POSSESSION

Possession

Directed by: Andrej Zulawski

France/West Germany, 1981

Drama/Horror, 127min

Distributed by: Second Sight Films

There’s really only two ways to watch Andrej Zulawski’s breathtaking and mind expanding, monster metaphor movie, Possession – either you love it or you hate it. This is possibly THE film that polarizes its audience and so it should, with it’s sluggish pacing, manic acting and gob smacking horror twist. Andrey Zulawski’s Possession is a masterpiece of art-house drama molten together with gooey tentacle monster in horrific body horror!

Alienation is a key to Possession and Zulawski puts this all up front as the film opens with a harsh scene of rejection. Mark [Sam Neill] returns home from a journey abroad only to be met on the street by his wife Anna [Isabelle Adjani] who proceeds to tell him that she thinks their relationship is over. This is followed by scenes of the couple discussing the fact that they don’t really have any sexual feelings for each other any more, which leads to the reveal that Anna has been having an affair with another man… or at least that’s what we think so far.

Mark becomes obsessive in his determination to keep the family assembled (consisting of him, Anna and their young son Bob [Michael Hogben]) and going through the motions, he shouts at her, fights her, throws himself at her feet, submits to her, all without result. Mark descents into a deep dark personal space as he fights for what he believes is true happiness, fighting for a memory of something that no longer is.

Looking at Possession from a storytelling point of view, it’s a rather interesting film when it comes to the lead characters – keep in mind that this is early eighties, and the nihilism of today’s genre films was decades away – so it’s something of a fascination that Zulawski keeps his lead characters somewhat inaccessible to us. Neither Anna, Mark or Heinrich [Heinz Bennet] are sympathetic characters, so I don’t really root for any of them, they are all quite unlikeable, egotistical people completely coming apart at the seams, all by their own hands.

The only person that really is a likeable and empathetic character is schoolteacher Helen [Adjani in a double role] who plays an important part in Mark’s catharsis! In her own way a metaphor for innocence and the corruption of same innocence... Oh, and watching Possession again after quite some time, I also feel that there’s a pretty cool and subtle message in there concerning the two private investigators [Shaun Lawton and Carl Duering] and their relationship!  

Secrets. Yes secrets, dirty secrets. Zulawski lures the audience down a deceptive route as Mark learns of Anna’s dirty little affair on the side with Heinrich. But he certainly doesn’t stop there, but Anna has yet another affair outside of her affair with Heinrich… the rush of insight when one realizes what has been going on is powerful, and both men become completely obsessive. Only one of them can have Anna, and nobody want’s to let go of her, in a way it’s Anna who has who has possessed the men and they will stop at nothing to have her. Even the before mentioned detectives have their “secret”. Anna’s creature, the shape shifting homunculus that she hides in that damp murky Berlin apartment is her dark secret, and in some ways it also becomes Mark’s when he learns of it.

An important part of Possession is the constant disorientation. Multi award winning cinematographer Bruno Nuytten’s work here is fantastic, but the way the scenes are edited together, one rarely comes to insight in how rooms or locations are connected, this despite several splendid steady cam shots and flowing long in and out of location moves. This adds to the mental confusion of the piece. It’s also really important to watch how the shots are composed, as the way Adjani and Neill move and place themselves in the rather long and demanding shots are like watching strictly choreographed dances. The way the camera lingers and keeps us at distance is also part of the earlier mentioned alienation. Even the audience is held at arms length from everything.

Emotionally the film grinds down it’s audience and becomes a surrealistic nightmare perfected. There are no release valves and tension simply builds, on both the character levels and on the monster levels before reaching it’s devastating climax. Neill gives a great performance as the devastated Mark but Adjani showcases some outstanding talent as she with perfection slips between the many emotions and states of mind that Anna displays.

The monster. We can’t really talk about Possession without talking about the monster, metaphorical or not. Pocketed between two academy awards for his on Alien 1979 and E.T. 1982, Carlo Rambaldi's creature of Possession is a repulsive and magnificent one, kept off screen as long as possible and when it’s revealed we never really get a clear idea of how it comes together… it’s all slime, ooze and tentacles as the creature feasts off the blood and flesh of the poor victims Anna brings to their shared secret lair, and despite being a mix of Lovecraftian elder and total nightmare beast it doesn’t stop Anna from being intimate with the slimy monster. It’s a fantastic monster and is used in the perfect amount of screen time, any more and we would have been able to start looking for the wires, rods and any other revealing pieces of trickery. Once that monster is seen the fact that Anna is pregnant with it’s child evokes some haunting mental images, but nothing as surreal and disturbing as what Zulawski, Rambaldi and Adjani conjure up in the subway miscarriage scene in the second half of Possession. This is the concentrate of nightmares indeed!

