Back in the day, I would search out for the most fucked up, goriest, splattered fill horror movies out in the underground. I soon stumbled upon German splatter like Ittenbach's Burning Moon or Schnaas Violent Shit trilogy. I would get excited when I'd get my hands on this type of movie because I'd see unrated gore and splatter in all it's 8th generation dubbed glory.
Those movies did it old school. Old school tubes, animal intestines and red faux blood to create those effects. Sure they were balloons filled with red dye and such but it looked awesome. Well those days are long gone unfortunately.
Today we get shit like The Summer of Massacre. A movie whose sole premise is that it holds the Guinness Book of World Records for the Highest Body Count in a slasher film at 155. To get this record it fills 1 hour and 37 minutes with HORRIBLY BAD CGI KILLS. And I don't mean these were Romero like CGI, I mean this is MS Paint bad CGI. It's the equivalent of super transposed 16 bit Genesis graphics on top of the movie. Atari had better graphics than this film.
It's technically an anthology with self contained stories about a mad killer on the loose, some grotesque handicapped kid, killer father back from the dead to torment his son, camp kids killed by mutant firemen and serial killers with a nuke. It's not as cool as it sounds. Bad acting, bad makeup effects, bad stories and utterly fuckin shitty CGI kills. Sliced necks, ankles, necks, etc. Bullet would deaths. A whole level of stupid gross shit. I could list shit but honestly I don't even remember. This is pretty much the worst horror movie I've seen in the last 10 years. And trust me, I've seen a lot of bad ones.
I just can't stand movies who use CGI in their horror these days. I'm an old school guy with a throwback to the grind mentality. I'm pretty sure it's necessary at times but I like seeing the vicious realism of trauma. It's what I grew up watching and I appreciate the effort by the filmmakers when they go this route.
The Summer of Massacre is a crappy induced diarrhea mess of a film. I'd rather have my eyes gouged by hot pokers than see this film again. I'd rather be eaten alive by cannibals and shown by beating heart than see this film again. I'd rather have all my arms and legs chopped off and placed in a wooden box buried alive than see this film again.
The scary part is all those scenes are going to probably be in the sequel in really fuckin bad CGI.
"It's always the quiet ones that cut your dick off while you're not looking"
-Token black guy DJ
It's rare to see a film that takes the slasher formula and hammers in the gore relentlessly. If there is one thing that nails this down, it's Sweatshop, a splatter soaked gore-o-thon that gives us sex, beats and a big fuckin sledgehammer.
Director Stacy Davidson and writer Ted Geoghegan clearly went for the jugular in this film. I'll get to the gore in a second but the cast of characters who we'll get to meet are the anti-Hollywood Hollister/American Eagle bunch of white people. They're ravers/punk rockers/crustycore motley crew sorta bunch and kudos to the costume department for making them all stand out in their own way.
A few plot points are scattered around, a few LOLs dabbled in but the gorehounds will rejoice when "The Beast" and his banshee she-demons get their kill on. It's the gore and splatter that drives Sweatshop, make no doubt about it. It's not reinventing the slasher genre but it's making sure the definition is being 100% adhered to.
Sweatshop's The Beast is a slasher even Thor would be scared of.
Boring Plot-O-Matic
A group of friends break into an abandoned factory in order to throw a impromptu party; unaware that it is not as empty as they originally believed.
Awesome Review-O-Matic
I review every slasher flickwith my handy jaded viewer slasher checklist. Below is a list of what we here at the jaded viewer deem as full of chunky gooiness when it comes to the ingredients of a solid slasher-palooza.
Does Sweatshop achieve everything on this list?
1.) Does the movie have..... a mysterious, insanely strong, ridiculed as a child, deformed, inbred redneck slasher?
Check. The Beast's backstory is never told, we don't even know why he wants to kill these glow stick motherfuckers. He's got a pimp fur coat and a welding mask and his fuckin large...like Butterbean large. I'm going to assume he's an inbred redneck as that's what I always assume.
2.) Gratuitous, over the top, super fleshy nudity?
