UNSUNG HORRORS: THE ABANDONED

Every once in a while, a genuinely great horror movie—one that would rightfully be considered a classic, had it gotten more exposure and love at the box office—makes an appearance. It comes, no one notices, and it goes. But movies like this are important. They need to be treasured and remembered. If intelligent, original horror is supported, then that's what we'll begin to receive, in droves. We need to make these movies a part of the legendary genre we hold so dear. Because these are the unsung horrors. These are the movies that should have been successful, but were instead ignored. They should be rightfully praised for the freshness and intelligence and craft that they have contributed to our genre. 

So, better late than never, we’re going to celebrate them now… one at a time. 

Dir. Nacho Cerdà
2006
Spain / Bulgaria / UK
Lionsgate

The most obvious parable in the horror genre is one’s fear of their mortality. Though not all, most horror flicks off at least one character – sometimes dozens – and these victims fall at the hands of every kind of antagonist imaginable: masked madmen, ghosts, the insane, the resurrected, monstrous animals, supernatural and mythical figures, and even Death itself.  They die quietly, loudly, upsettingly, peacefully—but they die, alright, and into the ground they go. What you don’t see terribly often is what’s presented in The Abandoned, a little-known, little-celebrated supernatural creeper. Our two doomed characters, once trapped in a creepy house in the middle of the Russian wilderness, find themselves fleeing in terror…not from any of the aforementioned threats above, but from their fates, which wear their own faces, and whose bodies sport garish wounds and mutilations that dictate the manner in which they will die. For as our two characters attempt to hide from the bloody ends that await them, it’s not random ghosts or murderers that haunt them, but it’s themselves—walking dead twins with white eyes and destroyed humanity. And there’s no fighting or resisting them: to inflict any kind of trauma upon these unnatural beings is to inflict that same trauma upon the body that those walking nightmares represent. So how do you fight the very thing out to kill you when that thing is yourself?

Let’s back up a bit.

Marie (Anastasia Hille, Snow White and the Huntsman) has received word from the Russian government that after years of having its files and affairs in disarray as a result of the Cold War, the most recent campaign to become organized has unearthed evidence that property in the Russian wilds has been bequeathed to her by her natural parents. Marie, herself a film producer working in Hollywood, has no desire whatsoever to do anything with the property other than sell it and be done with it, as the hazy memories she does have of her childhood in Russia are not that great. And so she sets out to mother Russia and meets with a man named Misharin (Valentin Ganev, Undisputed II & III), who provides her with the necessary paperwork, as well as instructions on how to get to the very remote property.

Marie, following Misharin’s instructions, makes the trek out to the last property that could be considered part of civilization. The man who owns the property seems to be waiting for her, as it’s his responsibility to drive her out to her inheritance. On the way there, some creepy circumstances cause Marie to become separated from her driver, so she completes the remainder of the journey to the house on foot, in the dark, all by her lonesome.

Once there, and after a round of exploring her old homestead, she comes across a very unexpected guest: a man named Nicolai (Karel Roden, who has played the token Russian in numerous films, including Orphan, Wayne Kramer's Running Scared, and The Bourne Supremacy). Stumbling across another human being in the middle of her old, definitely abandoned childhood home is shocking enough—but he takes it one step further as he introduces himself…as her long-lost twin brother. He goes on to explain that he received a similar call from Misharin, hence his presence there. She remains suspicious until he brings her to one of the upstairs bedrooms and shows her two ancient cribs, which sport each of their names.

Marie barely has time to process this revelation when two more uninvited guests show up: while they appear to be exact copies of Marie and Nicolai, it soon becomes quite obvious that something really wrong is taking place in that house. The brother and sister flee after learning the hard way that these monstrous figures cannot be harmed without inflicting that same harm upon the person the thing represents. It is Nicolai who soon deduces what is going on: that they are being stalked by what are commonly called doppelgängers.

Doppelgängers? What the—

Let’s Wiki this bitch.

In fiction and folklore, a doppelgänger is a paranormal double of a living person, typically representing evil or misfortune. In modern vernacular, it is simply any double or look-alike of a person. It also describes the sensation of having glimpsed oneself in peripheral vision, in a position where there is no chance that it could have been a reflection. Doppelgängers often are perceived as a sinister form of bilocation and are regarded by some to be harbingers of bad luck. In some traditions, a doppelgänger seen by a person's friends or relatives portends illness or danger, while seeing one's own doppelgänger is an omen of death.

And so the chase begins, and it’s much more than a case of a killer stalking its prey. It’s not just a random threat, but it’s Marie and Nicolai’s own fates. It is their reckoning, in a way—and to defy these identical creatures coming for them in the dark is to deny the “natural” order of the world. What can they do? Is there a way to escape the apparently inescapable? Will they go down fighting, or simply give in?

The Abandoned, first and foremost, is absolutely beautiful. For a film featuring tons of blood, grime, and muddy pig mutilation, that’s saying a lot. But director Nacho Cerdà has a masterful eye, and The Abandoned is not his first foray into beautiful horror. He first broke out on the scene years ago with three short films:  The Awakening, in which a boy begins to slowly realize that he's dead; Genesis, in which a sculptor mourning his dead wife creates a bust in her image...which begins to slowly come to life; and Aftermath, his absolutely unflinching look at the autopsy process...as well as what happens when a mortician likes to get a little too close to his specimens. Each segment is more horrific than the next, but each also contains an inherent beauty that you ordinarily would not find in such subject matter.