Possession works in two ways, one as a metaphor for the disintegration of the Mark/Anna relationship, which is presented in a gut-wrenching fashion as the couple slowly, slowly, disintegrate and come apart at the seams. Emotional recognition is vital to understanding movies that want to tell situations we will never end up in (such as being traded for a gory monster that slowly takes your shape) so recognizing the suffering and torment that the characters are experiencing are important for the audience as this is what makes us know what they are feeling, experiencing and going through. The most of us have at least one really bad break up in our luggage and this is what Zulawski uses… at least to lure us into the strange freaky place he takes us.

But the movie also, as Andrej Zulawski points out on the commentary track, works as a metaphor for the “monsters” people became during the cold war and the terror of the Stasi. It’s possible to see this metaphor in the shape of Helen who “accidentally” is drawn into the world/relationship of Mark and Anna, and is the real and only true innocent victim of the piece. As mentioned earlier, neither Mark nor Anna are all that likeable as characters, Helen is the only one who we can empathize with, hence her in all her kindness and innocence becomes the victim. Just like friends and family turning on each other in Cold War Eastern Germany.

Loaded with a full batch of possessive extras such as TWO audio commentary tracks (one with Zulawski the other with co-writer Frederic Tuten); Interview with Zulawski, A DIVIDED CITY which sees Zulawski’s frequent composer Andrzej Korzynski talk about the soundtrack to Possessed, and if you like his work, you should pick up some of their collaborations released by Finders Keepers Records on LP and CD. REPOSSESSED; an expose on how the film was received in the UK during the Video Nasties era and how the US censors recut the film, OUR FRIEND IN THE WEST sees producer Christian Ferry is interviewed, and even the artist responsible for the amazing poster for the film is discussed in the featurette BASHA. THE OTHER SIDE OF THE WALL is a feature length making of Possession documentary that gives even more insight into this fantastic film…

The Second Sight release of Andrej Zulawski’s nightmarish drama, Possession, is without a doubt one of the top five must have Blurays of 2013. Available from 29th July 2013.

Alyce

Alyce

Directed by: Jay Lee

Horror/Thriller 93 min

USA, 2011

If you had told me beforehand that this was made by the same guy that wrote/directed Zombie Strippers 2008, I’d probably never have slipped the disc into my machine. Zombie Strippers is a movie that I still haven’t seen, and never really been interested in, although find myself curious as of now. Because I would never have thought that the same person who made a spoofy zombie flick could have made a genuinely disturbing and haunting flick as Alyce.

Following a party where a common sleazy trait is exposed by boyfriend Vince [James Duval], Alyce [Jade Dornfeld] and her best friend Carroll [Tamara Feldman] take to partying on their own, so that Carroll can tend to her disappointment. But the girls’ night of bonding and confessions comes to a harrowing end when Alyce accidentally knocks Carroll of a rooftop. The accident becomes a catalyst for the deterioration of Alyce, as she becomes snared in a downward spiral taking her through a maze of drugs, sex and violence finally landing her in a deep dark place.

Alice’s Adventures in Wonderland [1865, Charles Lutwige Dodgson, aka Lewis Carroll] may just be one of the most important works ever written. Despite being within the fantasy realm, it’s a story that strongly influences the horror genre, and perhaps it’s something of an underestimated gem if you look at it through the horror goggles. As a child that animated Disney flick used to freak me out, and to some extent still does. So one can easily see how it metaphorically can be applied to movies on the genre scene. But this isn’t something new; as early as 1903, when cinema was in it’s infancy, Cecil Hepworth and Percy Stow directed a ten minute short version, and with its stop motion animation and in camera effects, it’s certainly breathes an eerie sensation. Jaromil Jires loosely based his Valerie a týden divu (Valerie and her Week of Wonders), 1970 on Carroll’s novel, Czech stop motion wizard Jan Svankmajer made a bizarre version in 1980, and it comes as no surprise that the subject matter appealed to GothBoy Tim Burton either. Therefor one would think that it would be easy to get lost in Wonderland, stuck in convention and repetition after being such a heavily sourced material, but instead Jay Lee’s Alyce reveals itself to be an intriguing dark gem of modern genre cinema.