Definite check. The raver-tastic Krystal Freeman who plays Lolli shows us her lovely lovelies (that's boobs) and it's mucho fantastico. Top it off with a sex scene with a fat guy and..... ::shivers::
3.) Stereotypical teenage caricatures who die gruesome and horrific over the top deaths?
Check. Clearly there's a final girl in here somewhere. We have Charlie, the greedy raver in charge, Scottyboy the mohawk sex fiend, Wade the hillbilly, Jade the malicious vixen, Lolli the slut, Miko the other slut and a token black DJ.
4.) No Plot?
Check. Kids have a rave in an abandoned warehouse where a Thor envy slasher kills them. What more you want?
5.) Kills by our slasher that make you go "Fuck yeah!"
Check. I'll say that they went old school with this one.
6.) Gore, lots of it. Like serious decapitation, dismemberment, impalement, hammer frenzy steroid rages and blood shooting out at various penetration wounds, limbs a flailing and mindless splatter and mayhem?
Check. Top notch over the top gore in this one. Severed heads via a hedge clipper, sliced heads via machetes, entrails and intestines ripped out and many many many splatter inducing, modified sledge hammer wallops that result in pancake ravers. Ocular trauma, penis trauma, hand trauma, neck trauma...there be a whole shitload of fuckin trauma in this.
7.) Geeky leader who takes charge of the hapless group as they try to escape who befriends a hot girl who knows about the "legend" (there's always a legend no one believes)
Nope. Nothing. Nada. Nobody really takes charge. Everybody fends for themselves. Bunch of savages in this town.
8.) Funny yet ill timed dialogue but also various quips and one liners that are funny only the first time around (yet somehow funny again when you buy the DVD and only when you're stoned)
There are a few jokes that made me chuckle but overall it's the final rave scene at the end where The Beast goes exterminator on the raver "roaches" that had me laughing.
9.) Gratuitous cameos by actors who have portrayed horror legends (Candyman, Freddy Kreuger and Jason Voorhees) that make you flash a metal sign and do the Beavis and Butthead pseudo head nodding.
Nope.
10.) Wildly ambiguous ending that can be used to warrant a sequel?
Sweatshop isn't the most creative slasher movie but it's the most bloodiest one I've seen in a while. It's got its gimmicks (ravers doing ravy things) and a masked slasher with a weapon that would make Jason Voorhees jealous. The characters are your standard cardboard cutouts of not white teen suburbia but cutouts of what we think ravers dress and act like. I mean they had them drinking and smoking weed...but not doing meth or taking E? WTF?
By the end of the first hour, the body count is quite high and your waiting to see what the hell will happen in the final 30. And I'll admit it doesn't disappoint. It's a crazy gore soaked ending.
I've always said that if you have gratuitous nudity, some semi interesting characters and a formidable killing machine, you've made a decent slasher film in my book.
You may not have expected it, but Sweatshop cuts off a good solid dick.
Gore-ipedia
See checklist item #6
Nude-ipedia
Gratuitous nudity at its most gratuitous WTF moment
That hammer is seriously pimped out
The Jaded Viewer's Final Prognosis
Sweatshop is being distributed via Screen Media Films and was released on DVD September 13th. Sarah Jahier of Fatally Yours has a quote on the DVD box (which peaked my interest in watching this) and a Bloody Disgusting and Dread Central gave good reviews.
With Hatchet 2 coming out next month and after rewatching it on Showtime, I had forgotten how awesome Hatchet is. I remember when I first heard about Hatchet. It was probably on some horror site and the tagline of "Old School American Horror" just got me pumped. We we're going to see a fuckin vintage 80s slasher film. This is the shit!
I saw the trailer and it looked mega awesome. Adam Green had unleashed Hatchet to us at the perfect time. We weren't massively rebooting or sequeling all the old horror we had now. It was new, it was a throwback and it was full of extreemy gore. I didn't realize Hatchet (see my original review) was going to bring back all that was fun about the slasher genre. And it did and jolted up to #2 on My Top 10 Horror Movies of 2007.
When I wrote my review, the legend of Victor Crowley as a new iconic slasher hadn't hit me yet. Here's what I wrote:
"Our man, Hatchet head is by far the most solid slasher to come along in ages. He's not a mysterious, conjured up evil or a pissed off fisherman, nor is he two teenage horror buffs.
