5 Stinky Thoughts on The Anti-Christ - Final Girl Film Club

StinkyLulu offers the following "5 Stinky Thoughts" as my contribution to the monthly FILM CLUB instigated by Final Girl.

click image to be routed to video/trailer

Thought #1: WTF?
I must confess: Most of the time, I had no idea what was actually going on in this freaky, meta-Catholic campfest. It seems that, on first glimpse, the story is your basic, exploitastic riff on the standard sexualized Satanic possession/pregnancy narrative but jeepers...this little flick seems to have decided to not to scrimp on any additional freakorama detail. Barking dogs. Doomed tourists. Possessed paintings. Hypnotherapy. Past life regression. Religious cults. Horny toads. Horny devils. Biting the heads off reptiles. Naked Swedish stepmothers. Immortal priests. Miracle cures. Creepy girls in pigtails. Fancy parties. Bad table manners. Weird statuary. Invisible sex in the sky. And lotsa lotsa incest... But, through it all, it seemed to me that this film might only really make spectacularly scandalous sense if you knew a little more about Catholicism than I. The spectacle's diverting enough but there seems to be an underlying logic of heresy that I seem to be clueless to. But, all told, wtf?

Thought #2: Satan Says Suck It.
Without question, my favorite aspect of the film was its reliance on perverse sex, especially references to oral sex, as a way to connote Satan's influence. Indeed, never have I seen a film that so clearly utilizes the serpent (and the serpent's lowly cousins, the lizard and the toad) as a hypersexualized symbol for ween. People are always shoving the heads of toads in each other's mouths in this film, forcing one another to lick up the toad goo, or the toad blood, or the toad puke as a signal of their ecstatic deference to Satan's power. Everytime you turn around, it's all gaping mouths, and lapping tongues, and drooly, oozy blowjob face. To which I can only say: Who knew Satan was so into oral?

Thought #3: Behold - Goatilingus.
And, indeed, one of the more startling examples of Satan's oral fixation (one which I couldn't quite bring myself to post a screencap of [but Gorillanaut's not nearly so squeamish]) arrives in the spectral sex scene -- where the lead lady is ostensibly reliving a Satanic sexual encounter from her past life -- and the horny devil is getting ready to mount her. At precisely the moment when we think we're gonna see nasty devil sex, one of the devil's minions presents a goat's hindquarters to the heroine and, after a flash shot of goat hoosie, we get an extended sequence of the heroine writhing in an extended lingual reverie. Her, alone on the bed, making orgasmic licky licky faces for, like, two minutes. And the filmmakers -- sick f'ers that they are -- leave it to the viewer's imagination to fill in the lickety-lick-lick blanks of the perverse picture, forcing the viewer to realize that, yes, Ippolita's the licker and, yes, the goat is the lickee. (And of course -- sick f'er that I am -- I take it to a whole 'nother level of twist and get all fixated on whether it was a girl goat or a boy goat.) Talk about stinky thoughts.

Thought #4: Why Cruising the Catacombs Isn't the Best Idea.
Probably my most favorite sequence in the film was the one when the heroine -- "miraculously" un-paralyzed all of a sudden -- goes cruising for German schoolboy in the nearby catacombs. She spies a dewy Leif Garret-clone and seduces him readily. The thing I like most about this sequence is how it fortifies my mini-reading of the film (see below) that Ippolita isn't really a woman at all, but a trans-ish character. A lusty Italian woman wearing only a crocheted dress would not go unnoticed amidst a busload of German schoolboys descending the catacombs, so I find it easier to read Ippolita in this scene as a femmy boy cruising another femmy boy. In any case, it's a palpably queer scene made all the queerer by the strange final image of the doomed German sissyboy. I mean, I've had my share to creepy cruising encounters, but what kind of nasty devil sex leaves you in this position?

