Review: Undercover Vice: Strapped for Danger Part 2

Text © Richard Gary / Indie Horror Films, 2020

Images from the Internet

Undercover Vice: Strapped for Danger Part 2

Directed by Richard Griffin

Scorpio Releasing / The Reasonable Moving Picture Company

88 minutes, 2020

www.scorpiofilmrising.com/

In the words of the director, “Enjoy in good health and bad taste!”

Just judging by the original Strapped for Danger, which came out in 2017, this may be “bad taste,” but it is great fun. The humor flies fast and furious, and usually hits below the belt.

In a switch in direction, whereas the original focused on the exploits of some Ocean’s Eleven-type twosome robbers/male strippers with the coppers on their trail, this one looks from the other perspective, namely that of the men in blue (and pink without their uniforms). With the same writer – er – in hand, Duncan Pflaster, Griffin continues his stream-of-gayousness kooky cool comedies.

Chris Fisher, Sean Brown

The focal characters are two straight and bumbling police detectives: Republican Kevin (Chris Fisher) and soon-to-be-engaged and very buff Andy (Sean Brown). After screwing up a screwball screw toy caper, they are assigned to go “deep undercover” as gay porn stars. Apparently, there is a threesome of these actors who like to blackmail Republican politicians (ripped from the headlines!!) for cash; our heroes are told to infiltrate the gay film scene, join the gang, and get the goods on them.

The three not-so-bad guys are Jazon (Alec Farquharson), Clem (Ricky Irizarry, who was so good in Griffin’s earlier film this year, Before the Night is Over, reviewed HERE), and ringleader, Thoby (Anthony Rainville).

Ricky Irizarry, Anthony Rainville, Alec Farquharson

It’s barely 8 minutes in before we are introduced to nude male tushies, and another minute before other naughty bits come into play, as it were. So, what are two straight cops supposed to do in a situation where not only are they expected to go over the bridge to Pimpleton, but to do it on camera? And for those to whom it matters, yes, there is also some female nudity supplied by the lovely and multiply pierced Zooey (Sarah Reed), Thoby’s girlfriend (it is explained in the film).

Who are the good guys and who are the bad is the central zeitgeist of the picture. Are the porn stars wrong for their actions? Is the political force behind the police correct in their methods (a valid question all things considered with what is going on beyond my doors these days)? While the humor is foot loose but not dildo free, it also makes a poignant point on the politics and hypocrisy behind the conservative wave that is hopefully starting to ebb a bit.

The sets are simple and look great thanks to Production Designer Margaret Wolf, from the police station to the St. Agnes Home for the Nearly Deceased. In addition, John Mosetich’s photography is also simple, and yet has quite a distinctive look to it, e.g., he loves medium shots; rather than the usual primary color lighting scheme (yellow filter! red filter! blue filter!), here it is more straightforward and realistic, giving the film a stark, bare-bottom (see what I did there?) feel to the action.

Ninny Nothin

The acting is quite decent, but the porno director, Piñata Debri (drag queen Ninny Nothin aka Johnny Sederquist) – named I'm sure as a tribute to The Producers (1968) – steals every scene she's in. She's also eminently quotable, with lines like "I promised myself I wouldn't fake cry, but it's happening." Everything she says feels like it should be followed by multiple exclamation points. 

I realize this review is a bit all over the place, but there is so much to digest (pun not intended), and it just about never stops through the entire picture. I mean there’s even a The Music Man (1962) reference, during a restaurant scene there is a Justin Trudeau full size cutout that was also used in the coda of Code Name: Dynastud (2018), a hysterically misleading false perspective scene in police station, and a Bollywood nod that had me in stiches. Even the dialogue, if you pay attention, will set your mind on fire, with lines like “Did you just call me a pussy for not wanting to get fucked by two dudes?!” One of my faves is a suggestion during a porn shoot to “…just think of Christine Baranski” (who I once saw on Broadway, and was fabulous, by the way).

Sarah Reed

It should come as no surprise that along with the comedy and the political underlining, it is both a story of sexual awakening (the real agenda for the film) and somewhat of a love story, some of which you may not see coming (watch the credits at the end).