He's a deformed, inbred redneck with a big hatchet scar. His dad put a hatchet in his fuckin head. That's a awesome slasher."
So after watching the film, I figured a relook back at the mega awesome death scenes would be fun. Have you forgotten them already? Let's rewatch em again and rank em!
DEATHS #1 and #2(Mr. and Mrs. Permatteo)
"Mr and Mrs. Permatteo are totally getting ripped off"
the jaded viewer says: When I first saw this, I got flashbacks of Jason immediately. "Jump to conclusions" guy is hatcheted up and the Mrs get her mouth ripped open inside out.
the jaded viewer says: Solid goblets of gore as Vic goes all twisty on our porn con man. Vic already went all mouth rippy, but the neck twisting was a twist (hahah get it?) and it's still awesome but kinda didn't have the splatter oooomph of the second kill. Still solid arterial spraying.
Rating: B+ "Jenna loves the pole" (@:48)
the jaded viewer says: Where the hell did Vic get a sand blaster? Is he sanding the Crowley house? Still an awesome skin rippage scene complete with a wrestling move thrown in.
Rating: B "Shawn wasn't head strong" (@ 1:05)
the jaded viewer says: Poor Shawn. Sure he wasn't the best New Orleans ghost tour guide, but he tried his best to keep everybody from losing their minds....well except his own. Simple decapitation but solid.
Rating: B "Marcus gets disarmed" (@ 1:44)
the jaded viewer says: It's not enough he gets his arms ripped of by Vic, but his now armless body gets pounded into the "Green" tombstone. I love how Adam Green gave us that not so subtle visual cameo Easter egg.
Rating: B
DEATHS #8 and #9 (Victor Crowley (not really) and Ben (well he looks like he's gonna die))
"Vic, be careful there's a pole...never mind."
the jaded viewer says: The supposed death of Victor Crowley came off kinda blah. I mean he runs into the pole. But the ending after the ending totally makes up for it as he uses Ben's arm to get Marybeth.
Rating: C
Well there ya go. A solid retrospective of the deaths from Hatchet. As the sequel takes place right after the original, we'll see if Ben survives (umm I don't think so). What new death scenes will we see in the sequel?
Can it possibly top these? In a month we'll find out. And we'll also get to know of the curse and back story of our new wait for it LEGENDARY slasher, Victor Crowley.
So what was your favorite death scene? Do you think Hatchet 2 can top these? Let me know!
If this is the first time you've heard the name Andreas Schnaas, well I'm here to educate you my gorehound minions. Schnaas is the director of the infamous Violent Shit Trilogy. Let me take you to a time when horror bootleg VHS tapes at horror conventions were the norm and 3 German directors redefined the low budget splatter film.
With Schnaas was Jorg Buttgereit (Nekromantik and Nekromantik 2) and Olaf Ittenbach (Premutos, Burning Moon). The only way to see their films was to trade on the internet or go to a horror fest and buy a badly dubbed VHS copy. These 3 left their mark in the gorehound hall of fame. Mind you their movies had no plot, their films badly subtitled and had no budget, but that was made up for in the buckets of blood, gore and guts they put on the screen.
So Schnaas who last made a Troma distributed film called Nikos the Impaler is back to his roots with Violent Shit 4.0: Karl the Butcher vs Axe. Who the fuck is Axe? I have no idea but from the trailer I noticed a few things:
NYC seems kinda apocalypticized
Egypt too
Umm lots of people are kinda dead
Metal Masks from 1989 look the same in 2010
Karl knows kung fu?!?!
Gratuitous nudity!
Arterial spraying! (looks like Schnaas got $5 extra dollars this time around)
Karl is gonna knock some heads this time around (PUN SO INTENDED!)
Here are my mini reviews of all three movies for the record. I wrote these circa 2002. 1.) Violent Shit
Andreas Schnaas is a cult horror icon throughout the underground horror community. Everybody has heard of the Violent Shit Trilogy. Holy splatter and guts Batman! This is utter torture in the worse way.