Every scene in The Abandoned is purposely constructed to trigger an emotional response, and it works like a charm. If Cerdà’s intention is to scare you, he’ll scare you; if he wants you to feel sadness, or longing, or desperation, you will. Above all, even more than scaring you, Cerdà wants you to feel uneasy. He doesn’t want there to be a single moment where you can settle comfortably back in your seat and fall into the film’s groove. Even in a rather uneventful scene in which Marie argues with her daughter over the phone, the harshness of their dialogue matched with seeming random close-ups of Marie’s belongings scattered throughout her hotel room have the power to set you at unease…even for a little.

The Abandoned's screenplay, by co-writers Cerdà, Karim Hussein, and the infamous Richard Stanley (a director himself, having made Dust Devil and Hardware), while not a typical slow burn (considering the very jarring sequence that opens the film), does certainly take its time. As usual, that leaves it open to cries of “it’s boring!” and “nothing happens!” by those who think a sequel to The Collector was a good idea. Those with patience will be rewarded, as the events become increasingly creepy until there is literally no way out.

Horror, in its nature, is very good at manipulating its audience into thinking it's interactive. No one shouts "don't trust him!" in the theater during romantic comedies; no one criticizes the hero during action films for running into the bulk of the danger instead of the fuck away from it. But when horror is involved, we become very invested, to the point we think the 2D image on the screen can hear us and consider our advice. And in such films, we like to mentally develop escape plans. We like to make it known what WE would do. "See, if this were me, I would be OUT of there!" Jada Pinkett says in the opening sequence of Scream 2. And for me, personally, I was so enamored by zombie cinema when I was young that I would always keep an eye out for houses I felt were perfect for withstanding a zombie outbreak: something with minimal windows, steel doors, more than one floor, and a fucking basement. But when it comes to The Abandoned, there is literally no escape plan. There is no tactic that Marie and Nicolai are failing to concoct. There isn't a single thing that can be done to salvage them. All we can do is wait for them to accept that there is no way out. And boy oh boy, some audiences do not like that one bit.

Hille as Marie and Roden as Nicolai are, for the most part, our sole characters on the screen. Nearly everything we see will be experienced through their eyes. Hille carries the first third of the film solo before meeting her brother, and so we journey with her, and see the things she sees, and we feel the desolateness and the angst that she feels. Performance wise, she stumbles at times, but never to the point where her role feels contrived or unnatural; likewise, Roden, as far as I'm concerned, put himself on the map with this film. Since seeing him as the haunted, terrified, but accepting Nicolai, I've noticed him each and every time he's popped up in something. He's not afraid to become immersed in a role and completely lose himself. In the aforementioned Running Scared, in which he plays a Russian henchman for the New Jersey mafia, he really cuts his teeth and lets loose for what may have been the first time in an American film. (In America's post-Cold War culture, it's not often that a character of Russian descent will be prominently featured in a film without the men playing a Bond villain or a mafia member, and the women either a prostitute or a total slut. If America's relationship with Russia had to be determined by only how they are portrayed in our films and television shows, one would think that we would happily shake hands with them and smile at the camera, but later, when no one is looking, douse ourselves with hand sanitizer and pray to God for protection. Our iterations of Russians are named Nicolai (hey, look at that!) or Natasha; they love to drink vodka; the women love to wear tight-fitting animal print dresses with pearls and fuck around on their husbands. And the men, well... apparently they're all insane. My god, Mitt Romney was right! Run!) 

Cerdà fills The Abandoned with heaps of well-executed scares. Sightings of the doppelgängers are at first filmed from far off, or made to feel like brief glimpses in our characters' peripherals, in keeping with the myth. But soon the beings grow closer until they're in our face, forcing us to recognize their own. Each sighting of these beings maintains a steady creep factor, even until we've reached the point where we, as viewers, should by now have grown used to their appearance and the shock value has worn off. But it doesn't wear off, not until the very last frame.

The biggest selling point of The Abandoned – and the biggest reason to seek it out – is the atmosphere that Cerdà establishes. Nearly all the critics agree – even those who would go on to slam the film itself – that Cerdà created a more than effective atmosphere filled with dread.

And speaking of, there has always been a measurable disconnect between critics and audiences. Audiences tend to think that critics lose themselves a bit too easily in “artsy-fartsy” stuff and are unwilling to recognize a more harmless and basic movie whose only intention is to entertain (and rightfully so), while critics tend to notice that there is a big difference in an audience genuinely liking/loving a film and said film actually executing expert construction in front of and behind the camera (and rightfully so); they recognize that film-making is an art, and is therefore open to deconstruction and discussion. As long as film critics remain a part of the medium (and with the boom of Internet journalism, it seems they are here to stay), this disconnect will always remain. Because of this, the widest chasm of this disconnect – that between critics and the horror genre – will also remain. It’s no secret there’s a common belief that most critics are unwilling to recognize a legitimately good horror film simply because of the company it keeps. As Bruce Campbell famously once said, horror sits on the second rung from the bottom of the film genre ladder, just above pornography. And he’s right. While there have been obvious horror films released over the years who broke the critical barricade and demanded they be recognized for the masterful works they were, they were also relabeled in an almost spiteful tactic, as if critics were unwilling to praise one of them there “horror” films: Roger Ebert, in his glowing review of Halloween, called it a thriller; Alien was, of course, referred to as science-fiction; Jaws a high-seas adventure; Psycho a psychological thriller; and The Silence of the Lambs a drama! A movie about a serial killer ripping flesh off fat women, all the while another cannibalistic serial killer tears men’s faces off! A drama, for fuck’s sake!