Thought #5: How Queer Is the Antichrist, Anyway?
The character I thought most intriguing in the film turned out not to be Ippolita, but her femmy brother Filippo (that's him -- yes, HIM -- at right above). The more I watched this flick, the more I wanted to be watching a whole 'nother movie, one which would have been building the whole time toward a fabulous freaky reveal in which the siblings Ippolita and Filippo would be simultaneously pantsed, thus revealing that Ippolita actually had a weiner and Filippo had a hoosie -- that the siblings would be intersex twins and that Ippolita's past life regressions were not her own memories but those of their birth mother (a different lady than the one killed in the car) who was impregnated by Satan and who gave birth to this freaky pair of genderqueer kids. This would explain why Ippolita was experiencing paralysis "from the waist down" despite having no spinal injury. It might also explain why Filippo looked so much hotter when I imagined he was actually a lesbian. Unfortunately, my trannyhack redo of this film was not the film on the dvd. Alas. But it didn't stop me from scavenging what queer pleasures I could -- like this unrealized seduction between Filippo and the cute shrink -- check out the shape of those mini-obelisks!

For my unedited ramblings on the film, click here.
And be sure to get your blasphemous freak on
with the rest of The Final Girl Film Clubbers here.

Strait-Jacket (1964) Reminds You That, Although It May Be Monday, Be Grateful You're Not...

Mostly An Alibi for Pepsi Product Placement, or...
Wearing a Kenley Collins original, or...
Getting Facially Felt Up by Joan Crawford, or...
Trapped in the Trippiest Water Closet Ever, or...
Just Trying to Blend with the Furniture, or...
Discovering that Your Husband's Been in the Closet this Whole Time.
Gratitude.
'Tis truly a question of perspective...
Just ask Lady Columbia.

This post is brought to you as part of Final Girl's Film Club.
For more on the monumental collaboration between two of the most frightening titans of American Cinema (Joan Crawford and William Castle)
(aka 1964's Strait-Jacket), click here.
For StinkyLulu's unedited ramblings on same, click here.
But whatever you do...steer clear of Joan's Wrestling Match With Herself -
T'Ain't Purty!

It May Be Monday, but Be Grateful You're Not...

Head-Butting a Giant Cock, or...
Arm-Wrestling a Massive Maggot, or...
Getting Cozy with a Really Big Rodent, or...
Aswim in a Swamp o' Rats, or...
Poking the Pink-Eyed Varmint.

Gratitude.
'Tis truly a question of perspective...

This post is brought to you as part of Final Girl's Film Club.
For more on this epic cinematic treatment of the inevitability of ecological disaster (aka Food of the Gods), click here.
For StinkyLulu's unedited ramblings on same, click here.
But whatever you do...watch out for the MASSIVE MAGGOTS!

StinkyLulu's Sampler of The Car's Delectable Delights

StinkyLulu offers the following as my contribution to the monthly FILM CLUB instigated by Final Girl. This month brings our attention to a curious classic of the "When ____s Attack" genre that became so ubiquitous in the 1970s. And even though the film didn't inspire my imagination so much (see my unedited ramblings on the film here; click image at above right to be routed to the trailer), The Car (1977) did provide several moments of surprising, delectable delight.

1 - Smell the Brolin.

Ahhh, the rich pungency of 70s studness.

2 - What's That Smell?

Perhaps my favorite moment in the entire film happens in the first minutes when one of The Car's first fatalities pauses his bike race with his girl friend. They roll to a stop, giggling and chattering. And then -- for reasons that remain unclear to me -- the boy sniffs his hand and makes a massive stinkface. (It's a fleeting moment of veritas, akin perhaps to the legendary Brando-glove business, just nasty tacky.) Between the "sniff" and my impulse to confirm that that screaming girly is indeed my beloved Nikki, I can confirm that, having carefully screened this tiny sequence scores of times, its inexplicable delights endure.

3 - Taste the Brolin.

A long drink of man. Naturally smooth, naturally strong.

4 - Observe the Principal.

Of course, my favorite character was the school principal lady. A girdled nightmare of hairspray, polyester, cat-eyes, and moral righteousness in one scene; a grimacing wild-haired gorgon in the next. My kind of character.