The reason Alice in Wonderland appeals to these days, and probably all those genre directors too, is that within that great source material lies a coming of age tale which gives the opportunity to deconstruct the main character, take them from innocence and propel them to adulthood. Alice goes from naïve little girl to powerful woman, hence the adult version directed by Bud Townsend in 1976, and the obvious attraction the original text has on genre directors.

Referents to Alice in Wonderland are riddled throughout the movie, from audio cues – A cover of Jefferson Airplane's White Rabbit is heard early on. Lines of dialogue, such as the bartender holding up shots in front of Alyce as he in a childish voice says “Drink me, Drink me”, and Alyce at one point says “off with his head”, as anyone familiar with the original text will know to be a frequent line uttered by the Queen of Hearts. Images, set design and scenery refer to the book - several times Alyce is seen with a white rabbit in the foreground of the composition, as she takes different drugs to achieve different “outer body” experiences, metaphorically changing her persona. Names especially reflect the source material; Alyce is the obvious referent, but even her friend Carroll Lewis, which is an obvious one.

But even the villains, the druggies, these characters are obviously reflections of characters in the books. Rex [Eddie Rouse] the drug dealer wears hats, much like The Hatter. He’s the supplier, just like in the books, where he’s the supplier of tea, and just like his metaphorical namesake he’s in trouble with the law. There’s also traits of the Caterpillar found in Rex, as he is the one person who whilst smoking, questions Alyce and her identity crisis… oh, by the way Rex is Latin for King, and in this inversion world, Queen is King. Rex is in other words a composite of several key characters in the books. By his side he has his cohorts, March [Brian McGuire] - a nod to the March Hare and the character is just like his book counterpart, something of an oddball, prankster and when push comes to shove, he’s the sidekick from hell! Finally there’s Mouse [Catero Colbert] – like the mouse that swims in Alice’s tears in the book, Mouse shares the numbing effects of the drugs with Alyce, and spends most of his scenes sleeping. Referents and metaphors like this are found all over the place in Alyce, but I’ll leave some of them for you to discover by yourself.

I’m convinced that this movie would never have had been anything as charismatic and powerful as it is without the outstanding performance given by Jade Dornfeld! She completely mesmerizes me, she has me falling head over heels in love with her, and her transformation from the fragile, delicate character we are first introduced to, to the raw, psychotic death machine in the last scene is truly one of the most spellbinding transformations I’ve seen in ages. And I’ll tell you why it works right now! When we’re first introduced to Alyce, she’s obviously playing second fiddle to Tamara Feldman’s Carroll. Gently we learn more and more about Alyce, and it’s apparent that she’s previously had issues with her own identity. This is hinted at in scene between the two women after the subplot concerning Carroll and Vince is instigated. Scorned, frustrated, angered and seeking ways to scorn Vince, Carroll brings important backstory into the piece. At one point in time, Alyce mimicked Carroll. In such a way that Carroll refers to it as the “Single White Female” incident. This backstory and the restrained reactions Alyce gives when Carroll tries to seduce Alyce, along with the initial distance Alyce keeps between her and drug dealer Rex, all help the audience to empathise with Alyce. Empathy needed before she starts her decent.

We want to help her, we want to comfort her, and we want her to come through the ordeal. This makes us empathise with her. When the envelope is pushed to far, starting with the fucking for drugs, the degradation at the funeral, the obnoxious visit from Vince, the physical and mental taunting, the nightmarish condition, we have an emotional recognition with Alyce. The most of us have done things we regret, been blamed for something outside of our control, treated wrongly, and we have all felt that strong urge to lash out and settle the score. This is exactly what happens in Alyce, and this is why we cheer Alyce on as she goes off that deep dark end… that violent and bloody rampage in the last act.

Seeking the core of Alyce was a fantastic journey. If you are a regular reader, then you know that I have a few corner stones that I rely upon when yapping on about what makes a great genre movie… and the crown jewel of all these traits is GUILT! Alyce is all about guilt. From the inciting incident on the rooftop, Alyce’s guilt drives her deeper and deeper into the abyss, or rather further down the rabbit hole towards her own transformation. Guilt is a magnificent tool, and in Alyce it’s like clockwork, at first it forces her to retrace her steps… i.e. to the club, to relive the moment in a desperate attempt to change reality, which takes her to her to doing more drugs, which in it’s own turn leads to her degrading herself to gain even more drugs (at mid point, the point of no return), which leads to the nightmarish world of abusive sex, necrophilia, violence and death. The fact that the film at times looks and feels like a mix of Dario Argento’s Suspira 1977, Roman Polanski’s Repulsion 1965 and David Lynch’s Lost Highway 1997, with effects in the vain of key splatter films of the eighties – courtesy of Patrick Magee and Josh Russell - makes me bond with the movie even more!