Back in the 1970s, when films from Sweden flooded the market with sex romps, this would have been known as softcore. Nothing is erect – though I’m glad this wasn’t in 3D – but there is a lot of sex of various styles, be it gay, straight, and multiple partners of both sexes.

There are several (yet not preachy) less-than-subtle digs at the Republican anti-LGBTQ+(etc.) mindsets (I use that term loosely), especially involving a Republican Senator Hanson (Jay Walker), who hilariously breaks the fourth wall at one point to say what we’re all thinking. One subtle (or possibly not so much) line is by the real villains (yes, Republicans) who exclaim, “It’s our job, as police, to protect and support the government,” not the people… sound familiar?

Story-wise, in some ways its sensical to figure out where some of it is going, and there are plot points that ain’t gonna happen in real life, but who cares? The narrative flows, the comedy works, everyone’s (male and female) bodies are spectacular, and it’s just a plain old good time to be had by the viewer, unless you’re the self-deluded conservative macho type who needs three guns to go grocery shopping (yes, that’s real).

Just sit back and enjoy it.

Review: Awesomely Righteous & Radical

Text © Richard Gary / Indie Horror Films, 2020

Images from the Internet

Awesomely Righteous & Radical

Directed by Luc Bernier, Michael D’Ambrosio, Jason Ewert, Dustin Ferguson, Dean Houlihan, Oliver Jolliffe, Shane Ryan, Matti Soikkelli, Aaron Stielstra, Jim Townes

Mad Sin Cinema; Vestra Pictures; Social Cinema Studios

101 minutes, 2020

www.madsincinema.com

It is a bonus when an anthology film is not only just a bunch of random cobbled together shorts (which I also like, I should add), but has a theme that runs through them. Bookends are always welcome, to help tie things in, but here there is an overarching theme of all the stories taking place in the relatively Internet- and cell phone-free 1980s. You know, the dark ages, when you needed pay phones. Back in those days, you played films on this grainy image thing called a VHS (which could stand for Very Hard to See). And like so many of those films, nearly all of these presented here have a heavily synth score of repeating, dissonant rounds.

All the films are pretty short, which is nice, so if there is one you don’t like, there’s another one just a few minutes away. On the other hand, if you like it, it’s time well spent.

The film starts off swinging with Jason Ewert’s “Swamp Buck” (2015; Media Storm Home Movie Ent.; Cinema Gold! Production Classics). It’s a tale told by an old feller around a campfire with some high-school aged (I’m assuming) young’uns of a hunting trip when he was just a wee teen with his dad. Rather than getting game, they attract the scent of a were-stag in the woods. It’s a bit cliché, but this is an ‘80s homage, so it’s a fitting story to start, with some major tropes including said-creature’s POV shots and the shock ending. One of the interesting aspects of this is that the “newer” parts of the story is VHS-ish fuzzy and full of video “noise,” but the flashbacks are clear as a bell. Despite the clichés, or perhaps because of them, it is smile inducing.

Shane Ryan, who put this collection together, contributes with “Guerrilla” (2018), a film I reviewed previously HERE. 

Luc Bernie’s “Wallet” (2019), again, is a basic idea: a young woman finds a wallet with some ducats in it, and decides to keep the kash. This turns into more than she expected: a free dinner with a friend paid for by the stolen shekels. I suppose the sepia-toned filter is a nice touch to give it a throwback feel (perhaps too far back for the period? Never mind, it truly doesn’t matter, does it?). In typical short horror fashion, there isn’t anything too deep here, just some electronic back score, a basic theme, and a fun twist end. What more can one ask, I suppose?

As the name of Dustin Ferguson’s “Los Angeles Connection” (Social Cinema) hints at, this is more crime drama and a revenge genre, rather than horror or terror. After some gang members or mobsters attack his girlfriend, a man (Raymond V. Williams) trains to become a version of (but not costumed like) the Punisher. Getting back is his motive. The acting is pretty wooden and the story a bit cliché, but I like the VHS filter giving it a low rez and spotty video noise…and then there are the numerous sleeveless white tees. Interspersed to place it in its proper time frame is 1980s stock footage. My favorite was the Rocky-ish electronic music during the mandatory training montage. The style of the action scenes were definitely more like Dolemite than Rocky, though, which is more ideal.