5 - Feel the Brolin.

Any film that spends several minutes staging a scene in which one character teases, taunts and torments James Brolin's manly bits is a film that I will forever appreciate.

6 - Observe the Principle.

As a child of the 1970s southwest, I must say this film does observe a principle I grew up witnessing on a fairly regular basis: hitchhiking hippies carrying weird musical instruments and throwing attitude to the locals are indeed at severe risk of being run over. Not judging, just saying.

7 - The luckiest girl in the world circa 1977.

By 1977, I think I envied Kim Richards even more than I did Melissa Gilbert. (And that's saying a lot.) Kim Richards was soooooooo lucky. She got to be Tia (opposite my 2nd grade dreamdate Ike Eisenmann) in Escape from Witch Mountain and she gets to have James Brolin for a dad? No fair, no fair, no fair. (That scene in the "hopped up on Holly Hobby" bedroom when Brolin pops in wearing his velour mini-robe? That single image realizes I don't know how many of my elementary school fantasies... All at once.) Though considering the above picture, and recalling all the times I rode on the back of a motorbike, terrified by the ride but thrilled that I was clutching some 70s man's abdomen, I think I would have wanted to be the one in the red helmet.

8 - Paint-by-number love.

If doing a paint-by-number painting of your boyfriend, and then getting run over in the middle of your living room, and then having that paint-by-number emerge undamaged and carefully lit from amidst the wreckage -- if that ain't proof of true love, I dunno what is.

9 - It really is all about the 'stache, isn't it.

Indeed. It. Is.

And don't miss
what the other Final Girl Film Clubbers
have to say about this achievement
in 70s 'stacheness...

"Hail, Diane, Princess of Darkness" - Referencing Supporting Actressness in The Devil's Daughter (1973) - Final Girl Film Club

StinkyLulu offers the following as my tardy contribution
to the monthly FILM CLUB instigated by Final Girl.

There's much to enjoy about The Devil's Daughter, a 1973 made-for-tv movie depicting the intimate horrors wrought by a secret Satanic cult among elite Californians. Very much a product of its particular cultural and historical moment, the film is variously fascinated with (1) the malevolence of conspiratorial elites; (2) the dark side of upper-middle class society; (3) the perils of independent single womanhood; and (4) that widespread problem apparently sweeping the nation: Satanic insemination. Broadcast the same year abortion was federally decriminalized, and in the first years of the national shift toward "no-fault" divorce, the dystopian The Devil's Daughter exploits the emerging mistrust of marriage and motherhood as appropriate social routes for women's lives. That said, the film operates most amusingly as a genre spoof of popular literary styles (think Ira Levin and Jacqueline Susann) that purported to offer sophisticated cultural critique from the relative privilege of the top of the best seller lists. The film is part Stepford Wives, part Rosemary's Baby, and a whole lotta Once Is Not Enough (a dark romance featuring an orphaned daughter who battles her curious compulsion to be near and behave like her loathsome father). All told, The Devil's Daughter is a loopy confused hoot, composed mostly of oblique references to other films and narratives, in which it's abundantly clear that all involved are just looking to survive the shoot and cash the paycheck. But, for StinkyLulu, The Devil's Daughter also did two other things. First, the film reinstigated my recurrent fascination with just how much cultural angst even the thinnest horror films of the 1970s and 1980s can hold and, second, The Devil's Daughter entranced me as an unanticipated repository of references to my favorite topic: Supporting Actressness. Indeed, at nearly every turn in the narrative came a vivid reference to a nominated performance in the category of best Supporting Actress. As evidence, please consider the following:

Diane Lad as Diane Ladd

Perhaps the most prophetic reference to Supporting Actressness comes in the first moments of the film. The actress playing Alice (the mother of the demon spawn) is a newcomer named Diane Lad, an actress who would -- in the coming year -- add a second "d" to her surname and pick up her first Oscar nomination in a film called Alice -- check that coinkydink -- Doesn't Live Here Anymore. Ladd would go on to be nominated several more times, most frequently as a mother seeking to protect her daughter from men with whom the mother shares an unsavory history.