Beautiful death, accompanied by the atmospheric industrial rumblings of Billy White Acre’s sublime soundtrack. The final reel of Alyce is a symphony of destruction leaving no holds barred. From frail delicate and reclusive girl to fucking machine of mayhem, Alyce tears a hole in your soul large enough for your next-door neighbour to peek through, and I loved every warped minute of it!

A somewhat "Spoilerish Trailer..."

Dellamorte Dellamore

Dellamorte Dellamore
Directed by: Michele Soavi
Italy/France/Germany, 1994
Horror/Romance/Drama, 105 min
Distributed by: Laser Paradise – Red Edition

Michele Soavi has always been an interesting director in my book, and one thing about him that is striking, is that each movie he made, the better they where! He started out as an actor in many a great genre movies working with the likes of Ciro Ippolito in Alien 2: On the Earth 1980, Lucio Fulci on City of the Living Dead 1980, Joe D’Amato in Caligula 2 1982, Ruggero Deodato in Atlantis Interceptors 1983 and Dario Argento in Phenomena 1985 – not to mention all the other Italian genre pieces he acted in without billing. It’s also the later two directors who would become somewhat of mentors for Soavi during the years to come.

Gradually he moved into working as assistant director and second unit on movies like D’Amato’s 2020 Texas Gladiators 1982, Argento’s Tenebre 1982, Lamberto Bava’s A Blade in the Dark 1983 and so forth. Eventually he became friends with Terry Gilliam and worked as second unit on both The Adventures of Baron Munchausen 1988, and The Brothers Grimm 2005. A collaboration and friendship that Soavi often refers to in his own movies where small winks at the movies he made with Gilliam are apparent.

Fairly obvious he was soon to take the step up to full-fledged director of his own. The music video The Valley, which features the song Bill Wyman wrote for Argento’s Phenomena. The video sees Jennifer Connelly walking around an old house as Bill plugs in his guitar to his amp and Argento directs the movie from behind the camera. It’s all honesty it's not too impressive, but a nice little documentation of the Phenomena production and behind the scenes footage.

Soavi followed this first video with the documentary The World of Dario Argento 1985, a study of his former colleague and mentor. Soavi’s first feature, Stage Fright (Deliria) 1987 is a violent generic Slasher film with all the Italian trimmings. Sex, death and gore come together in a terrific mix scripted by George Eastman, and was produced by Joe D’Amato through his Filmirage production company. The movie won the Fear Section Award at the 1987 Avoriaz Film Festival assuring that Soavi was a director to keep your eyes on.

From there on Soavi’s films became bigger and better in many ways, The Church (La chiesa) 1989 - a modern horror with Gothic influences, was written by several leading characters in the genre. Soavi, Lamberto Bava, Dardano Sachetti, and Argento all added to the script, even Nick Alexander wrote the English dialogue. Argento also produced the movie, and it saw his daughter Asia Argento in one of her first movie roles. The Sect (La setta) 1991– a modern, raw Italian take on the Rosemary’s Baby tale, was once again produced by Argento with the Cecchi Gori brothers, and scripted by Argento, Gianni Romoli and Soavi. The Sect is a great movie, although one would today perhaps have preferred Soavi to have stuck with the Pino Donnagio score completely and not used contemporary rock music by at the time popular bands. I find it a problem that several Italian horror films of the nineties suffer from those heavy metal, Goth and rock soundtracks, as they have aged quite a bit by today’s standards. Scores never go out of fashion.

Gianni Romoli was given a second shot at scripting a Michele Soavi flick with one of the best movies to come out of Italy at the time, the excellent Dellamorte Dellamore. Together with Tiziano Sclavi (more on him later), the two writers started to adapt Scvali’s novel of the same name for the big screen. Sclavi had previously written the dark comedy Nero 1992 directed by Giancarlo Soldi. Just like the original comic book, Dellamorte Dellamore keeps the laughter, even though dark and sinister, close at hand through out the movie. Even though the characters have different names and live in completely different location than the source comic, there’s no contradicting that Francesco Dellamorte is Dylan Dog. Change his name to whatever you want, he’s still Dylan Dog in my eyes.

