Maniac Nurses

This was bad - really bad. It was some Belgium film that Troma bought and slapped on some cheesy narration to make some sort of a story that never really made sense.

In truth, it could have been a slide show for all the action that was in the film. The only time anything at all happened is when they were blowing some poor soul's head off, or chocking some picnicer.

There weren't even any sex scenes. This was supposed to be some sort of lesbian horror film. Well, it was a horror all right, and, if there were any lesbians in this film, they were all virgins.

Stay far away from this one, even if it is free on Netflix.

The full title for this film is Maniac Nurses Find Ecstasy and yes do they ever. This film actually started out as a porn flick back in 1990 and now we have only other pantomimed versions available. Although not as graphic as other reviewers have mentioned but none the less quite gory. Not a bad film overall but I would reccommend to watch Bloodsucking Freaks instead. Oh did I forgot to mention that this is the sequel to Bloodsucking Freaks. Check it out.

I've been known to enjoy awful films, but even I have my limits: Maniac Nurses Find Ecstasy (released by Lloyd Kaufman's Troma studio, home of many a z-grade crap-fest), is a heavily cut, re-edited and dubbed Belgian porno flick that is so atrocious that even copious amounts of nudity from a bevy of beautiful, lingerie-clad women and the occasional bit of bargain-basement gore cannot stop it from ranking as one of the worst films I have seen.

Once they had finished hacking the XXX action from their original acquisition, the guys at Troma obviously realised that the collection of disparate scenes they were left with didn't make an awful lot of sense. Rather than cutting their losses and binning the mess, they improvised, adding a narration track that appears to have been conceived on the fly (the story about a private clinic run by sadistic women is utter garbage), and using some stock footage to pad out the running time.

When I watch a film featuring exploding heads, severed feet, a man impaled on a gnome, a self-flagellating monk ridden like a horse by a hot brunette, machine gun-toting babes in suspenders, a baby born with an Elvis tattoo (!), and a scorching blonde sadist who likes violent comic books (that look like like they've been drawn by a ten-year-old) AND I'm still struggling to stay awake, then I know I've discovered a genuine stinker.

So this movie is one of my favorites, along with City Lights, Vertigo, and Little Dieter Needs to Fly. It's a perverse amalgam of a rumored Hungarian porn film, set up by Troma to act as an inane and confusing trifle regarding nurses in a random clinic finding random people on random abandoned roads and then randomly torturing them. Of course the acting is non-existent; the movie has no real linear direction; the music is from a low budget box; the dialogue insane and murky.

Yet through the narrator's non-stop ramblings, the viewer can find a sense of amusement resulting from what they experience. Troma didn't alter this in order to add it to their own library as a mounted and highlighting piece. Rather, the studio took Woody Allen's "What's New Tiger Lily?" and played around with the concept, experimenting the same way teenagers would after receiving editing and dubbing equipment.

The aforementioned narrator tries to connect and explain what we see on screen. The problem is, he's watching a different movie. He claims these nurses are sick and twisted, beyond reproach. But in that dour sense, he's wrong. Nurses, /people/, who reach this level of absurdity are going to be kept in an abandoned, desolate "clinic". They're not sick, twisted white trash. They're hyperbolic heroines who are stuck with a bad plot.

For whatever reason, the gardener sees the nurses as bizarre, yet works at the clinic in the middle of nowhere. The true purpose of the gardener in the movie is beyond the scope of this exploratory exercise. Overall he isn't a non-sequitor. His role isn't as philosophical as the Plate O'Shrimp from Repo Man, but it isn't just a reason to cut to randomness. The gardener doesn't provide a moral view, he's in this just as much as the nurses. At least the narrator is an intentional ruse who tries to solemnly explain to the viewer what isn't explained on screen.

As for the post-editing touches such as the swirl, the flashing names, and the score card, Troma includes this only to further push the outlandishness of the movie. Afterall, Sabrina stands in her room with a gun and shoots in a 180 arc, making soft gun noises. The movie was already mind-boggling. As with Terror Firmer: if you're going to try something, why not go all out?

The point is: there is no point. It's a nihilistic take on film, not on "sex-u-ality". Troma steps up to the plate, looks at the critics who say their feature films have no substance, and then swings for the fences with this movie. But it turns out to be a foul ball on a full count. It accounts for nothing in the long run while managing to anabolically load Troma's other films by allowing them to say "Hey, at least it isn't Maniac Nurses"

See this movie. You'll have to get it through an online rental place. Watch it with at least two other people. Only then will you realize that it's a joke by Troma. It's an attempt to show that we all live in a meta-narrative, and the post-modern approach of satirizing film with film exemplifies the point of no return which our modern collective has reached.

The full title is Maniac Nurses Find Ecstasy. Interestingly enough, Ecstasy was in Vermont, not far from Montpelier.

Here's the formula to duplicate this movie: shoot some cheap videotape footage of women in white lingerie. You don't even need to shoot sound footage. In fact, it's more flexible without sound. Just make sure there are plenty of shots of the women from behind, so you can dub in some voices later without having to worry about lip-synching. This gives you the additional advantage of having the movie in any language for later distribution. Why just imagine your masterpiece in Catalan or Frisian, or even in Latin for its run in Vatican City. Include a little bit of nudity and gore, although this will have to be cut when the pope watches.

"Hey, now that I have the footage of them doing various things in my backyard, how does that become a movie?"

Easy, make up a story. Any story. Just watch an old episode of Alfred Hitchcock on Nick at Night, and copy down a plot summary. Now have one of your friends with a deep voice read your summary aloud, and tape him. Add this here and there throughout your footage as a voice-over narration. It worked for Blade Runner, and it can work for you.

"Hey, I did that and it's only 44 minutes long."

No problema, amigo. Here's how to lengthen it. Watch a travelogue on TV and tape it. Let's say it's about Venice. Choose about 10 minutes of good stuff, insert it in your footage somewhere near the end, and have one of the characters say something to another, something like "you wonder how it all began? Your mother and I met in Venice, where I was working as a gondolier." Have him or her recite some background activities, some interesting facts about Venice, or just some generic thoughts like "those were the good times, I tell you. Yessireebob". If you have a friend who can say it with an Italian accent, all the better. Or for that matter, any accent will do. People who watch movies like "Maniac Nurses" can't tell the difference between a Chinese accent and Estonian.

"Hey, no travelogues on tonight. Just some shark specials on Discovery."

No problem, my friend. Just change the monologue to "your mother and I met off the great barrier reef, where I was hunting the Great White with Captain Cousteau's crew." Pretty much any real-life footage will work.

"OK, done, now I still need another 15 minutes?"

Easily fixed. This is where you add some fine art which will make your film much admired at Cannes. Does your script take place over four days? That's three sunsets and three or four sunrises which not only add to the beauty of your masterpiece, but provide an all-important time marker for your film, and do so much more subtly than ripping the top page off one of those desk calendars. Do your characters live in a house? Surely there is a beautiful old home near you which will make for some good exteriors. Your narrator simply needs to say something like, "meanwhile, in Stately Wayne Manor, ... ".

Finally, perhaps one of your characters is reading some magazine. Right after the footage of the character, show some of the articles he or she was reading. If you show some warning signs of cancer or something, you'll not only add educational value but also provide redeeming social importance, which is so critical to those obscenity trials. And this has an added plus. Later in the film you can add the exact same footage back in as a flashback, while your character tries to remember that third warning sign. Use the same footage again and again to add to the fun, as you provide valuable insight into your character's psychological development, or deterioration, as the case may be.

Now the only thing left to do is to dust off the mantlepiece, and make a little extra room for your Palm D'Or.