Shelley Winters as Shelley Winters

Surely the most derivative reference to Supporting Actressness comes in the person and performance of Shelley Winters as the ominous Lilith. Winters's Lilith inartfully disguises pettiness, bravado and imperiousness under a mask of respectable womanhood -- a loose reprise of the actress's first Supporting Actress trophy-snagging role (as Mrs. Van Dam in 1960's The Diary of Anne Frank).

Shelley Winters as Ruth Gordon

The most conspicuous reference certainly comes in Winters's Lilith as a chubbier version of Ruth Gordon's cheerier (but also trophy-snagging) performance as Minnie in 1968's Rosemary's Baby. In their own party scene, The Devil's Daughter's filmmakers ape the lens work, scenography and composition of the legendary party sequence in Polanski's 1968 film. An unsubtle homage that infuses the 1973 version with an enjoyable effectiveness that it doesn't entirely earn.

Belinda Montgomery as Katharine Ross

But the most interesting reference comes when the curiously cross-eyed Belinda Montgomery realizes that her marriage is a trap, an elaborate ruse to keep her from fulfilling her own wishes and dreams. Here, the filmmakers seem to be offering another homage to the lens work, scenography and composition of another late 196os auteur -- specifically, Mike Nichols's work in the apocalyptic conclusion (by domestic comedy standards, at least) of 1967's The Graduate. Montgomery's full-frontal bridal shrieks evoke Ross's in ways that underscore the comedy of The Devil's Daughter as well as the darkness of The Graduate.

There are other resonances to be noted too -- Montgomery's basically wearing Piper Laurie's Carrie hairdo; the doomed Jewish-ish roomie is basically the same character as Brenda Vaccarro's in Jacqueline Susann's Once Is Not Enough; the revelatory trance dance evokes everyone from Rita Moreno to Penelope Milford to Rinko Kikuchi -- but the four examples listed above are the ones with which a Supporting Actress obsessive must begin. And each permits my greater appreciation of this little 'sploitation movie from 1973 tv. The folks who made this obscure flick sure had a good time doing it and -- with some attentiveness -- so might we.

Be sure to check out what the rest of the Film Club has to say...

5 Stinky Thoughts on Near Dark (1987) - Final Girl's Film Club

Forgive my tardiness as StinkyLulu offers the following "5 Stinky Thoughts" as my contribution to the monthly FILM CLUB instigated by Final Girl.

click image to be routed to video

Thought #1: Near Missing Near Dark.
Not sure how it happened but, somehow, despite a near miss or two, I had totally missed Near Dark -- 'til now. So, for Film Club, I arrived to Kathryn Bigelow's film as a complete neophyte, knowing little about it beyond two superficial details. One: people seem to treasure this indie horror flick. Two: it features what is possibly Bill Paxton's most revered performance. But I truly expected Near Dark to be a smartish splatter-tacular featuring hip vampires as outsider anti-heroes. I also anticipated there to be a "bad blood" riff, a nightmare -- circa 1987 -- of the deadly consequences of exchanging blood products. I certainly did not expect a genre-defying existential romance featuring a cowboy with pronounced vampiric tendencies and a heightened ethical sense. Indeed, Near Dark defied my every expectation at nearly every turn. Thanks, Final Girl, for the prompt to screen this smart, scary, sensitive tale -- 'tis an unusually haunting (and hilarious) film.

