SplatterFarm

Splatter Farm Directed by The Polonia Bros, (1987).

There are some shitty-os (shitty movies shot on video) that have come down the pike that defy rationality and description, but Splatter Farm is a special case. We’ve seen many unquestionable turds float to the top of the bowl like 555, Killing Spree or even Burning Moon, but this one is horrendous and puts them all to shame. When Skunkape is too busy, which he understandably has been lately, I must call on my other best pal Sharky, who is the lunatic that sent me this flick. We also watched it together over the phone and be forewarned, this one requires being smashed, fried and totally baked to endure the tortures of the damned. So, act accordingly when viewing this highly toxic event.

this is totally fine but weed is still illegal in the South.

SF apparently has an audience because it was re-released on DVD with quotes from Joe Bob Briggs and Frank Henenelotter praising its merit. But I'm pretty sure there are horror fans out there that will buy fucking anything because one of my most hated movies Lucker The Necrophagus has a special edition DVD! Skunkape is that movies only fan.

Can I have your autograph Mr. Odenkirk?

Splat begins with a pervy hayseed named Jeremy, who bashes the bejeezus out of a raw meat filled dummy. Next, the Polonia Brothers, who look like typical 80’s AV Club dweebs drive around for a little while. I imagine they took the video tape of this very movie on their way to the high school auditorium to show it as their summer school thesis. You might think The Black Devil Doll is the most atrociously, inept shot on video opus, but I’m almost embarrassed to say, this one was definitely edited using 2 VCRS! The music is slightly better than the casio tone for the hopelessly deranged aka the keytard stylinz of Chester Turner. I guess you could call Splatter Farm, the White Devil Doll!

Woah! Wrong tape again!

There’s tracking issues, a giant PLAY that flashes over the edits and I was kind of disturbed at what these kids were up to. I wonder what film makers possessed these knuckleheads to enact such fictional depravity and involve their Grandma/ Aunt to join in on the sexual deviance. I'm guessing it was Pasolini and Fulci. I kept wondering if it was going to hit, amateur porn levels of sickness and it sort of does. There’s fisting, coprophagia, pee drinking, a dude shits out a knife and wiggles his belly button in extreme close-up. It’s all simulated though, which still isn’t comforting. I don't recommend watching it alone, because you will most likely give up and watch reruns of WKRP in Cincinatti.

Thanks again to Hollywood High's #1 fan for sending me this. 

What we got here is a failure to communicate, the famous line from Splatter Farm.

Savage Weekend

Savage Weekend Directed By David Paulsen, Starring William Sanderson (1979).

Forget 30° of Kevin Bacon, this trivia question waiting to happen is something on the nerd level of what scuzzy 70’s flick has David Gale from Re-Animator and William Sanderson from Newhart and Fight for Your Life. That's right, this piece of trash.  Right over the credits we hear banjo music and a chainsaw heating up for some action. William “JF Sebastian” Sanderson is the thrift store Leatherface of this feature. This is the kind of movie where you're not sure if you had a nightmare about it or it actually happened but it's been sitting on the burner for at least five years and was gnawing at my subconscious so I just had to review it right now. It's got Caitlin O’ Heaney who I remember as the sexy teacher from Three O' Clock High in Oshkosh baa gosh if that doesn't get your motor running then just turn it off right now! Everything has that smothered in Vaseline light quality and it all just screams underground movie never to be seen for public consumption.

check out this cool maxi-pad from Hot Topic!

There’s this Tab Hunter type guy played by Christopher Allport. This actor was in one of my favorite fucked up movies Brain Wash and also Dead and Buried. His character is very flamboyant and comes on to Bud Light swilling rednecks, I mean he's just asking for trouble. This is supposed to be filmed in the backwoods but everything about it says Canada.

I could totally see Vinegar Syndrome putting this out on Blu-ray, it has that typical cruddy film stock that they love to remaster. There is a Kentucky fried movie level of boom mic prowess, I mean I expect at any minute to lower down and drink a glass of water.

or shave your face!

Sanderson was typecast in a lot of country hillbilly bullshit before he landed the gig in the famous Ridley Scott film. Really though, how do you top a movie as fucked up as Fight For Your Life, you’d think it’d be all downhill after that. Sanderson delved in mainstream fair like Coal Miners Daughter in the mid 70s as well.