There’s a purpose to my rant, I swear: and here it is. In all these negative reviews – even the ones that praise Cerdà’s talent for creating dense atmosphere – they call the story itself inept, nonsensical, confusing, and purposely vague. Which, I’m sorry, makes me call bullshit, for two reasons: First, look me in the eye and tell me that Kubrick’s adaptation of The Shining makes one goddamned lick of sense by the end, and when all is said and done. Does it make the film any less frightening, effective, or legendary? Fuck no, nerds. And two: why is it that films need to be tied up neatly by their conclusions for them to pass the critic’s test? Why aren’t films allowed to exercise a little bit of mystery and introduce a vague detail here and there in an effort to keep their audiences guessing? Why is it the audience is allowed to know every beat and every piece of reasoning introduced in the film, but meanwhile our characters are stumbling around in the dark trying to figure this all out? Is it not reasonable to suggest that the audience should be just as confused and unsatisfied as our characters, if the filmmaker’s intent was to unify them and make the audience feel what our characters were feeling?

Full disclosure: I have my own questions about the film. I can’t tell you 100% from beginning to end what exactly happens, and why. But that’s the beauty of it. The Abandoned wants you to accept its story at face value.  If you examine every nook, cranny, aspect, hidden meaning, trick, etc., of anything you love, it becomes less special. It’s unmasking the mascot that you’ve seen capering around at sporting events for years. It’s watching Robert Englund or Doug Bradley peel off Freddy Krueger’s or Pinhead’s make-up. The magic is gone. And who wants that?

At the core of The Abandoned is the nagging theme of the past, present, and future. Even if you can wade through all the clues and put together what you think transpired throughout the film, regardless if the director wanted it to be clear, or remain abstract, one thing remains: every film has a "point" or a "lesson" that it wants to bestow upon its audience. Or, if the filmmaker has at least half a brain, there should be. So what's the "theme" of The Abandoned? Perhaps it's that we shouldn't let our pasts define who we are in the present, nor should we ever let it have any of our time and space, as Johnny Cash used to say, in our futures. And a theme like that has a far reach. We all come from different backgrounds and different walks of life. For some of us, that journey has been a little tougher. And while it may have shaped the type of people we have become, we shouldn't ever let it get the best of us. Sometimes the past is exactly that – the past – and, like sleeping dogs, sometimes we should just let it lie.

H(ART)

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HOLY SHIT!

MOURN

HEY, KNOW WHAT'S A REAL MOVIE?

REVIEW: CARL PANZRAM: THE SPIRIT OF HATRED AND VENGEANCE

In this older post, I discussed the memoirs of a man named Carl Panzram. For those not familiar, he was a sociopathic killer from the early 1900s who spent most of his life either in reformatories or prisons. His non-institutional exploits took him all over the world, and he claimed responsibility for over twenty murders, as well as robberies, rapes, assaults, arsons, and over one thousand acts of male sodomy. While incarcerated, he began writing down his life story, including every (or nearly every) crime he ever committed. What resulted from those was an extremely valuable and insightful memoir, which should be required reading for students of true crime, psychology, and sociology; it’s the most openly intimate account of a killer's life in existence. And not only does Panzram spare no details of his crimes, he laments the fact that he is a product of society, and of an abusive and dismissive upbringing. Within the pages of his memoirs, he is telling you, me, and society itself, how to avoid bringing about another Carl Panzram. It’s one of the reasons it remains a dark but celebrated piece of material, even as it nears 100 years old. To read the book yourself is to know that Panzram isn’t trying to pass the buck, and he’s not trying to gain your sympathy. Because simply put: Fuck you. He’d kill you if you were in front of him, because he knows that if you were reared in the same society as him, you’re not worth a damn. Panzram never declined responsibility for his crimes, and he, by his own admission, never had a desire to reform himself. All he really wanted was to teach society a lesson – one they’d never forget.

His most famous quote remains:

In my lifetime I have murdered 21 human beings, I have committed thousands of burglaries, robberies, larcenies, arsons and, last but not least, I have committed sodomy on more than 1,000 male human beings. For all these things I am not in the least bit sorry.

Enter documentarian/filmmaker John Borowski. Previously responsible for documentaries on other early 20th century serial killers H.H. Holmes and Albert Fish, Carl Panzram: The Spirit of Hatred and Vengeance explores the titular killer utilizing interviews with those who have studied the man, his crimes, and even one particular man who knew him perhaps the best of anyone: Henry Lesser.

Lesser, at the time, was a young and idealistic prison guard in a Washington, DC prison where Panzram was remanded at that time. He was also the catalyst for what can be described as Panzram’s reputation as a cult figure. It was at Lesser’s urging that Panzram put pencil to paper (sneakily passed to Panzram’s cell in small increments, as such materials were considered contraband) to tell his life story. The few pages at a time Panzram wrote were soon assembled into a manuscript that would then take forty years to see publication, as most publishers simply did not want to be associated with the material.

Lesser, in an archival interview from the 1980s performed by San Diego State University, is one of the several experts to contribute to Borowski’s documentary. Additionally, the documentary utilizes Panzram’s original handwritten documents, which Lesser had kept in his possession for years before donating them to San Diego State University, as well as prison photographs, a handful of items used in Panzram’s execution, and modern-day footage of the places where Panzram lived, murdered, and died.

A five year odyssey that began as far back as 2007 has resulted in a fantastic and comprehensive documentary on one of the most hardened men who may have ever lived. Borowski crams as much essential information into this documentary as possible, and it never fails to be interesting. His assembly of interviewees with different backgrounds and pedigrees bring a wide range of perspectives and insights on a man whom I can only assume never dreamed he would still be a topic of conversation more than eighty years after his death.

