Porklips Now

This truly hilarious take-off of "Apocalypse Now" is as filled with textured background gags as any Kurtzman-Elder page from the old "Mad" (check out the books in the bookcases Fosselius pans across while Mertz reads poetry to Dullard, for example). You might remember Fosselius from the great parody "Hardware Wars" he produced for about 29 cents and which got its first exposure on local Bay Area television fave Bob Wilkins' "Creature Features." Here, Fosselius works with a big budget (at least $1.25!) and the result is this 28-minute epic that zeroes in like a laser on every pretentious absurdity of Coppola's magnum epic. My favorite bit comes at the end when Dullard comes after Mertz with a knife and Fosselius cuts to a meat slicer churning out very thin slices of bologna. Yeah, there's a few dead spots, but well worth seeking out if only for the raspberry it blows directly in Coppola's face. Don't get me wrong - I like "Apocalypse Now" and Coppola, but I just crack up every time I see this. A classic!

"Hardware Wars" has its moments, but *every* moment in "Porklips Now" works for me. From Billy Gray's uncanny Sheen-like look and sound, to the incredibly and purposefully stupid dialog, to the spot-on Brando take at the end, "Porklips" is a masterpiece. When I first saw this on the original VHS tape that included "Hardware Wars" and "Bambi Meets Godzilla", I was working in a small video store where we were allowed to watch just about anything we wanted. This became a prized screening choice among all of us who had seen "Apocalypse Now", to the extent that we had to restrain ourselves from showing it every day, lest we grow tired of it. That never happened, btw . . . We need a DVD!

O....M....G.

Sorry if the above quote was inaccurate as to the price of porklips, but it's been 25 years since I saw the original, on the flip side of "Hardware Wars," by far inferior.

Since then, I've run around saying "Porklips" is THE funniest film ever made. Yep, better than Spinal Tap, in a low-budget kind of way, which Fosselius plays up.

"Apocalypse Now" is the #1 best film ever made, so I guess it'd stand to reason I'd rank Porklips as the #1 funniest film. I wonder of Coppola has ever seen Porklips? Anyway, about 5 years ago I found a VHS copy on ebay, and snatched it up. Took it to a fiend's house, where we literally rolled in the aisles for hours.

"I think that I shall never see a poem as lovely as a tree. Dullard? Dullard, are you listening to me?" I called the fiend a month later to get my tape back. "Oops. I taped football over it." *)%*@#)!!! So now I'm on a new quest...If anyone knows where to obtain this, email me! Fred Mertz...Operating beyond any reasonable or sane price controls.

This movie is way way better then "Apocalypse Now".

It's not too funny. But You'll be able watch this without fast-forwarding through it.

Skip "Apocalypse Now" but pick this one up at your local video store.

"Never get out of the car. Mertz got out of the car. Then he got out of the car business..."

Did you like "Apocalypse Now" ? Then you should love "Porklips Now," probably the greatest no-budget amateur film (the indy hadn't yet been invented) of the '80s. Spot-on parody fantastically directed with truly bizarre performances. Skewers its target in less than 30 minutes with the best Brando impression of all time.

Why the heck isn't this available on DVD (along with director Ernie Fosselius' "Hardware Wars") ? And why didn't Fosselius end up directing feature comedies ?? Your mission is to find this film. And you're not borrowing my raggedy VHS copy.