From the UK is Oliver Jolliffe’s “Party Like It’s 1984” (2020). Between the accents and the echoing sound, my ears were having trouble making out the dialog. In this loose comedy, Bob (Tom Jolliffe) wakes up in the woods after a coke bender with no memory of how he got there, soon joined by the singer he manages, Cyndi (Sarah Dyas) and her bodyguard Harry (the director). Cyndi has a gig to get to, and Bob and Harry are trying to get the reluctant Cyndi to get to it, if they can find their way. To be honest, this one had me baffled as to just what was happening, including the ending.

Not to be confused with the XTC non-LP B-side song, Jim Townes “The Somnambulist” (2020; Shadow Kamera Film and Entertainment) is a short piece about three scientists trying to gain access to another dimension through the use of a woman who has been in a coma for a couple of months. It plays slow, but the fun bits happen fast, so pay heed. It’s a simple story with an equally simple set. Kept me interested, but that does not surprise me from its director, who gave us the incredibly enjoyable slow burn of House of Bad (2013; reviewed HERE). 

In a very quick short of about a minute called “Tank Soon Do,” director Michael D’Ambrosio uses a Super 8 filter to show a martial artist practicing his moves in the woods. There is no plot, no narrative, just the form. Okay…

I actually sat through Dean Houlihan’s “Odyssey of the Disturbed” (2019) twice, because the first time I wasn’t sure what was going on. After the second, I’m just as confused. Each edited piece lasts about 5 seconds and folds into the next through a fade-out/fade-in. We are introduced to a couple in which the male is being bullied, a second couple where the guy is bullying the first with the help of his enforcer, and a goth girl (witch?) sits in a room and writes kaons really large in a date book while smoke bellows around her. Okay, I get there’s the bullying and revenge motif, possibly within a dream, but what the hell? The lack of dialog adds to the mystery, in my opinion. Looks good but it annoyed me that it needed to be so cryptic. Or maybe I’m just a fool and am missing something blaring.

Also without dialog is Matti Soikkelli “Luna di morte” (2019), about a murder-suicide, I believe. Again, artistic licence gets a bit in the way of the narrative, but there is a lot of blood shot-for-shot, with guns and knives and masks. Oh, and nearly every scene is in a varied, dark monochrome, usually blood red, giving it a nearly European feel (I get the impression that was the goal, considering the title, and that the director is Finnish). It’s quite short, but also jarring, so in that way it was effective. The last shot of the film left me uncomfortable and stuck with me, so I guess that worked, as well.

The final short is Aaron Stielstra’s “Tumor Hunter” (2020; Depth Charge Pictures). It’s also a bit shallow in the narrative department, but has lots of emotion in the way it is presented. We meet a young alcoholic man in a wheelchair who I assume is homeless, and a bunch of his friends. Between ripping off liquor stores of brew and getting chased by other street thugs, his life is directionless and certainly filled with harm of self or others. Then there appears, I believe, the titular anti-hero defender. There is no real ending, just a glimpse into a violent life. This feels like a scene that was lifted out of a longer film, and it looks like it was shot on 16mm, then videoed off the projection screen. Both the image and the sound is muddled, much like the character’s life.

As the bookends at the beginning and end, there is a period piece looking-back-in-amusement PSA with Clint Eastwood (as Dirty Harry, it looks like), warning about the dangers of crack cocaine. At the end, is a trailer for the film, Samurai Cop (which is actually from 1991, not the 1980s). The only spacing between films is a b-roll of a VHS starting.

As anthologies go, it’s a bit hit and miss, as nearly all culled collections are, but if you’re similar to me and like genre shorts, it’s worth the watch. There is a decent variety of genres and styles, so lots of the audience should be pleased. There is so much filmmaking talent here, even if the occasional story left me bewildered. But make sure you sit through everything, as I did. The artists deserve the view.