Shot on video trash, VS is an exercise of guerrilla film making. A plot is non existent, but Karl the Butcher, our delusional and insane serial killer armed with a butcher's knife goes frolicking around the back, waaaay back German woods hacking up victims who just happen to be there.
The gore is very artificial but in a comical sorta way. Arms get cut off, heads get beheaded, intestines fall out, victims get cut in 2. It's a total ripoff of FT13th but Karl the Butcher has its moments and Violent Shit is fuckin violent shit.
2.) Violent Shit 2: Mother Hold My Hand
The best movie of the trilogy. Looky here! An opening title sequence. Classic splatter. No holds barred dismemberment's, intestines, yada yada yada.
3.) Violent Shit 3: Infantry of Doom AKA Zombie Doom
We conclude with Zombie Doom. Schnaas, you would have hoped by now would have had a budget to make a decent flick but alas he tries to intermix some American movies he must have seen (bad move Andreas!) and add some goofy humor.
Basic plot: Karl Sr and Jr. are reunited and have started a cult. Members train and of course if fail are unfortunately dismembered and killed. A former member (let's call him Chinese guy) and 2 castaways land who unfortunately land on the wrong island must survive Karl Jr's game...humans are hunted for sport. (you so original Schnaas!)
Cult members die, splatter galore, dismemberment's, disfigurements, tit impaling, head impaling, gutted stomachs. You got the picture? A little letdown from Part 2 but it's got the goodies.
We here at the jaded viewer love ultraviolent gorefests from Japan. So when I heard there was another crazy martial arts gore-a-thon coming soon, I was intrigued.
In the awesomeness of flicks like The Machine Girl and Tokyo Gore Police comes double trouble in the form of Hard Revenge, Milly. This flick and it's a sequel Hard Revenge, Milly: Blood Battle are the work of Takanori Tsujimoto.
From the trailers below, they are as bloody fuckin bloody as advertised.
Actually it should probably be in the top 5. But alas, what's done is done. I can't go ahead and change the list. I mean I'm one of those people that once its posted, its set in stone.
Let's just have TGP and Machine Girl as co-#7's. Cool?
I'm giving TGP 4 fuckin spinkicks. It's 100 times more awesomer than The Machine Girl even taking a crack at it during the movie.
I went into seeing TGP as maybe another Machine Girl. But my expectations were blown away (like many heads). This is the Japanese equivalant of Hong Kong's the Story of Riki Oh, filled with the splatter and gore so over the top, so gushingly gratuitous, so arterial spraying magnificent that one can only wonder if this will EVER be topped.
It works on so many levels. We've got Ruka the hot police officer killing some mutant ass, a plot that actually made sense and the title definitely living up to the flick.
My thing is I've seen the Ichi, Machine Girl, Tetsuo and other crazy Japanese cinema. I'm as jaded as they come when it comes to the Japanese underground flicks. So when I say I was thrilled by everything in TGP, seeing more totally weird and fucked up shit every few minutes, it's saying something.
It's saying this was insanely insane with an atomic bomb of insanity.
Good times.
Boring Plot-O-Matic Set in a future-world vision of Tokyo where the police have been privatized and bitter self-mutilation is so casual that advertising is often specially geared to the "cutter" demographic, this is the story of samurai-sword-wielding Ruka and her mission to avenge her father's assassination. Ruka is a cop from a squad who's mission is to destroy homicidal mutant humans known as "engineers" possessing the ability to transform any injury to a weapon in and of itself.
Awesome Review-O-Matic
Tokyo Gore Police will draw comparisons to Robocop. Both have the central plot points of a police that has been privatized and a criminal element that has taken over the city. Also, TGP squeezes in some hilarious "pro" Tokyo Police Corporation PSA's and commercials.
All show up randomly throughout the flick and are great ha ha's during the 110 minute gorefest.
Ruka (Audition's Eihi Shiina) is our beautiful, sexy, wristcutting cop whose job is to track down "engineers", mutant humans who once they get sliced or diced regenerate the missing limb into a bioweapon.
And people do lose limbage. Part of the joy was to see what weapon their missing appendage would regenerate into. The prosthetics and home grown rubbery latex may be cheesy, but I'll take that over CGI any day.