In what may be the wisest decision made on the part of the documentary, Borowski obtained the participation of John Di Maggio, who has worked as a voice actor for the last 25 years (most famously voicing Bender in "Futurama" and a few other robots in the newer Transformers projects).  His incredibly raspy, Lance-Henriksen-sounding voice brings the perfect timbre to Panzram’s memoirs. His words come to life, and when recited with unrestrained anger, make them much more powerful.

Speaking of Panzram's words, the choice to forgo using a more traditional narrator was vetoed in favor of using text lifted directly from Panzram's memoir, retaining that first-person perspective. Because of this, his presence is consistently felt from the first minute until the last. Using Di Maggio’s voice over, Borowski weaves a tapestry of photographs, interviews, and reenactments to construct a truncated version of Pangram’s life story. The more significant and even anecdotal bits of Panzram’s past (he once robbed William Howard Taft!) are included here, as are the more vicious excerpts from Panzram’s memoirs.

Borowski is also objective enough to allow his interviewees to contradict each other: One interviewee emphatically states that a child raised in a loving and nurturing home would grow up to be a loving and nurturing adult (which he prefixes with “fact”) – ergo, Panzram's claims of the abuse he suffered at the hands of his father and other siblings leading him to his murderous life are valid – while another interviewee claims that it wasn’t this abuse, but any number of reasons including possible brain damage, or simply being born that way, that caused Panzram to commit the crimes he did, even stating that Panzram's other siblings all growing up to become productive members of society. Further, this same interviewee alleges perhaps the most interesting question raised in the documentary: Did Carl Panzram really commit every crime to which he laid claim? Did he really burn down juvenile detention centers where he was remanded, or kill over twenty people, or commit 1,000 acts of sodomy? Did he really smash in the heads of children with rocks, or kill men and feed their carcases to alligators? She asserts that contradictions arise from his writing, and Panzram’s own delusions of grandeur are clear signs he is building himself up into something more murderous and virtueless than he actually was. This claim is based on the idea that a serial killer’s main thrill is to feel powerful—so what better way to feel powerful then by tacking on dozens of murders and hundreds of crimes, knowing that his history of using aliases when being arrested would make his past near-impossible to trace?

One thing is definitely for certain: His last will and testament really did bequeath his "carcass" to a dog catcher in Minnesota – to provide meat for the dogs – as well as a curse to all of mankind.

My only real point of contention with the documentary is the use of reenactments. To me they seemed erroneous, and at times even distracting. For a few sequences, the on-screen reenactment actor playing Panzram would exchange dialogue with another “character,” over which Di Maggio’s voice work would be dubbed. In a few instances, this works just fine, but in others, it doesn’t. Other scenes reenacted come across as rather hammy, including a quick silhouette shot of one of the many acts of sodomy to which Panzram alleged. These reenactments are akin to something you would see on the History Channel (maybe not the sodomy), and in some cases aren't even quite as effective.

But calling out the inclusion of these reenactments feels like sour grapes, as they’re a cosmetic complaint at best; the documentary presents a lot of valuable information and brings new insights to this fascinating man and is barely hampered by these narrative scenes.

If you're intrigued by this dark individual – if you’ve read the book and even seen the movie – I don’t think I have to tell you that this documentary is essential viewing.

Copies of Carl Panzram: The Spirit of Hatred and Vengeance are available only through John Borowski’s website, and the first one thousand units sold will be limited editions featuring the filmmaker’s autograph as well as postcards of Panzram’s mug shot and signature.

BECOME WRATH

"I don't think you're quitting because you believe these things you say. I don't. I think you want to believe them, because you're quitting. And you want me to agree with you, and you want me to say, "Yeah, yeah, yeah. You're right. It's all fucked up. It's a fucking mess. We should all go live in a fucking log cabin." But I won't. I don't agree with you. I do not. I can't."

If we don't, remember me.

CANDIDNESS

"This world would be a damned fine place if man were off it."

TEOS RECOMMENDS: KILLING THEM SOFTLY

Did you see Killing Them Softly this weekend?

Based on the box office reports, you didn't. Nor do you know anyone who did.

You really should, though – so long as you know what you're in for.

Something I find myself saying more and more in my reviews/examinations of films is, “This film is not for everyone.” I suppose that could be said about every film, really. More and more people say The Godfather is the greatest film of all time, but that doesn’t mean everyone out there likes it – hence, The Godfather is not for everyone.

But it really, really applies when I say that Killing Them Softy (based on the book Cogan's Trade by George V. Higgins) is not for everyone. What is being sold as an action/thriller with Brad Pitt as a leather-jacket-clad hit-man is really not that at all. What the film most certainly is…is angry.

To sum up, two low-level hoods knock off a card game overseen by Markie (Ray Liotta). Jackie Cogan (Brad Pitt) is brought in to knock off the two hoods as well as the mastermind behind the scheme.

Does this actually happen? I can’t really say, but that’s not the point. What, on the surface, looks like a gritty revenge suspenseful-thriller is actually a very angry film about the economy, and the government’s handling of the bail out, and how, basically, those at the top responsible for his whole mess walked away from the affair unscathed. Some reviews have labeled the film as anti-Obama, and while I can see how that thought might be raised, I would disagree. I suppose the film would have to be anti-Obama in some unavoidable respects, being as how he is a part of the political machine, and he was one of those who signed-off on the bail out. But really, the film is anti-government. It’s anti-bullshit. And it’s very much anti-pretending that we’re all one community of people who care for each other, because our society proves again and again that we’re not. In the aftermath of Hurricanes Katrina and Sandy, and much earlier, 9/11, yes, our community got together and saved lives and helped people and even dug out rubble. We donated money and goods and we all felt really good about ourselves. But the things that divide us on a daily basis – politics, religion, incomes – crept back up to make us remember why it is we simply can’t get along with others.