Review: Mind Melters 2: A Collection of Even More Short Films

Text © Richard Gary / Indie Horror Films, 2020

Images from the Internet

Mind Melters 2: A Collection of Even More Short Films

Directed by James Balsamo

Acid Bath Productions

90 minutes, 2020

www.acidbathproductons.com

www.facebook.com/Balsamosmindmelters/

When you are as prolific a filmmaker as James Balsamo, what is one to do during a global pandemic? Well, all those films he worked on, all those conventions he’s attended, and those cameos he coerced (via kindness) from other actors, filmmakers, and musicians, can come in handy.

There must be tons of footage from his films that have been excised for time, or just short bits, laying around the house, figurately speaking (since they’re on a computer), so zipping together a menagerie of clips from previous films and other works surely is a good way to keep Satan away from those idle hands.

Balsamo, who if you’re not familiar with his work – and you should be – falls into a subgenre of directors/actors that use the medium with themselves as the focal point, and all hell goes on around them in a charming, yet amateurish way, that is genuinely endearing, albeit based on some incredibly adolescent humor (such as Bill Zebub).

Version Deux here has some commonalities with the first Mind Melters (2019), but there is one glaring difference that I think puts this above the introductory release, and that is a level of cohesion. Mind Melters was kind of a mixed-up mish-mash of little, unconnected bits, mostly, and thereby a bit inconsistent; not bad, just more stream-of-consciousness, kinda. Here, the separation is more flowing and straightforward in a series of short films rather than just “bits.”

For example, it starts off with the short, “Lunch Meeting,” where a bunch of middle aged male executives each have their own fantasies about someone trying out for the Administrative Assistant position. Hilarity and nudity abound.

There is a bit a lunacy as well, or one might think of it more as surrealistic, such as the short “Vampire Laundry Machine,” where a vampire’s bite turns a washer/dryer combo into, well, you know.

This is followed by a series of shorts of people talking into the camera, sort of like professional wrestlers, be it a pair of vampires (in front of said washer/dryer), or a very strange and extended bit with heavy curtain chewing by Craig Muckler (of 1979’s Microwave Massacre), holding a large bat stuffy down by some river and waterfall, after being interviewed by a reporter cleverly named Lewis N. Clark (Bob Cummings). These latter two pick up again a couple of times later as the same characters, but this time discussing a snake (feathered serpent god Quetzalcoatl) and then with a giant spider (puppet). Shot in the woods, the best part is the guy in the background who is cleaning off the trail, not sure what was going on in the foreground. Just pitch perfect for an off-the-wall bit, raising it to a higher level of laughter. Then there is the Andy Kaufmann effect: was that guy real, or a planted actor? I’m not sure I even want to know.

James Balsamo

While it’s obvious that Balsamo likes to be the center of attention (and I have no issue with that), some of the fine moments is when he lets other people just go off. For example, next up – and bits are shown throughout the film – is the centerpiece where Balsamo interviews cult filmmaker Ted Nicolaou (including 1988’s TerrorVision and the Full Moon Subspecies franchise, which started in 1991 and continues). It was originally done for Mad Monster Radio, and there’s lots of tidbits about filmmaking. In another bit later, during “James Quall Sings,” he lets the comic do a full, original song, “I’m Still Stamping” – that’s what it sounds like, anyway – which is quite bemusing.

One of my favorites is “Creature of Science,” which starts off slow, with a mutant pooch that kills a group of people, one in an especially sensitive moment; actor and vlogger Shawn C. Phillips is hysterical as the amateur scientist doing his own podcast about warning people to not try his “giant dog” experiment.

Another completely ridiculous and WTF short is “Johnny De Dead,” dealing with jealousy, the afterlife, and “ghost sex.” It lasts a good couple of minutes, but that’s also probably how long I laughed at it after, for it’s sheer ridiculousness. Left me smiling.