Uh Oh I pooped again!

David Gale has one of those Marty Robbins handlebar mustaches and is pretty unlikeable.

I'm surprised I didn't review this sooner, it has a Mansion of the Doomed or Messiah of Evil quality that I dig. It's definitely way more captivating then say Pigs (which is available on Blu-ray).

I'm gonna peel you like a large orange.

The boom mic is shown so much here that it's almost another character. The boom operator must have a limp wrist like Lamar, forcing him to dip below the frame so much that he probably could've used a Revenge of the Nerds style floppy javelin instead of a straight pole to handle the microphone.

artists representation of Boom operator.

Chas Balun mentioned how this was the first movie with the masked Jason type killer. Big deal!

There's a lot of scenes where William Sanderson is just talking to himself right next to an Ed Wood style cardboard gravestone.

This version I watched on Betamax TV seems slightly edited maybe they're trying to cater to the whole summer blockbuster audience that doesn't exist anymore. Even with all the excized bits, I can't imagine enjoying this anymore, especially sober.

William Sanderson puts on the dime store mask and kind of lurks in the corners. The writing is non-existent and I have no idea what’s going on or what the point the film has.

Nobody is going to say that this was the precursor to Friday the 13th or some bullshit like that but I guess it's slightly relevant.

It's definitely kinky in the sex department which is kind of abrupt and I can't say it's a good film. I definitely can't recommend it, but it's an oddity nonetheless. The director also made the way better Schizoid with Klaus Kinski for Cannon, they also later distributed Savage and Paulsen worked primarily in TV on Dallas of all things.

I just discovered while writing this that Kino Lorber actually did put this out restored on Blu-ray with new interviews, excited? Not me! It's also available to stream on the Night Flight app.

TOTAL WASTE OF TIME.

The Lift

The Lift Directed By Dick Maas starring bunch of chuckleheads (1983).

By all logic and reason a killer elevator movie should be as criminally inept as a bed that skeletonizes it’s victims aka Death Bed: the Bed That Eats People, but for some reason I was totally entranced in this movie. Maybe it’s the euro trash stink and irresistible dubbed weirdness, not sure but I am way into it. I remember an early issue the Fangoria I saw a review for this 1983 flick from the ubiquitous Dr. Cyclops, which could've been any writer under that alias. I've been meaning to check it out ever since. 

Damien in the Omen part 2 used his demonic brain powers to control an elevator and make it slice up Meshach Taylor, the flamboyant fellow from Manniquin one and part two respectively, into bite-size pieces. The Lift has an elevator with a mind of its own and murders anyone who innocently steps on.

Felix (Huub Stapel) the elevator handyman seems like a bad parent. Dick Maas (which sounds like a Gay Pride Xmas celebration), the director who made this film has one of those phobias that Lucy from Charlie Brown would diagnose and really he must enjoy seeing people fall to their  death from the result of an elevator crash.

Everyone in this movie is seriously unlikable it’s like a virtual forrest of all ugly branches.

I’m expecting people from the White House to show up any minute and excuse the elevator for the death toll.

During the hilarious decapitation scene, the head mouths something as it plummets to the bottom. I know my friend Rob Fletcher should include it on his next severed head celebration post on FB.

The factory that Felix works at reminds me of that Rainer Werner Fassbinder film Fox and His Friends. It’s all very German or possibly Dutch at least they don’t pretend like it’s US.

In 1983 a cinema snob had waay more options on films to watch, so I’m glad I waited this long to see this film. I always think about how I could go into one theater and see Return of the Jedi the same year this came out and another theater and see something better that’s why it pays to wait it out sometimes. 
Felix at one point rolls a cigarette like an old Timey cowboy or maybe it's a joint, who knows? He gets pretty close with this one attractive reporter though and it upsets his wife.

The weirdest part of the movie has nothing to do with an elevator. When the science guy goes into detail all about computer chips, it reminded me of once again of Idiocracy where in the future you have to be set up with the barcode or remain scannable.

The pacing gets really slow and not very rewarding but stick it out anyway. I was yelling just die already like Elaine did during the forced viewing of the English patient, maybe you will too there’s something to look forward to!

HIGHLY AND BEGRUDGINGLY RECOMMENDED.

In Harry Canyon voice: when she looked at me like that sheesh!

Please don't hurt me Mr. Elevator.