(1970)
Dir - John Waters
Overall: MEH
For his first sound full-length, trash pioneer John Waters took his cue from Herschell Gordon Lewis' Two Thousand Maniacs! in the rambling, occasionally riotous Multiple Maniacs. Shot in his native Baltimore with all of the technical skill of someone who has no idea what a camera is, the rough presentation is befitting to the grandiose treatment of its perverse themes. In typical Waters fashion, all forms of lewdness are comedically glorified for their transgressive shock value which is perhaps best realized in a lengthy sex scene shot in a church where Divine takes Mink Stole's rosary in his ass while moaning ferociously and narrating about what a glorious experience it was. Hilarious dialog like "I mean I can only sit around and be insulted by turds for so long, everybody has a limit!" and "I love you so much I could shit!" show that what Waters lacked in technical cinematic skills he more than made up for in tawdry wordplay. Understandable considering that it was an amateur feature made with as little experience as it had finances, it is largely made up of long-winded chattering that goes on for excessive lengths of time. Even with laugh-out-loud outrageousness regularly interjected, as well as a finale that sees Divine wrestling with a papier-mâché lobster monster before sledgehammering a car and getting murdered on the streets by cheering soldiers, it could still afford to trim about thirty sluggish minutes.
(1971)
Dir - Al Adamson
Overall: WOOF
Well-deserving of its abysmal reputation, Z-grade filmmaker Al Adamson's Dracula vs. Frankenstein has some delightfully awful moments for bad movie fans, but it is predominantly a sluggish embarrassment. Apparently, the entire addition of both Dracula and the Frankenstein monster happened after a rough cut was submitted and then found to be unsatisfactory by production supervisor Sam Shermon, so one has to shudder at how even more boring the movie was like in its initial form. Serving as the final screen appearance for both J. Carrol Naish and Lon Chaney Jr., the latter never looked or performed worse in his career. Stumbling, profusely sweaty, morbidly obese, and completely inebriated by alcohol, Chaney's scenes were allegedly done in between him laying down in immense physical discomfort, which certainly shows. Despite such unfortunate casting, Russ Tamblyn appears for a total of about twenty-seven seconds in two useless scenes, Adamson's wife Regina Carrol makes a fool of herself, Forrest J. Ackerman has a cameo, Angelo Rossitto gets a few lines, and Zandor Vorkov, (in his second of only two acting appearances), is a hilariously wretched Dracula equipped with racoon eyes, an afro, exaggerated mannerisms, and a reverberated voice. It is all punctuated by meandering dialog exchanges and stock music montages, plus Adamson still has no idea how to stage a single shot or generate any momentum for the pathetically asinine story that he is trying to tell.
(1978)
Dir - Walter Stocker
Overall: MEH
The only time that actor Walter Stocker was behind the lens instead, Till Death is low on budget and rudimentary on story, but it emphasizes slow-mounting dread for those who are patient. Opening with an obvious nightmare sequence that foretells events to come, we get a quick wedding ceremony and an automobile tragedy which then puts our protagonist in the position of being trapped in a crypt overnight. Allegedly shot anywhere between 1972 and 1974 yet given a release date of 1978, the film has lingered in obscurity ever since. Stocker employed family members to assist in the production, with his son writing the screenplay and his daughter helping out with the wardrobe and props. The results are crude, unhurried, and predictable, but there is a humble sincerity that comes through and the movie fails to be insulting in its cheap construction. No one on screen delivers Oscar-worthy performances, but they also do not embarrass themselves and we get plenty of fog, some garish zombie makeup, ghostly apparitions, and an agreeably-used spooky soundtrack. It is too uneventful and sluggish to recommend, but there are far worse out there from the period which were done within similar means.
No comments:
Post a Comment