TITAN

Balsamo shows a bit of his artistic side with a full music video for black metal (death metal? I’m a punk rocker, so the subtleties of this genre escape me) band TITAN, which consists of a vocalist/guitarist and a drummer. It’s filled with satanic imagery and ritual (and a nice cameo by the director). The song, “Abramelin,” pounds away as a good black/death metal ditty should.

If you like animation, there a bit of that two, including the theme song to “The Glork Show,” featuring an alien who becomes a talk show host, and a full episode cartoon featuring Fester Fish (Aaron Long Productions, 2012) titled “Fester Makes Friends.”

Many of the usual Balsamo regulars are not here for this release, but don’t be alarmed, there are a few, such as a clip with the late, great Dave Brockie (aka Oderus Urungus, of Gwar; d. 2014), Dan E. Danger, Billy Walsh, who appears at least three times, and Balsamo’s dog Alf (not to be confused with the “big dog” experiment.

I actually had quite a bit of fun with this, and because it was more cohesive than the first, I probably liked it even better than the first Mind Melters. The only thing I would have added would have been some captioning for the Nicolaou interview, because due to circumstances that is life, the master sound recording was lost and it is using the camera mic, which makes it a bit hard to hear in spots.

If you’re a Balsamo fan, like gonzo filmmaking, lots of variety and lunacy, and looking at nude women, you really can’t go completely wrong here.

Mind Melters 2 trailer HERE

Review: Hanukkah

Text © Richard Gary / Indie Horror Films, 2020

Images from the Internet

Hanukkah

Directed by Eban McGarr

Nevermore Productions; Scream Team Releasing; Invincible Entertainment;
My Way Pictures; MVD Entertainment

106 minutes, 2019

www.facebook.com/hanukiller/

www.mvdb2b.com

I am so sick of Christmas films, be it smiley good cheer ones or of the slashy variety. Lifetime-originated or Blumhouse-released, it’s still all “Deck the Halls with blah, blah, blah, blah.” Even Easter has been given its turn with the likes of Easter Casket (2013; reviewed HERE)  and Easter Sunday (2014; reviewed HERE). It’s about time the Chosen People chose to light up the screen and cut some skin like a mohel; that there needs to be more Jewish horror is also mentioned by a character in this film, like The Last Synagogue on the Left. Yes, this is a dark horror comedy film.

Okay, I’ve got my dreidel (wood, not plastic, of course), my chocolate gelt, and my throwing star mezuzah (yeah, I made that last one up), and I’m gonna fire up this release. Will it fly by or feel like it’s been on for eight nights? We shall see…

Sid Haig

With a strong start, we are introduced to a very frail-looking Sid Haig (his last film; d. 2019) by the light of a menorah, which looks incredible, as an Orthodox observer with literal head in hand, during a prologue from 1983 as the radio announces about the “Hanukiller.” His character is named Judah Lazarus, so how long you think he’s gonna stay dead, and is this going to be a mixing of the Old and New Testament, since the Lazarus story is in the Second Set? It has my attention.

De Mare, Felsted Jr., Katz, and Harris

We are introduced to three roommates: there’s somewhat loveable wiseacre with a Jew-Fro, Adam (Robert Felsted Jr.), kind of bland David (Toliver Harris), and dashing Josh (DAndre Johnson), who is black and a strict Christian. They travel up to the a cabin in the woods… okay, a house in the Catskills, for a party with excitably loose cannon and gravelly-voiced Rachel (Sadie Katz, who was so great in 2013’s House of Bad; reviewed HERE), who is Josh’s girlfriend du jour, and tattooed, pierced and bi- Amanda (Scream Queen Victoria De Mare). On the way to the bash hosted by their friend Ian (Caleb Thomas), they run into some Russian clichés Yuri (Wali Habib) and Ivan (Adam Franek), who have with them Nina (statuesque Katherine Pegova, who was memorable in 2020’s Catch of the Day 2; reviewed HERE), who are also on their way to Ian’s place. 

Joe Knetter

While there, they are Torah-rized (okay, I stole that in part from the back of the Blu-ray case) by the new Hanukiller (Joe Knetter, who ironically plays a slayer Santa in 2010’s Night Terrors), the identity of whom I will not give out, but it’s pretty obvious right from the start and doesn’t really try to red herring the audience.