Really what you have in Killing Them Softy is a message that’s simple: If somebody steals your money, you fucking kill them. Forget about due process, because something as massive and deludedly infallible as the government has proven it doesn’t have the honor and sack it takes to fix the problem. This is eye for an eye revisited.

Killing Them Softly comes from Andrew Dominik, screenwriter/director of The Assassination of Jesse James by the Coward Robert Ford (also starring Brad Pitt) – another film from Dominik’s body of work that I absolutely adore, which is another of his films that did not find the kind of success or attention it deserved. Dominik took the story of one of America’s most beloved outlaws, removed all the glamour and gimmick and godliness that’s been attached to him over the years, and instead presented you with a broken-down man, surrounded by family and friends, but ultimately alone. His life of crime left him constantly wanted by the law and constantly on the run, and he was left in a place where there wasn’t a single soul he could trust.

Killing Them Softly is incredibly well-acted, with James Gandolfini’s aging hit-man, Mickey, having all the best lines, while Scoot McNairy (of the incredible Monsters) gets to be a part of the most effective and suspenseful scenes in the film, including the robbery that starts this whole mess.

Don't expect non-stop violence (though the film is violent) and action set-pieces. What you can expect is a lot of anger towards our leaders and towards our society. What you can expect is a reflection on life – our own specific lives, as well as the one we share as a community. And you can expect to leave the theater with a wry smile on your face, knowing that it took a bunch of Boston hoods and hit-men to be more openly honest about what is they want, what they’re willing to do to get it, and to what means those affected will resort in order to get it all back—and that’s more than you can say for those allegedly looking out for the American people.

Plus, it's actually pretty funny.

BUY ME THIS: SKULL SHOT GLASS

Your booze of choice forms the shape of the skull. How do you not want this?

You there, reader - I'll take a set.

SHITTY FLICKS: INVASION OF THE BLOOD FARMERS

Shitty Flicks is an ongoing column that celebrates the most hilariously incompetent, amusingly pedestrian, and mind-bogglingly stupid movies ever made by people with a bit of money, some prior porn-directing experience, and no clue whatsoever. It is here you will find unrestrained joy in movies meant to terrify and thrill, but instead poke at your funny bone with their weird, mutant camp-girl penis.

WARNING: I tend to give away major plot points and twist endings in my reviews because, whatever. Shut up.

Invasion of the Blood Farmers opens with a fascinating monologue about demons that roamed around the country thousands of years ago. Oh, and something about blood sacrifices. And the screen is red, so you know the narrator means business.

We immediately cut to terror. A bloodied man stumbles down a country road. You can tell he’s in pain because he shrieks.

Not too far down the road sits a bar full of good-old-boys, cracking jokes about people we don’t know as we are inundated with odd close-ups of the patrons, badly angled and distractingly timed. The bartender asks a man if his wife has turned up yet (see, cuz she’s missing), but the very unworried husband waves away the bartender’s concern. Then someone else asks where Jim Carrey has been. For serious.

Before anyone can answer, the bloodied-shirt man (Jim Carrey!) stumbles into the bar, wagging his tongue around (just like the Jim Carrey we love!) before collapsing into a weird heap. The good-old-boys, not knowing what to do, make appropriate “yucky!” faces.

We then meet two new characters lying next to a river (which we hear, but never see). They are Don and Jenny. Their awkward '70s fashions are no match for their atrocious dialogue.

"Let me put it in your stinker once, Jenny. Don't be so greedy."

“There are some things you can’t learn in a school!” says Jenny, as Don defends his decision to attend pathology school, which I guess severely hinders their relationship. Don also states how brilliant of a pathologist Jenny’s father is and why he wants to work with him. Jenny asks about marriage, the suffocating bint that she is. Don responds by groping her highly-socked leg as generic library music fills the scene. Then they awkwardly bend to kiss...

...But no time for that, as we meet yet another lovely couple! Victim Girl and Blood Farmer # 1. Blood Farmer # 1 has inserted a tube into Victim Girl and is draining the blood from her body. And we can tell because of the sucking noises provided by the wonderful sound design. Blood Farmer is also inexplicably wearing a black Klansmen hood, its pointy cone shape a marvel of bigoted beauty. Who knows why, really, but it doesn’t matter. He’s sucking blood from a girl using a cow-milking machine. Is it really worse if he hates black people?

Jenny and Don momentarily race before falling to the ground, with Don awkwardly attempting to show intimacy with Jenny as he literally rubs her denim dress-covered stomach. Don then somberly talks of Jim Carrey, who invaded the bar, disgusted a bunch of drunks, and then fell on his face, without ever singing amusingly out of his asshole. Not once, but twice we are greeted with quick cuts to Jim Carrey laying face down on the floor as Don talks of finding him and how it has affected his life. A strangely utilized frying bacon sound is used to complement each cut back to Jim Carrey for unknown reasons.

It’s at this point that we meet the greatest man in the whole world: Dr. Roy Anderson, played with a currently unmatched amount of enthusiasm by the great Norman Kelley, a theater actor who over-annunciates and shouts every line he has in the film. “Where have you two been?!” he explodes. “Never mind! Come to the lab! Yoooooou won’t believe what’s HAPPENING!” Despite this invitation being directed to both Jenny and Don, only the latter follows, which is fine with me, because the less characters in a scene means the more opportunities for Dr. Roy Anderson to talk dynamically about scientific things, really excited to be in a feature film!

