clean-cut playboy detective Harry Glass stops by for a bite with curvy secretary Ms. Poultry … well, you just know tomorrow’s special will be breast of chicken.

And, of course, it is. The Undertaker and His Pals is very much an imitation of Herschell Gordon Lewis, and while it’s no work of art, neither is Lewis’ stuff. Nope, like the work of that Godfather of Gore, this even-lower-budget effort is just a fun mix of a little blood, a lot of bosomy dames and painful slapstick. At 63 minutes, it simply doesn’t have time to be dull. —Rod Lott

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I figure any movie that begins with a Pixies song can’t be all that bad. And Stuck on You isn’t. It’s another funny, sweet and politically uncorrect (but never demeaning) film from the Farrelly brothers, still best known for hanging semen from Ben Stiller’s ear in There’s Something About Mary.

The joke is that brothers Bob and Walt Tenor (Matt Damon and Greg Kinnear) are Siamese twins. They seem fairly well-adjusted and are popular around Martha’s Vineyard, where they make a living flipping burgers. But Walt is a budding thespian, currently putting on a one-man show about Truman Capote. When the acting bug bites hard — despite Bob’s penchant for on-stage panic attacks — the boys move to Hollywood so that Walt can chase his dream.

Unfortunately, the market for conjoined twins is limited in Tinseltown, and they’re the laughingstock of every agency they set their four feet in. Through luck and sneaky circumstances, Walt lands the male lead in a new detective series opposite Cher (playing herself), and although the director has difficulty keeping Bob out of frame, the series becomes a hit. Success has a price, however, taking a toll on Bob’s relationship with his Asian Internet girlfriend while limiting Walt’s acting opportunities. Eventually, Bob and Walt wonder if separation is the answer to their problems or just another problem to add to the list.

The Farrellys know how to mix outrageous humor with an endearing sweetness. Whereas most comedies just play mean, they can generate big laughs that often originate in the heart. They have a genuine love for their characters, whether they be conjoined twins, mentally handicapped busboys, sleazy Hollywood managers or — most frightening of all — Cher.

Damon is good, but Kinnear is terrific, with a semi-smarmy presence and expert comic timing. He’s really underrated as a comic actor. In the eye-candy role, Eva Mendes shows a real flair for playing a hot, dumb babe with a bosom with mesmeric powers. Seymour Cassell does an amusing turn as Walt’s two-bit agent, who lives in a retirement home, rides around on a motorized scooter and sports one of the lamest toupées ever seen onscreen. —Rod Lott

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In Club Dread, the once-promising comedy troupe Broken Lizard’s follow-up to the stoner-beloved Super Troopers, an island paradise turns into a blood-soaked nightmare when a machete-wielding killer interrupts a vacation of sun, sex and suds.

A game Bill Paxton stars as Coconut Pete, a drug-addled Jimmy Buffet-like singer who runs the getaway spot, with the unmemorable members of Broken Lizard serving as his staff, including a tennis pro, a DJ, the “fun police” and a fat masseuse who can give women orgasms just by touching a certain spot above their upper lip. One by one, members of the staff meet gruesome deaths at the hands (which hold a very sharp blade) of the unknown murderer.

It’s a spoof of splatter films, but by the second act, it threatens to become the very thing it parodies. By the third, it does. As with the overrated Super Troopers, it’s on-and-off fun, but highly flawed. A couple of the jokes are brilliant, while many more are absolutely infantile. There’s the same problem with flow and tone, but here, at least they try to make up for it by throwing in the bare breasts of Cabin Fever babe Jordan Ladd. There’s also a monkey. —Rod Lott

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The AIP teen/horror/comedy/racing quickie Ghost of Dragstrip Hollow is barely over an hour, and yet the plot doesn’t kick in until the 40-minute mark, and then promptly hightails it 10 minutes later. It’s about — and maybe I should put that word in quotation marks — a group of drag-racing gearhead high schoolers with cool, souped-up cars, and they unwind at the local malt shoppe where they sing and dance.

Following this “big story” is a some old-guy reporter in a three-piece suit. He talks like he has chestnuts in his mouth, barely moves his lips and takes copious notes on a notebook no bigger than a Post-it. I’m not sure why hanging around kids who play with chassis (“I dreamt I was a 12-shaft drive motor! It was wonderful!”) and do the jitterbug qualifies as a scoop for any print outlet, but hey, that’s overthinking it. No wonder the newspaper industry is fucked.

After more dancing and a pajama party with even more dancing, the teens go to a house that’s supposedly haunted so they can do more dancing. (Hey, at least the film commits to something.) Plot: There’s a monster lurking around the rooms, causing all sorts of dust-ups. End plot.

At the end, the would-be creature is unmasked as AIP special-effects man Paul Blaisdell, playing himself, saying he did it because AIP didn’t hire him for such-and-such movie. It’s totally Scooby-Doo, with lots of dated dialogue like “She’s the ginchiest!” It’s also the kind of movie that’s not satisfied with having a talking parrot, so it has to throw in a talking car, too. Can’t blame it. —Rod Lott

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Not to date myself, but I remember a time when Joe Piscopo told punch lines instead of being one. He was great on Saturday Night Live, very funny in Johnny Dangerously and surprisingly endearing in Brian De Palma’s criminally ignored comedy, Wise Guys.

Dead Heat, however, provides ample evidence for the continued absence of Joe on the celebrity stage. If there is a prize for Comedian Who Should Be Least Allowed to Improvise One-Liners, Joe wins hands-down, besting even the immortally awful Pauly Shore. Every single line Piscopo grunts out falls to the ground and dies an ignoble death. As a cop who becomes a zombie, poor Treat Williams suffers death, rebirth and decomposition, but that’s nothing compared to having to smile at every ill-timed goddamned gag that slips out of the witless jokesack that is Piscopo. When Joe finally gets murdered, the feeling is not one of sadness, but utter relief.

The rest of Heat’s a mixed, low-rent bag. A routine tale of buddy zombie cops (seriously, why should that be routine?), it has some pleasingly goopy gore, wastes appearances by Darren McGavin and Vincent Price, and at least gave Williams a paycheck to feed him until Deep Rising.

Other than Piscopo, the main claim to fame for Heat is being written by Terry Black, brother of writer/director Shane Black (Kiss Kiss Bang Bang). On the spectrum of movie people with more talented siblings, Terry is far from a Tony Scott, Beau Bridges or even Eric Roberts. He’s not even a Charlie O’Connell.

No, Terry’s a Stephen Baldwin. I didn’t want to go there, as there are just some things you can’t take back, but Dead Heat forced me to. —Corey Redekop

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