The modern Hanukiller’s outfit looks a bit like a cross between the Litch (from James Balsamo’s film by the same name; Balsamo is a producer of this release, I should add, and has a nice cameo) and Robert E. Howard’s Solomon Kane, mixed with a bit of Hasidism. What I find interesting in the reasoning for the killing, namely people being “bad Jews” by not obeying the Torah, specifically Leviticus, which could easily have been filled in with any other mainstream religion, be it Christian maniacs like the Westboro Church or Muslim jihadists who fly planes into buildings. To me, any religious fanaticism is a shanda (Yiddish for disgrace), as it places everyone else as “Other,” and opens up interpretation into abuse. But I digress… Nu?

Charles Fleischer

The stunts are choreographed by the great Kane Hodder (does anyone need me to explain who he is, really?), and the effects look great, such as the skull cap made from, well, a skull. The SFX, most of which is practical, looks excellent (though the blood is a bit dark) and there is plenty of it, considering the budget’s capabilities.

I have to say, most characters aren’t very likeable, even with Adam at times, so it’s easy on the heart to see them dispatched. Most of the actors are Jewish, many of whom you may not know are of Hebraic heritage, such as with the cameos by the likes of Sid Haig, PJ Soles (aka Riff Randall, though most will who read this will probably think of the baseball cap victim of 1978’s Halloween), Charles Fleischer (the voice of the titular character in 1988’s Who Framed Roger Rabbit), Rob Zabrecky (who was amazing in 2015’s Decay; reviewed HERE), and the legendary Dick Miller, also in his final role (d. 2019).

Sadie Katz

The film has a rich color palate for lighting and lenses that works well, and it all is enwrapped by a great soundtrack, including music by Harry Manfredini (another Friday the 13th reference, along with Hodder). There is a strong sexuality present and nudity (female, no male) quotient, more than the killing. Honestly, taken by itself, the film makes Jews look a bit sex obsessed, which, as a secular Jew myself, I found a tad uncomfortable; I didn’t mind the sex and the nudity, it was the attitude of the characters.

My big issue with the film is the many holes in the story. For example, people are suddenly missing, and while it’s obvious why, there little hint of it happening as it occurs. Mostly someone mentioning at some point, “Where’s so-and-so?” Another example is David saying to Nina, “You have a car? Let’s go to the police,” as he walks to the door. The next time you see them, they’re sitting calmly on the couch talking to Yuri, who hasn’t been seen since about half an hour of the film ago. They keep talking about leaving for good but never do. What? The film takes place over a few days, but it isn’t clear about the amount between scenes enough (title cards or captions would be good). But no one left? I would have gotten a cab to the train in the first day.  Also, I had to watch the last 20 minutes of the film again to get what had happened at the end (shades of Hereditary!).

PJ Soles

There are some nice amount of extras on the disk. The commentary, which includes the director and the main actor, Felsted Jr., is kind of ordinary. It’s not bad and there are the occasional nuggets, but it’s a take-it-or-leave-it; either way would work. There are also a large number of deleted/bloopers/backstage/final shots of Haig and Miller, which kept my interest most of the time. Despite that the film could use some editing and can easily be brought down to 90 minutes or less, there were a couple of deleted scenes I would have liked to see included in the film (such as the one at the gas station). It’s also nice to see a brief clip of producer Felissa Rose on her cell phone, and also absorbing is Fleischer giving the cast some candid samples of his voice work.

After the final credits, they hint at a sequel to be titled Day of Judgement [sic], or maybe it should be perhaps Simchat Torah? Then maybe on to Tisha B’av?

Review: The Evil Rises

Text © Richard Gary / Indie Horror Films, 2020

Images from the Internet

The Evil Rises

Directed by Daniel Florenzano

Florenzano Films; Terror Films

85 minutes, 2018

www.facebook.com/evilrisesmovie

www.facebook.com/TerrorFilmsLLC

It amazes me how many genre films are based on some really stupid people who make really, really stupid decisions. For example, at a beach party (yes, bikinis abound, natch), a couple discover a statue peaking out of the sand that has some strange powder inside it.