Dr. Anderson shows Don the samples of blood that were taken from Jim Carrey. Don is astonished to see that the amount of blood has increased by itself, now taking up half a beaker. Why, this blood was expanding all by itself!

"OK, let's go over the rules again: $30 for chugging,
$20 for gargling, and $10 for just lapping some from my palm."

Dr. Anderson takes his time, severely concentrating on reciting long, scientific diatribes, ignoring his flubs and continuing on. “This will either be a major milestone in pathology or a major blow to mankind! Let’s work all night until we nail this thing DOWN!”

Meanwhile, a local boob, Tex, fruitlessly attempts to clean up Jim Carrey’s blood from the bar floor, but since this is the same blood that keeps multiplying, he’s fucked. As he recites his lines, something about the blood and the present odd circumstances within the town being “demons’ work,” we reach a point in which the actor must not have been saying his lines loud enough, and a much-louder voice-over is layered directly over-top the old dialogue. As Tex babbles on, some strange farming men at the bar glare at him, since all the “strange things going on in this town” could very well clue townsfolk in on what’s actually going on: the sucking of people by these two wicker-hatted dudes.

After monitoring the conversation regarding Dr. Roy Anderson and his location on Willowbrook Road, one of the strange men, Egon, asks the bartender how to find this road. He claims to have “pressing business” with one of the residents.

“Are you guys tailors?” shouts an off-screen patron in response, which is greeted with laughter.

Upon receiving the directions, Egon responds with, “Your directions have been most…satisfactory,” and he and his sucking partner, Sontag, leave the bar.

Egon journeys on his gimpy leg to find Roy Anderson’s property and does, indeed, locate the residence. However, Egon then accidentally bumps into the window because he is a moronic demon alien, or something, and flees, having blown his stupid alien demon cover.

Buster, a white puffball of a dog, chases after Egon, who is promptly beaten to death with his Egon's demon alien cane. Jenny comes rushing out, looking for Buster, but sees only Don instead. She makes some offhanded comment about him being overdue, to which Don replies, “Well, you’re way overdue…for bed!” The fact that it's mid-afternoon is lost on our characters, but not anyone watching this film.

Don then leans into the camera, in shoddy close-up, lips parted, for a hot kiss. Jenny responds in kind, also leaning into the camera for this hot kiss, but then the camera cuts and we’re suddenly in bloody Egon’s mouth as he is eating the dog!

Wwatch out for Mr. Film School over here!

Don takes a brief trip through the woods to try to locate the dog, but instead finds a random key dropped by Egon earlier in the day. Don decides an old key is a good substitute for the dog and goes back to the house.

Later, we meet a newly married couple, honeymooning in the most romantic spot in the country: a seedy motel in Blood Suck Town. Man says “I’m gonna shower and then we can watch "'The Late Show.'”

His wife replies, “We’re married, now! We don’t watch 'The Late Show' anymore!”

Before you can figure out what the fuck that's supposed to mean, Man is killed in the shower by Egon as his wife lies on the bed and shakes, either from an off-screen attack or a vibrating mattress. And I'm serious when I say that. I really can't tell if she was just hit on the head and perhaps is experiencing a seizure, or if she just dropped two bits in the vibrating bed coin slot.

"Howdy, pardner. Room in this shower for two?"

The next morning, Dr. Roy Anderson sits at the table, patiently awaiting his daughter, Jenny, to fix his coffee, since he’s so fucking old and scientific that he can’t do it himself. Jenny forlornly pours the coffee, distressed by the absence of her dog. “Buster never misses breakfast!” she sadly exclaims.

Dr. Roy Anderson responds, “Don’t worry, when he gets hungry, he’ll come home…just like my students!” Thankfully there isn't much time to let sink in the fact that this line doesn't make a bit of sense, because Don stops by for breakfast, telling Jenny that they’ll go out later together looking for Buster. This warms her heart, and she offers to make him eggs.

“Scrambled, like you!” Don lovingly says. A nice sweet moment is shared. Everyone smiles at each other, really reveling in the warmness of the world and anxiously awaiting all the pleasures of the coming tomorrow.

And then Egon hangs the dead, mutilated dog outside the front door, rings the bell, and slowly drags his gimp body through some bushes, because he’s a gigantic dickhead. Jenny sees the dog's body, probably shoves her fist in her mouth and screams, and probably falls.

Dr. Anderson and Don examine the dog’s blood and find that it, too, is capable of the strange, replicating effect. 

“I’m afraid we’re dealing with forces we know nothing about!” exclaims Dr. Anderson, the top of his head the only part of him on camera. Don walks away, not responding to this as the camera awkwardly pans down on Dr. Anderson staring off, shocked, into space. Then the camera unsmoothly pans down to reveal the beaker now brimming with blood.

Jenny lies in bed, upset about Buster’s recent blood-draining and hanging. 

Don is also dismayed. “Why would someone try to SCARE us like this?”

Dr. Anderson’s booming, omnipresent voice fills the room. “Don! Come quick! YOOOOOOOOU won’t believe what is HAAAAAAPPENING!!” 

Don rushes to the basement lab to see Dr. Anderson trying to contain the blood now gushing from the several containers holding it and pouring all over the floor.

Oh no! What will they do!

No matter, because we then cut and finally meet Creton, the reason for all this bullshittery.