Now to the movie. Dellamorte Dellamore is all about Francesco Dellamorte [Rupert Everett] a dark, cynical man who spends his time working as the caretaker at the Buffalora cemetery where his special task is to take care of the ” returners” who get up out of their graves after seven days and roam the cemetery.

He’s assisted by his dumb mute mate Gnaghi [François Hadji-Lazaro], who only ever say’s ”Gnah” as they keep the peace and the dead in their graves. Quite fed up with his task, but still pretty content, everything keeps on track and the everyday life of the two just simply shuffles on. But one day during a funeral, he spots the young wife of the recently deceased man being buried, and it’s a woman, simply referred to throughout the movie as She [Anna Falchi] who fills Dellamorte with emotions he has never felt before. These emotions have him loosing his way and becoming obsessed with the woman, plunging into dark territory indeed.

As in all great love stories – because you can read Dellamorte Dellamore as a dark comedic horror love story if you chose, which isn’t’ too far away from the main themes of all those comic books that it’s based on – there has to be an obstacle for the main protagonist to overcome in his quest, and without revealing too much “She” becomes a major obstacle for Dellamorte. She’s just buried her husband and doesn’t want to get involved with him, but carnal lust makes that a difficult decision and eventually after a great homage to Arnold Böcklin's key painting The Isle of the Dead - which was one of the paintings that kick-started the Romantic period of art history – She can resist no more. As they give in to their desires her husband returns from the dead, and taking a big bad bite out of her arm which will soon lead to her death, Dellamorte is faced with the first of many dilemmas he has to tackle throughout the movie, after all it is his job to kill the returners.

The twists and turns taunt Dellamorte and he finds himself standing face to face with She in several incarnations, and the strong emotions he holds towards She make him do some terrifying, hilarious and surreal actions. Theses actions and the complex love affairs eventually drives him over the edge and makes for a great twist ending. An ending that readers of the comic book source will cherish as it makes perfect sense in the Dylan Dog universe.

One theme that is recurrent through out the movie is the relationship between Death and Life entwined. Lost lovers return – both from the grave, and in new incarnations, new lovers die – both at the hand of the dead and by the hand of the living, and Dellamorte is caught up in-between them both, which is also illustrated through his frequent meeting and dialogue with death, and the most obvious being his name Dellamorte - even though it's his mother who is called Dellamore Dellamorte the name is translated to "of love (life), of death".

The red haired death puppet is just one of those regular Soavi winks towards Terry Gilliam – The death figure is the same animatronics as in Gilliam’s The Adventures of Baron Munchausen – on which Soavi worked as second unit on – there’s even a Baron Munchausen keying in a shot seen in The Sect if you want further examples of the referrals.

There’s a fantastic circular movement that wraps around the movie; during the opening credits there’s a snow globe that shows Dellamorte and Gnaghi standing on a wrecked bridge, as the movie comes to an end we are once again shown the snow globe, but pay attention and you will notice that the figures are on opposite sides to where they where standing in the first shot. It’s fair to imagine that the two will have further adventures together which will once again see the two of them change places and roles with each other. And this is also a theme that is recurrent in the Dylan Dog comic books.

Dellamorte Dellamore is in many ways Soavi’s finest hour, as everything that he’s picked up along the way, be it as an actor, assistant director, second unit or from the guidance of the magnificent mentors that have acted as producers on his movies to till this one, is brought to it’s peak. Wonderfully told, an engaging story, great effects and some stunning imagery that certainly must have had Dario Argento, Aristide Masseccesi and Terry Gilliam satisfied that there protégé obviously had been paying attention through out the years.

The movie walks a fine line between horror and dark comedy, and that’s not too surprising as the movie is based on Tiziano Sclavi's novel Dellamorte Dellamore, which also has a lot of humour in the darkness. Sclavi wrote this novel several years before he refined the character into the dark hero character found in the splendid Dylan Dog comic books, for whom Everett actually served as the main inspiration for.