Of course, one of them, Willie (Julian De La Mora), knows the entire history of this statue from a lecture he attended months ago. Say what? Anyway, most of them take the powder from the statue, put it in their beer, and swig away. I can just hear in my head, “Amber says whaaaaat?” None of that makes any sense, but if it sets up the rest of the story (as this is only the first few minutes), so be it.

Michael Glauser and Bailey La Flam

The powder turns the beach blanket bingo into a splatterfest as our California campers turn into mindless zombies controlled by… well, gimme a minute to get there. They kill each other off until there are only three: Claudia (Bailey La Flam), her boyfriend Sebastian (Michael Glauser), and Willie (the “intellectual” third-wheel). The killing raises, out of the sand, the… American Indian? Aztec?... spirit, Callas (Erik Cram), who controls them. Of course, Callas speaks perfect English, as most aboriginals did 666 years ago (yeah, that’s the timeline given, even though it’s more than 100 years before Columbus set foot anywhere near the Americas, and nearly 200 years before the Spaniards landed in California), and is killed by colonists who are dressed like the Puritans, who never left the East Coast. Since Callas is played by a colonialist actor; would this be considered cultural appropriation? I’m not sure. What is surprising to me is that the film is loaded with Latino/Latina actors, and they didn’t find one for Callas? Anyway, this is still in the first ten minutes; the credits haven’t even finished yet.

Now the sole purpose of this trio is to find the blood of 50+ people to raise Callas (no, not Charlie, RIP) to this dimension to begin his malevolent reign (hence the evil rising). Junkies, party animals, and all others are welcome to be obliterated as either flesh eating zombies or victims thereof.

La Flam and Alec Lobato

Of course, if you have evil, you must have good. On the side of humanity is a police detective, David Jones (not of the Monkees nor David Bowie; played by Joe Paulson, who actually holds up best in the acting department), Chazz the pizza delivery guy (Alec Lobato), and the local scammer priest (e.g., uses the tithe money to go on vacations), Father O’Malley (Ed Hollingsworth), who’s brogue comes and goes at will. Yeah, he’s on the side of “good.” Social commentary, anyone?

There are lots of moments that could have been excised to keep the pace going, such as the conversation between Chazz and a 911 operator. Do they or we need to hear that he thinks “the girl is smokin’ hot”?; good way to get a hang-up from the EMTs.

There is a huge cast in this film, which for its budget, in and of itself is impressive. Even some porn performers make their faces known. My favorite character is a super scary looking macho guy whose girlfriend is on a leash, who ends up being a scared little boy. This character, though completely underdeveloped, still made me smile the most. Truth of the matter is, all the roles are pretty undefined as far as personalities go, never mind back history of any kind. But the meat and potaters [sic] of the film is not so much the details, but the extraneous stuff: substance abuse, violence and gore, and of course, the flashing of boobs, which pop up on occasion (nothing of the male action).

As for the violence and gore, well, that looks rather good and enjoyable, without overdoing it (though a literal pool of blood looks a bit like water with coloring). Stabbings, biting, machetes are all instruments, among others, used to dispatch victims. For me, a weak spot was the final party scene, where there was room to focus more on the action than the story, but they let the story get in the way. This is probably due to budget constraints.

Is it a great movie? No. Is it a good movie? Well, it’s decent and entertaining, but there are places it could have been cut, and others where it could have been plumped up, as I noted. Of the two villain leads, Claudia comes off the best and the nastiest, while Sebastian is kind of… there, and kind of superfluous. This is the writing though, not the fault of Glauser.

I didn’t feel like it was a waste of time to watch it, but I don’t really feel a need to see it again, though I’d like to see La Flam and Paulson in more films.

To finish off in the digression department, the pizza place in the film, City Pizza, is a real San Diego shop that “specializes in New York style thin crust pizza.” That also made me smile. And miss New York style thin crust pizza.  The film crew did well to advertise the company within the film, and I hope they got some decent free pizza out of it.