Rising with the morning sun, bathing in the warm springs,
and sucking a few bodies of their blood.
Creton relished it, and it was his.

Easily mistakable for a grey-haired version of Hyde from "That 70’s Show," Creton babbles bullshit over a dead woman’s body in a glass coffin as a boring suited man, Dr. Woodrow Kinski, looks on. The two off-handedly discuss the point behind the harvesting of blood (to awake their Demon Queen from her glass cofifin), even though at this point, everyone involved should pretty much know the game plan.

Back with our tepid heroes, Don shows Dr. Anderson the strange key he found in the woods while looking for Buster. Dr. Anderson, not recognizing the metal because he is brilliant, attempts to phone Dr. Kinski(!) at the institution, ignorant of the fact that he is not of this earth, or at the very least a non-human man.

Meanwhile, a random man we have never seen before sits behind his desk in an office, staring at the floor and literally waiting for the phone to ring in order to begin his scene, while simultaneously putting his faith in the director to cut out all that footage of non action.

Oops.

The phone does ring, and it’s Dr. Anderson, looking for Dr. Kinski, of course. Though Dr. Kinski has been holed-up somewhere doing research for the past month and left orders not to be disturbed, the man gives Dr. Anderson his phone number anyway, because why not?

Dr. Anderson ploddingly dials each number, (only 6 digits in all, which may have been appropriate for the time period, but as I don’t know any better, I will laugh anyway because it’s all the more to appreciate about this hammy movie) and then stares up at Don and smiles, looking as if he is about to ask someone out to a Sock Hop. The good doctors connect and make plans to meet up later to exchange the newly-found key for some tests.

"I just want to LOVE again!"

Dr. Kinski reports back to Creton immediately and thus takes part in a scene that lasts literally five minutes, but which only establishes Kinski has found the location of the key and that he’ll eventually steal it. Meanwhile, the woman attempting to play the dead queen in the coffin shuffles and jimmy-legs at her own disposal.

We then quickly check in with the deputy of the town, as he once again states that the chief is on vacation, and thus cannot solve the case of the missing people, because God forbid he should do any actual work. However, the vacationing chief decides to call the bar from a rainy area (see, because he’s in a different place) and verbally berate his deputy for letting the town fall victim to blood farmers, all the while magically knowing he could find his deputy at the bar.

Despite the fact that the deputy says absolutely nothing in reference to the Chief’s anger, nor even verbally acknowledges that the person on the other end of the line is the chief, a disembodied voice from the other end of the bar still decides to yell, “Give ‘em hell, Shorty!”

The random blood ritual has begun, with each black-hooded blood farmer drinking from the ceremonial bowl and then kissing the ceremonial dead girl.

We cut back to Dr. Anderson, the phone to his ear, waiting for his scene to begin. It takes roughly three Mississippi seconds. He’s talking to the Chief, and after a weird, unintentional throw-back of his head, the camera whirls momentarily within the woods to symbolize the passing of time, and the Chief appears at the doorway, already shaking Dr. Anderson’s hand. Dr. Anderson and the Chief settle down on the cozy couch as he lays down the entire dirty business of the growing blood and other goings-on of the past few days.

"Well I ain't never kissed a man, Bill, but you
do rub me the right way. Let's go for it."

With the courtesy of another quick cut, Dr. Anderson and the chief are now on their feet, with the chief agreeing to check out the Whittaker farm house, home to some of those blood farmers about which the town has frequently gossiped. How Dr. Roy Anderson knew this was the location of the bullshit is anyone's guess.

Chief meets Dr. Kinski at the house, who claims that the Whittakers have agreed to lend their abode to him while they vacationed in California. Dr. Kinski explains what’s going on, doing his best to keep up with overly-complicated scientific sounding jargon, yet clearly fucking up several of his lines.

Meanwhile, Dr. Anderson excitedly explains to Don a concoction he has whipped up to thwart the ever-expanding blood. As Don examines microscopic samples, the phone rings. Anderson grabs it, holds it to his ear and stares directly into the camera, knowing this is where they have agreed to cut. It's the chief, and the two gab for a bit before Dr. Anderson hangs up and looks confused. Dr. Anderson then dials Dr. Kinski, and Egon, who despite not having the patience to speak human English, answers the ringing phone, anyway. Egon mutters an angry demon curse and fires sparks into the phone with his hands. 

Dr. Anderson’s cry of “whaaa-a-a-at?!” mixed with his look of overstated befuddlement is priceless. “Look, I want to spo—SPEAK, to…DR. KINSKI!” he manages.

“There is no Kinski here!” replies Egon.

“Is this 4…6...2 - 7…8…3…?” Dr. Anderson stumbles.

Kinski quickly gets on the phone and makes up some shit about working on atomic bombardment “and you know how that can make some people feel.” Kinski, before hanging up the phone, says that his work is going well. 

Don inquires, “what did he say?” 

Anderson replies, confusedly, “he says his work goes…well!” as if it’s an outlandish concept. What the fuck, Dr. Anderson, you asked him.

The chief then receives a call from a missing girl’s father who grows impatient with the slow work of the police department. And right here is where I’d tell you how the chief handled the call if the scene didn’t cut him off mid-sentence and propel the audience suddenly to the woods.

Dr. Kinski drops by Dr. Anderson’s and the two make polite chatter. Dr. Kinski asks for a Bloody Mary and Dr. Anderson does not conceal his over-the-top confusion at his request, considering he offered him a drink in the first place. 

And then we cut outside to Dr. Anderson and Don talking about random life things. Where did Dr. Kinski go? Who knows! I sure don’t!