Thought #2: The Family That Feeds Together.
Vampire stories are so well suited to AIDS allegories -- the deadly desires, the survivor's guilt, the blood products -- that I tend to casually disregard the possibilities of vampires as addicts. (I think my preferred monsters for addiction narratives are probably werewolves.) Yet, even as Near Dark savvily dodges any AIDS implications in this mid1980s riff on the vampire story, it subtly explores the dimension of another cultural crisis circa 1987: active addiction as a family disease. Perhaps it's hard to recall now but it's worth noting that 'twas not until crack began ravaging certain communities in the mid- to later 1980s that the notion of a family of addicts started circulating in the popular consciousness. (Previous notions of addiction as a family disease had a single addict threatening the health and security of the nuclear family.) The idea of relatives "turning" each other onto a shared drug of choice was comparatively new in 1987, a narrative trope reflecting something that happened banally with alcohol from forever, stealthily with heroin in the 1970s, with crack more rapidly and more visibly in the 1980s, and most extensively with meth in the 1990s and the 2000s. But this intergenerational vision of a mother, pre-teen and grandfather all using the same drug at the same time became a particular, new vision of horror in this period and Near Dark explicates it with an evocative ambiguity that remains compelling.

Thought #3: Who Knew Bill Paxton Could Be So F'n Brilliant?

As the big bad Severen, Bill Paxton delivers what is certainly one of his most memorable and accomplished performances. Paxton approaches Severen as a person who just happens to be a supernatural monster, and this simple choice enriches the film in delightful and terrifying ways, while also elevating the character's stock horror bits with poignant hilarity. Paxton's Severen is all unfettered id (albeit the id of a mucho macho man who happens to drink blood with plans to live forever). But rather than tapping into Severen's rage or angst or arrogance, Paxton taps into the character's glee, recalibrating Severen as a creature who wants to party all the time, every night, for all eternity -- and beware to any who kill his buzz. This is, I suspect, what makes the scene in the biker bar so thrilling. Paxton could have played it all predatory and terrorizing, but instead he plays it as an incredibly tasteless prank, a "let's play with our food before we eat it" kind of stunt. Further, Paxton plays the scene as if he's taking his little brother to a cathouse. For Severen it becomes an opportunity to have a good time showing off a little while also initiating his young ward into this new mode of manhood. The result is a strangely charged scene of homosocial preening and masculine autoerotics. Yes, it's a gruesome terrifying scene, but one made curiously and complexly thrilling by Paxton's excellent work.

Thought #4: Behold the Dewy Doofus.
Among actors of his generation, Adrian Pasdar must have one of the most distinctive heads. The pronounced brow, the sleepily deep set eyes, the supple lips, the cartoonish jaw -- Pasdar is both immediately recognizable yet curiously generic, both sooo 1987 and timelessly ideal for morally ambiguous characters. Here, Pasdar's tasked with playing a zen romantic hero, a sensitive new age family guy capable of kicking ass but who's defined by his adamant refusal to become a killer. Pasdar possesses a dewy doofiness that permits the actor to participate effectively in what emerges as one of the film's most interesting subversions (the reversal of the date rape scenario). Pasdar maintains our empathy even when, all at once, he's both the aggressor and the victim. In just such a way, Pasdar conveys all the character's essential paradoxes: he's the horndog with a heart of gold; he's the kid who's neither especially smart nor particularly dim but who nonetheless somehow figures his own way out of an eternal conundrum; and, most essentially, he's the tender-hearted vampire. The role draws well upon Adrian Pasdar's peculiar gifts and the actor's actually fairly excellent in the part (and pretty dreamy besides).

Thought #5: Detox for the Undead.
One of the things that remains fascinating about this film to me is that, aside from its use of unspecified vampirism as an overt metaphor for an unspecified addiction, Near Dark also stands as a recovery narrative: a narrative depicting one addict's ability to "recover" from his addiction and (most especially) spread the possibility of such healing to others similarly afflicted. The film's climactic transfusion sequences are essentially detox scenes and, when Caleb brings the hope of a cure to his beloved Mae, it's like an AA story -- one addict helping another to find a new way to a new life without their drug of choice. There're no rehabs or 12steps in Near Dark but the film does stand out as a fascinating riff on the cinematic genre of addiction/rehab narratives, whether intentionally or not, with Caleb standing as proof that there is a way out of the (near) darkness.

So, lovely reader, do you have your own Near Dark experiences?