But Everett, in the movie shape, pulls it off like clockwork and is everything that the illustrated original is, and as the movie ponders into the final quarter it takes on an even bleaker tone, that makes it stand out among the contemporary flicks that where being made at the time. The dark cynicism of the comic book shines trough and I’m glad that it does because this could have been such a bad movie if one had made the decision to develop the characters into something else than those of the fantastic comic book. There’s currently a new Dylan Dog movie in the making, Kevin Munroe’s Dead of Night which I’m certainly looking forward to, but at the same time I’m very sceptical towards as I don’t really feel that they will manage to keep that authentic Dylan Dog aura to the characters. There’s not to many US produced dark comedies that let the protagonist stay as complex as Soavi’s Dellamorte actually is, and I fear that they will make him more Twilight likeable than the complicated character he is supposed to be.

After Dellamorte Dellamore, Soavi ventured into directing TV movies and sort of vanished of the radar for a few years, but reminded his audience that he was still a key figure with the excellent thriller The Goodbye Kiss (Arrivederci amore, ciao) 2006, and the WW2 drama Blood of the Loosers (Il sangue dei vinti) 2008, which reunited him with Screenwriter Dardano Sachetti. But I feel that Dellamorte Dellamore is the crown jewel of his career, and I was lucky to see the movie on the big screen during the Stockholm Film Festival in the nineties – it’s still one of my favourite films and festival experiences – and revisiting the movie all these years later I still found it a very entertaining little movie that has stood up against the tests of time with bravura.

Image:

Widescreen 1.85:1

Audio:

Dolby Digital Surround English Dialogue or German Dub available. German subtitles optional

Extras:

Trailers for Laser Paradise Discs and a Horror Trailer show for horror related titles that they released on DVD.

Nekromantik

Nekromatik
Directed by: Jörg Buttgereit
Horror/Comedy/Romance, 75min
Germany, 1987
Distributed by Blood Pictures (OOP)

At the end of last year, the wife and I celebrated our tenth wedding anniversary, and moved into our second decade as a married couple. This gave me the urge to go back and watch the first film that we saw together on our second date - the first date being a Dinosaur Jr. concert thirteen years ago. Luckily she didn't walk out in disgust, but instead realized what she was getting into and has been the biggest supporter of my compulsive cinephillia ever since.

And what a perfect first movie to break in a new relationship with, as Jörg Buttgereit’s taboo breaking Nekromatik is a riot, it has some brilliant scenes and is without a doubt one of the finest movies ever to come out of Germany. It’s packed with sinister sexuality, brooding angst, and wonderful dark nihilism.

Buttgereit followed up Nekromantik, his breakthrough movie, with Der Todesking (The Death King) 1990, Nekromantik 2 1991, and Schramm 1993 – a fascinating suite of movies that all focus on death, sex and the fascination we hold for these taboo crusted areas. Four movies that must be a goldmine for those wanting to divulge into psychological analysis. But that’s not what or where I’m going to go today. I dig those films at face value and take the entertainment value with me from them. Buttgereit vanished from the scene for a few years, working on TV shows, and supplying special effects on Swiss director Martin Walz brilliant adaptation of Ralf König's hilarious gay comic book Kondom des Grauens (The Killer Condom) 1996. The Killer Condom was incidentally designed by none other than H.R. Giger.

Last year Buttgereit returned to feature films with Captain Berlin Vs. Hitler 2009, a comedy based on a play written by Buttgereit,which goes in the vain of Universal Horrors, the many “they saved Hitler’s brain” movies of the fifties and sixties and good old German burlesque. – Keep in mind that it’s always a winner to sprinkle Nazi references in your alternative entertainment.

The quick fix for those who haven’t seen this fantastic film, or for those who need a refresher, goes like this: Main protagonist Rob [Daktari Lorenz – who only ever starred in two early Buttgereit shorts and Nekromantik. He also composed the music for the movie and later for Der Todesking with Herman Kopp and John Boy Walton], is a looser kind of guy, holding one of the most repulsive jobs ever – he cleans up accident places for Joe’s Cleaning Agency. Constantly in fear of his obnoxious boss, sick of his job and with very little future prospects, the light of his life is his cherished collection of pickled human trophies that he steals with him from crash sites. Not to mention his beloved girlfriend Betty. [Beatrice M – who went straight to Wim Wenders’ masterpiece Wings of Desire 1987 after this one, and later returned as Betty in Nekromantik 2 1991]. The prized trophies play an important part in the couples sexual relation as Betty takes romantic baths using the body parts as bizarre bath oils. Rob brings them home, Betty bathes with them.

When the guys at Joe’s Cleaning Agency get a call to dispose of a body found in a near by river Rob hits the mother load, and obviously takes the decayed corpse home to Betty. Needless to say Betty ignites on all cylinders and after making a prosthetic penis out of the end of a curtain rail, the three of them engage in the most bizarre ménage a trois ever put on celluloid.

