Wednesday, March 1, 2017

Review: Killer Waves

Text © Richard Gary / Indie Horror Films, 2017
Images from the Internet

Killer Waves                   
Produced, directed and edited (among others) by James Balsamo
Acid Bath Productions
90 minutes, 2017
www.facebook.com/killerwavesmovie

Most directors have a shtick. Some call it auteur, but when you’re dealing those who tend to dispense comedic horror, each has their own thing, be it gender politics, absurdity with a sharp wink towards its own genre, or relying on a body of knowledge about the history of horror, directors have their strong points. For James Balsamo, it’s – for lack of a better word – the pun. Hell, he even has a book out of this kind of word play (Total Pun-ishment, HERE).

Balsamo’s film are self-depreciating (he gets beaten up in just about every one, usually by some heavy metal musician doing a cameo); he is the trickster, the hustler, and the – okay – pun-isher. And that’s exactly why he has so many fans.

I love it when killers have a name. Sure Meyers, Kruger and Voorhees are great, but I like the ones with designations like Ghostface, The Subway Vigilante, or the Shropshire Strangler. For this film, we are dealing with the Unholy Diver, someone dressed in a full and antique-style deep-sea diving outfit, including a Robot Monster-like full mask. But instead of what should be seen through the helmet, there is a skull face.

This is a slasher crime comedy that is a culmination of the direction Balsamo has been driving towards in his previous releases, all in the fast lane, in that his work is consistently inconsistent. What I mean by that is there are some constants, and not all of them are written in stone (though many are). As Desi once said, “Let me ‘splain”: With the possibly arguable exception of one (I Spill Your Guts, 2012), all of his six features have been loony comedies, some more outrageous than others, but all of them somewhat over the top. That descriptor is, of course, not meant as an insult.

Also, there is a lot of gratuitous female nudity (usually upper body, but not always), blood and gore (including the red stuff always pouring from mouths), a large body count, body parts (or visceral matter) separating from the victim, the aforementioned puns, and the cameos. Balsamo goes to many, many genre conventions and gets either musicians (sometimes solo, sometimes the entire band) or genre cult idols (such as Joel M. Reed) to do brief stints in the film, usually on the street, in an alley, or a hallway. Hell, if he doesn’t have any idea what to do with them, they just riff and he puts them in somewhere; most of the time, they beat him up, or say nasty things about his character. Yes, that is another thing, Balsamo is nearly almost always the lead in his films which, again, I don’t really have a problem with that.

Each film has a growing number of actors who appear regularly, such as the wonderful Carmine Capobianco and Genoveva Rossi; hopefully Chloe Berman joins this list. Then there’s a guy named Frank Mullen who always amuses me, even when he looks like he’s reading cue cards while doing his scenes. His spiel is to go into an angry, curse-filled rant, and I always cheer when he does.

Then there are, again, the puns. Beyond the excruciating ones during the dialogue that make Freddy’s look like Shakespeare (okay, maybe Robert Frost…), even the character names are jokes, such as Katie Crest (get it, a film about waves…), Brian Blackwater, Billy Bermuda, Blue Crush Vicky, and so forth. There are some snarky names as well, such as there both being a Vicky and a Vicki (“I’m Vicki with an ‘I’” is how she introduces herself), and Jenny and a Jenni (“I’m Jenni with an ‘I’”, I kid you not).

The loose (very loose) story is centered around the Killer Waves Surf Contest. The Unholy Diver (I guessed wrong at who it was for a while) is murdering the surfers – and nearly anyone else who crosses his path – in part to make a surfboard make of human flesh; the end products is one of the goofiest things you’ll ever see…again, not an insult. There are any number of ways of dispatching the victims, from various blades to electric eels, and so forth.

If you are familiar with Balsamo’s earlier films, there are a few self-references to his work, such as a mention of an Acid Bath (his production company), and someone else wearing a torn version of a Cool as Hell tee. This could be a drinking game. I’m up to my fourth glass of Lemon Ginger Echinacea drink from Trader Joe’s. Yeah, I’m a wild spirit.

While this was being filmed, I know that Balsamo (and his brother) were in the process of moving from Long Island, NY, to California, and it’s pretty obvious to tell it was recorded on both coasts. I mean, there are shots on a beach or street with palm trees, mixed with scenes obviously on the streets of Manhattan; during a key cop investigation scene at a dock, the Park City ferry (going between Bridgeport and Port Jefferson, Long Island) passes behind them. Made me smile.

As for inconsistent, well, the story is more of a series of vignettes and bits rather than a cohesive narrative. The core remains the same, of the events surrounding the surfing contest, but each bit (and murder) is more hodgepodge scenes than a storyline. Much of the movie could be a series of short films ranging from a few seconds to a few minutes. Occasionally this can be confusing if not distracting, especially with the improvisational feel of the overall product, but somehow it manages to work. Everything that seems a bit wonky is part of its charm; I don’t really know how to explain it more than that.

If one were to see just this film, it might be a bit of a headscratcher, but in the overall Balsamo canon, if one is familiar with his style and work, it’s more of the inconsistent consistency charm that I was discussing before, just more so.

The puns are cool as hell, the blood and gore graphic, the cameos superb, the nudity is nice, and the acting is, well, as these are mostly non-professional actors or winging it off the cuff in some alleyway, it’s adequate if not over-the-top. It definitely works, and this is fun all the way through, but I honestly would like to see more focus on a cohesive storyline. That being said, while it is surface level that never digs too deep in thought or tone, it’s still bloody good amusement.


1 comment:

  1. Great Soundtrack!! Check out "Contemplating Murder".

    ReplyDelete