Review: A Drunk Scorpion Will Sting Itself to Death

Text © Richard Gary / Indie Horror Films, 2020

Images from the Internet

A Drunk Scorpion Will Sting Itself to Death

Directed by Denton True

A Hard Work and True Storys Production

76 minutes, 2029

www.imdb.com/title/tt12244776/

My home town of Brooklyn is represented in Denton True’s sophomore film, though honestly, it’s not a Brooklyn I recognize from the middle class Bensonhurst from which I come. The title of the film may sound like an Italian giallo film from the 1980s, but it is solid local drug denizen territory.

As with his first film, American Male (2018), which I have not seen, True both directs and stars as its main character; in this new one, he’s Dean, a drug addict who is trying to get himself clean. Note that he was played a junkie in the first film, so there seems to be a motif going on here.

Denton True

Hanging out with his crew on a rooftop along Broadway in Williamsburg near the EL (you can see the old domed Williamsburg Savings Bank on Driggs in the background), including somewhat girlfriend Diana (Eva Maria Wojcik), and getting higher than the building elevation, he ODs and falls off the roof, breaking his nose, and with a prominent black eye. This isn’t a band of brothers (and sisters), they are bonded by what they smoke, which is a tenuous and untrusting connection at best.

Through a confrontation on a train, he meets Maria (Chanel Mack), dressed in red as she is one of right-wing Curtis Sliwa’s group of subway vigilantes, The Guardian Angels. It’s appropriate as its apparent there will be some sort of relationship between them as he tries to get straight, becoming his personal guardian angel in more ways than one.

Perhaps it’s real life, but there is an extremely liberal use of the word “Fuck” throughout the entire run time. I’m not offended by the word in any way, but eventually it starts to become distracting, and the dialog gets lost in it. As a metaphor, remember when Rocky was fighting the Russian dude, and he just kept wailing away at one spot until the bigger and stronger guy starts to wince? It’s kind of like that. It’s not the word itself, but the constant contextualizing of it. Eventually, it’s all you hear, and the dialog gets lost in the flood of any one word or expression, such as “like,” “y’know” or “dude”; I actually heard someone say “Dude, this dude doesn’t know, dude,” on the streets of Berlin.

Chanel Mack

There are some interesting twists and turns here that make this more than just a “get-straight” narrative, and brings it right back to the American giallo. The thing I know about getting clean, even being straight-edged, is that one of the hardest things to getting free of drugs (and alcohol) is the friends you keep. Part of any 12 Step Program is to stay away from those who use. Well, thanks to Maria, Dean finds a more permanent way to do that, that is actually pretty hardcore for what you may be expecting for this kind of film.

While the relationship between Dean and Maria is hazy other than sponsor and roommates, it is clear there is some twisted version of caring between Dean and Diana, who has a different vision of her future, much like The Days of Wine and Roses (1962), where one partner wants to get out and the other doesn’t. But can Dean actually do it? He definitely shows some ambivalence, but this is more a destitute lifestyle paradigm shift rather than just paying to go to rehab, which is new and different from Dean’s life up to that point and has been for at least a decade.

Brooklyn, for this story, is not exactly shown in the best light, with littered, wet streets, that is more reminiscent of Taxi Driver (1976) than the glorification of the city in, say, They Might Be Giants (1971). But considering the texture and tone of the film and it’s subject matter, it is quite appropriate.

The sound quality, like Dean’s thought processes, can be a bit chaotic. As there is an attempt towards clarity, the dialog is often matched with dogs barking, people talking, being on the subway, or just street noise as many scenes take us along walks among Brooklyn’s streets. The soundtrack is as muddled as Dean’s brain trying to function.

True’s filmmaking style is reminiscent of John Cassavetes (d. 1989), with a nearly documentary style, lots of close-ups, and a tendency to go in and out of focus momentarily here and there. But this style works well both for the story, for the characters, and for Dean’s thought processes. The big mystery is if can he succeed with so much violence in his wake.