Buttgereit poetically and sombrely sets this surreal scene of forbidden erotica to a minimalistic, romanticised piano score which give a strange almost blissful tone to the scene. Rob starts neglecting work and becomes the runt of his colleagues for his tardiness, but when he does get himself off to work, Betty just cant get enough of their new plaything and starts pleasuring herself with the corpse while Rob is out of the house. Rob get’s fired from work and telling Betty, she gives him a bollocking for loosing his job as she now sees her supply of entrails and corpses being shut off. This nails the rift between the two that lead to Betty leaving Rob and taking the corpse with her. In his frustration Rob burns all reminders of Betty and kills the cat he brought home for her. But as we all can relate to, letting go is never easy and he keeps the dead cat in that masochistic memorabilia game we all play with ourselves when coming out of a painful separation. Dwelling in self-pity and self loathing Rob downs a bunch of pills with booze and has a fantastically surreal erotic dream where he’s a corpse, and later in his state of depression he murders a prostitute he’s trying to screw in a cemetery when she laughs at his ability to get aroused. Only when she’s dead on the cold ground does Rob manage to complete his act finally getting that sexual release. Hitting rock bottom of his depression, Rob performs what must be the ultimate nechrophiliac ego trip; he takes his own life whilst jerking off and dreaming of that initial childhood memory which now plays backwards. As both Rob and the movie reach their climax Buttgereit presents us with images of Rob and his blood and semen spurting dick that will stay with you forever. Finally, setting it all up for a sequel, the movie ends as the camera gently sweeps over Robert’s grave accompanied by soft music only to be interrupted as a female foot rams a spade into the fresh soil…

Little things, like the Charles Manson picture on the wall, the jars of preserved pieces of bodies, the skeletal parts that decorate their bed, the slaughter of the bunny rabbit in Rob’s childhood flashback crosscut with Rob performing and autopsy all set the tone of the film in it’s initial quarter. It prepares us for the dark world, which we are about to step into, and establishes Rob’s background and that first incident that made him a nechrophilliac. Yeah, Rob got a stiffie watching that cute bunny die if you want a single line of Freudian analysis thrown in. It’s easy to understand why this movie was banned in several countries Strange stuff freaks the crap out of the censors.

The ending is by far one of the best in the genre, you gag, you laugh, but you can’t resist it. There's a forward motion in the very last scene, with the woman just about to dig up Rob’s body. And in the extension we can only imagine what Betty - cause you know it is Betty don't you - will get up to with Rob’s corpse. Ironically it’s in death that they will finally be reunited, and as I've mentioned on this site before, we always want lovers to have each other at whatever cost so you can interpret a happy ending in there if you want... in some fucked up way at least.

You cannot not like this movie, it's entertaining, fun, repulsive and delightful as it takes a very dark humoristic approach to its content. This is empathised even further by the oompa loopmaish soundtrack by Daktari/Kopp/Walton – what is it with German horror flicks and their synthesizer soundtracks? Wasn't that cheesy keyboard music but yet another reason to dislike the Andreas Schnaas Violent Shit movies? I’ve always had the feeling that the 16” film adds to the charm of this movie, as it’s soft colours and grainy grit bring a atmosphere to the film that is very fitting.

The bloody bathtub scenes, and overall look of Nekromantik where incredibly influential on me when I shot my own thesis film in early 1991. I showed my friend who created the special effects the movie and told him that I wanted the bloody bath in my own film to surpass Nekromantik. A task he pulled off with bravura, and still the highlight of that juvenile short I once made.

It’s easy to think of Lars Von Trier’s AntiChrist 2009 when watching this flick, and there’s no doubt in my mind that Trier’s movie parallels this one on many levels. I got really aggravated whilst working the cultural department of Swedish TV last summer due to the fact that so many of the staffers there where constantly praising Trier for his bold approach to his narrative and the disturbing way he chose to portray his characters inner demons. The statement ”He is so innovative and revolutionizes the horror genre like no one before him.” was uttered on more than one occasion, and it had me gagging at the ignorance of these people each and every time.