The movie follows Ruka as she eliminates these engineers eventually leading her to battle the leader called"The Keyman". The Keyman is key (sorry I couldn't resist) to the plot of who our true mastermind behind the mayhem is.
In a nod to Kill Bill, the keyman explains the real deal through comic storyboards. It's a clever way to reveal the motives and get that pesky plot out of the way so we can get to more splatter.
But lets face it, it's the gore and splatter than dominate. TGP is non stop. I mean freakin non stop when it comes to scenes of arterial spraying, sword slicing and blood on the lens. It's so frenetic that every scene was pure, magnificent Grade A carnage. And the splatter wasn't just a slice and dice every time. Each bloodletting was a little different, a little unique from the others.
Each scene was a carefully constructed artistic piece of splatter and gore. A gunshot blasting open a head, a chainsaw to the face, sword play cutting a body in two, a metal pole thru the mouth and in one glorious piece of gore-ific cinema, Ruka cuts a subway groper's hands with her sword and his arms arterial spray in Matrix-like slo mo as Ruka walks away, under umbrella as it rains blood.
So awesome. So fuckin awesome. And it keeps going. More scenes of wickedness. We see a brothel full of freaky hookers. All are engineers and all are mutantly delicious. I was hoping the 3 breasted hooker from Total Recall was there. This concludes in a golden shower of epic proportions.
Un-fuckin-believable.
Later, we view a penis gets ripped off, leading to a geyser of blood. A prostitute gets gunned down and regenerates her lower half into a croc like mouth. A cop turned engineer develops a "money shot" mutant cock.
Need I say more?
Yes? OK I'll keep going.
The corporate police, go all police statey and wreak havoc on every citizen. Innocent civs are gunned down and Ruka's bartender friend gets ripped apart medieval style. There is even an homage to The Machine Girl during a fight scene between a rogue policewoman and a Sailor Moon uniformed engineer schoolgirl.
So fuckin cool.
The ending has more limbs, flying fists and concludes with some rocket flying arterial spraying. Just fitting to a movie that went into the stratosphere of gore movies.
Tokyo Gore Police is a little long, but there isn't any lull in the entire movie. It's one non stop splatter scene after another. Honestly, what movie can claim that?
I have the poster hanging right above my computer, having grabbed it at the NY Comic Con. And it was always on the back of my mind to watch it. I can't believe it took me this long to see this gore-tastic movie.
There is a point where you get in the mood to see a mindless manga come to life. When you enjoy watching real life NC - 17 cartoony violence. Ichi the Killer and Kill Bill use arterial spraying to fit its universe, but movies like The Machine Girl and TGP make arterial spraying and gore the norm.
This could only come from Japan, where the crazy is the norm. I can only imagine if I ever visited Japan that while looking at ladies panties in a vending machine, some dude gets his arm sliced off and arterial sprays an ocean all over the place. I'd scream out "Oh shit!, This stuff happens for real here!"
Gore-ipedia (if you want to be shocked don't read)
So much to list it would take too long. Most of the good shit is what I wrote in the review.
Nude-ipedia (because you like boobies)
Mutant boobies
WTF moment
The torture Wii game Slo Mo arterial spraying subway molester punishment
The Jaded Viewer's Final Prognosis
Some fun facts. Yoshihiro Nishimura did all the makeup and special effects for The Machine Girl, Sukeban Boy, Meatball Machine and Suicide Circle.
As the credits roll, keep watching. There's even a proclamation of "More Gore Coming Soon!".
You really have to be in the right frame of mind to see continuous arterial spraying, blood, gore and splatter. But once you are, this movie will hit all the pleasure centers of every gorehound's brain.
Tokyo Gore Police is artistic gore at its finest, a frenzy of weirdness and carnage that is a testament to this new subgenre of mutant weapon appendages.
This is a millennial cult classic that will only be topped by Nishimura's next splatterfest.
The Summer of Massacre
I just can't stand movies who use CGI in their horror these days. I'm an old school guy with a throwback to the grind mentality. I'm pretty sure it's necessary at times but I like seeing the vicious realism of trauma. It's what I grew up watching and I appreciate the effort by the filmmakers when they go this route.
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