Dir - Karim Ouelhaj
Overall: MEH
Belgium filmmaker Karim Ouelhaj's Megalomaniac is his first full-length venture into horror and it shows that the New French Extremity movement is alive and well in its neighboring country. Any investigation into such a film must come with a warning label as this is far from easy consumption, except for those with the most desensitized of pallets. Ouelhaj dives right in with a brutal pregnancy opening that is only a hinting of the visceral nastiness to come, as well as something that is bookended before the credits roll as we follow a dysfunctional family that is based off of the still unidentified Butcher of Mons serial killer. Benjamin Ramon is as inhumane and cold as any such cinematic character has ever been with his pasty skin, no eyebrows, dead expression, and unflinching dedication to carrying out his infamous father's "work", which is torturing and murdering women. His sister, (played by Eline Schumacher, who Western audiences will have a hard time not picturing Elisabeth Moss in as far as an American remake goes), represents the bleakest presence in the film as a woman born from evil who lives a life of perpetual loneliness, ridicule, and rape. This sibling duo leads a diabolically nurtured existence that needlessly continues the cycle with no hope of escape. Too unflinchingly bleak to recommend, but its stylized brutality casts a wretched spell that is impossible to take lightly.
Dir - Carter Smith
Overall: MEH
The third full-length from writer/director Carter Smith sees him quasi-returning to horror with Swallowed, which is actually more of a queer-centric thriller if we are to split hairs. Taking place within a time frame of less than a day, it follows two friends who have just about the worst luck imaginable as they are forced at gunpoint to transport what they believe to be drugs across a border via swallowing the goods and naturally depositing of them later, from out the other end. Gross. Things get more uncomfortable from there and the film would be a refreshing and tension-fueled nightmare if not for how consistently dour it is. Jena Malone turns in an against-type performance as a hard-edged drug dealer with Mark Patton laying it on thick as her flamboyantly terrifying boss. The movie largely belongs to its lead Cooper Kotch though, whose character maintains a keen survival instinct while being victimized, leading to a finish that is rewarding from a comeuppance perspective. Despite its unique, homosexual point of view towards a crime gone wrong synopsis, the "horror" elements are too underplayed which if properly fleshed out, would have provided a more interesting genre mash-up than what is given.
Dir - Alex Phillips
Overall: MEH
A goofy and disgusting midnight movie debut from writer/director Alex Phillips, All Jacked Up and Full of Worms has its absurdist heart in the right place, exploring drug-fueled depravity in a way that echoes its broken character's desperation. Whether longing for parenthood, enlightenment, connection, or just more vile behavior to feel alive, every person on screen goes through some form of icky metamorphosis brought on by tripping off of actual worms, which may as well be a stand-in for actual addiction and the more dark areas that it can take someone. Of course this is just one interpretation of what Phillips has concocted here and who is to say if it is the "correct" one? Allegedly, he had written it as a stage play first, which would fit right at home in some dingy city basement while performed to a combination of alarmed gasps and giggling for an audience looking for something that John Waters would approve of. The results are a mixed bag in their ridiculousness, but whether intentionally or not, it is difficult to take anything seriously that transpires on screen. Even if nothing here is profound and the fringe genre fans that it targetsare probably too desensitized to be appalled, it is at least a brisk seventy-two minutes that delights in its WTFness.
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