Naturally I find Trier a genius too, and his films are among some of the finest, but I admire him even more for the way he plays mind games with the cultural elite and movie critics. I’m sure that he sits down there at the Zentropa offices and laughs at the way people lap up every new approach he comes up with. The entire Dogma 95 movement! Come on, what was that all about – Lets ditch professional equipment, lighting, sound and real actors in favour of natural light, sound and real raw art on film. And the critics lapped it up calling it a revolution, a new wave, a unique experiment. I call it the stuff kids have been shooting on video in their backyards since the dawn of time. Then Trier took it one step further, and in Dogville 2003 he even removed the sets! Actors walked around in Spartan furnished locations with painted markers on the floor for walls and doors. Again the ”Experts” dove in, praising his daring new minimalist approach forcing focus on the actors – really? - is Nichole Kidman that good an actor? Once again, I’m certain that Trier sat down there in Denmark chuckling his ass off, as his ”art” enabled him to get away with whatever the fuck he wanted. Remember his 1998 movie The Idiots? Remember that there where so many discussions about the hardcore insert in that movie? Remember what happened when earlier visionaries tried these tricks? I discussed Thriller – A Cruel Picture 1974 some time back, and how it ended up being banned for amongst other things the hardcore inserts. Inserts that where part of the movies narrative, not just a “lets let the people who are pretending to be retards have a fuckfest in the grass” for no apparent reason like in The Idiots. Well how come the hardcore of The Idiots was considered fine art and not when others use pornographic images in their narrative? It happens all the time, Catherine Breillat, Michael Winterbottom, Peter Greenaway, etc. etc. – Go figure, why do some get the pat on the shoulder and the "fine piece of art there mate" reviews and others are considered smut peddlers. And don’t get me started on that whole bag of praise given to Gaspar Noé’s Irréversible 2002 for being innovative, non-linear and a shocking approach to sexual violation and violence– in our field we call it the rape revenge exploitation flick and nobody ever praised Shaun Costello’s Forced Entry 1971, or Buttgereit’s Schraam 1993 for their reverse narrative and offensive violence and sexual content did they. What differs Dame Helen Mirren’s nudity and shagging in Greenaway’s The Cook, the Thief, His Wife and Her Lover 1989, from Tinto Brass’ Caligula 1979. If you where to rant on about Greenaway’s film you’d be considered a connoisseur of fine art, if you rant on about Brass’ film you’d be considered a pervert. At least one of them will teach you some history.

Well getting back on track, I feel that this is exactly the case with AntiChrist, and during those discussions (and more recent ones as it hit DVD a few weeks back) Trier presented his mix tape of the horror and exploitation genres through AntiChrist, and I always make a point of telling people this when discussing the movie. I give them pointers to scenes that probably inspired him –The talking animals (well the Fox at least), the guilt of the dead child, the violence; the dick, balls, labia and clitoris maiming it’s all been done before. Which brings me back to Buttgereit’s Nekromantik.

The way Trier uses these tricks is just the same as the Transgressive art movement and the movies found there. Directors like Nick Zedd, Richard Kern, Kenneth Anger, George Kuchar, Curt McDowell, John Waters, Andy Warhol and definitely Buttgereit, all made movies that set out to rupture our stern views on basic values and emotions. I frequently claim that the beauty of Art is in the eye of the beholder. If you feel that Jesus Franco, Jean Rollin, Bo A. Vibenius, Ingmar Bergman, Akria Kurosawa, Bruce LaBruce, Bruno Mattei, Claudio Fragasso, or whoever is art, then I’m not going to argue. It’s your definition that set’s your experience, not mine, not theirs, but yours.

Now that’s a daring statement, because it would be easy to say that all horror and exploitation is after the same effect, to provoke the norm, and in the lot cases it is true. But only a few actually make a distinct definition between arty transgression, and gore, eroticism and shock value as pure entertainment – luckily exploitation directors make the movies that still are watchable. So the next time some stuck up cultural persona tells you about the daring symbolism of AntiChrist, tell them to check out Jörg Buttgereit’s Nekromantik films an orgy of Corpse Fucking Art to quote Buttgereit himself, then they can waste your time when the have an authentic frame of reference and not the last poxy article published by some dick on the culture pages of the days newspaper.

Image:

Full frame 1.33:1

Audio:

Dolby Digital Stereo 2.0- German Dialogue with optional English French and Spanish subtitles.

Extras:

This Blood Pictures edition is packed with extra features: An audio Commentary by Jörg Buttgereit, it’s in German but if you speak the lingo decently enough you can follow it. Interviews and Outtakes with Buttgereit, a making of featurette, Trailers, still galleries and Buttgereit’s early short “Captain Berlin” Yes the same character he recently returned to feature films with.