Dr. Anderson and Jenny are kidnapped by the cult and taken to the mountains where the final whatever will take place.

"I can dance CIRCLES around you, old man.
Any time, ANY PLACE!"

Luckily Don shows up with the antidote, but for some reason never even thinks to use it until Dr. Anderson tells him to. Don attacks the main dead girl with it, which melts her almost instantly, along with the rest of the cult.

Wow, that ended fast!

The three of them retire back to their peaceful home, where Don makes wedding plans with Jenny, regardless of the fact that she can’t even stand from her ordeal.

“Don, come quick!” Dr. Anderson suddenly cries. “YOOOOOOU WON’T BELIEVE WHAT’S HAPPENING!”

Oh no, what now!

But don’t worry, it’s a new puppy, which Dr. Anderson holds up while smiling devilishly. The movie literally ends with Dr. Anderson laughing into the camera, raising his eyebrows as if to say, “eh?? Eh????”

And thus ends the greatest movie you never saw.

HEY, KNOW WHAT'S A REAL MOVIE?

REVIEW: ABOLITION

The idea of the anti-Christ has been a huge part of the genre, at the very least, since the Christian timeline. Obviously I don’t just mean mass media, but in culture itself. This idea that the son of the devil is out there, or will be out there, and will bring about the end of times, has always been a powerful presence in the Catholic faith. It has extended itself to classics like Rosemary’s Baby, and more directly, The Omen. It would seem that Abolition is the next step.

Playing out more like a sequel to The Omen, Abolition (meaning “the end”) is about a lowly anti-Christ named Joshua (Andrew Roth). He is not outwardly evil, nor is he purposely amassing followers to bring about the apocalypse. No, it turns out the anti-Christ is a lowly and dour maintenance man, born of what I suppose should be called demaculate conception. After the building in which he works and lives is condemned, he finds himself living on the street amongst those others who were displaced. He begins to amass followers without even trying, and flipside shades to biblical stories are presented; there isn’t just the aforementioned scene of virgin conception, but the story of Jesus breaking five loaves of bread to feed thousands of people is also re-interpreted as Joshua begins to hand out sliced bread to the indigents surrounding him. There’s nothing miraculous to be seen here—instead, the indigents begin to claw at each other like animals, desperate to satisfy the hunger in their stomachs. The scene soon grows so violent that Joshua ends up fleeing.

After a near-deadly altercation with a street hood, Joshua collapses on the steps of a church, where he is found and cared for by Matthew (Reggie Bannister, in an atypical role). As the two become more acquainted, Joshua explains that he used to be the maintenance man at another building, so Matthew invites him to oversee maintenance in the apartment building that he owns. One of this building’s inhabitants, Mia (Elisa Dowling), is presented as a conflicted but potential love interest for Joshua after he saves her from a rape attempt. Filling out the cast is Caroline Williams as Joshua’s mother, aka the woman in the opening of the film who goes to bed, has a bunch of nightmares, and wakes up preggers. Seeing as how she’s the mother of the anti-Christ, she’s got a few…problems.

Much like anything having to do with religion, shit eventually hits the fan.

There is a good idea somewhere in Abolition. I like the idea of the anti-Christ not really being that bad of a dude. I like that he’s conflicted and depressed, not because he knows what he is, but because that’s just his personality. I like that he’s not painted to be a generic villain, but that instead great attempts were made to actually make viewers feel…sympathy for the devil? (So, so sorry.) The problem is the film just doesn’t do enough with this concept, and so much of the running time is spent meandering along that when things start to get interesting, we’re only ten minutes away from closing credits.

Andrew Roth as Joshua gives a performance that, after a while, becomes exhausting. Viewers can only spend so much time with a broken-down character before it starts to take its toll. At least that’s the case for me. Roth is competent enough and carries all the scenes he’s in, but after a while, it somehow manages to feel like way too much as well as not enough.

As previously mentioned, Reggie Bannister gives a good performance as Matthew, which is propelled by the decidedly more serious tone of the film. While Reggie will always be best known for the Phantasm series as the guitar-plucking, 4-barrel-shotgun-wielding, skirt-chasing ice-cream man, his career has mainly extended primarily to bit parts in direct-to-video garbage. While nice to see him in something more grounded, it’s a shame the film itself wasn’t better.

Abolition unfolds at a pace that will seem downright punishing to even the most patient of viewers. I can’t say the film was ever boring, but you spend so much time waiting for the big pay off that when it comes, you’re nearly furious that you’re not given more to go with.

I will always give credit to filmmakers who wish to tell a story with less flash and gimmick. It’s evident here that co-writer/director Mike Klassen believes in his story, enough that he’s confident his particular pacing is worth the journey. I’m not sure I’d agree with the method.

Like that age-old belief, "How do you know that homeless man asking you for food isn’t Christ himself?,"  Abolition asks, "How do you know that lowly maintenance man you disregard on a daily basis isn’t going to bring about the end of everything?"

Unfortunately, in this case, you'll find it hard to care.

COMPANY

"Do you ever find yourself talking with the dead? Since [my son] Willie's death, I catch myself every day, involuntarily talking with him, as if he were with me."

CREEP

Three years ago I went to a national chess tourney with some friends. We stopped off at a restaurant, and there was this older man there who claimed he was traveling cross-country, meeting famous people and the like. So the friends I'm traveling with - their Dad tells me to go interview him for the trip. I had brought along a video camera, you see, to document the trip and the tourney. So I went over to him and sat down and offered him an interview about his travels. He seemed jovial at first, but when I brought up cameras he became alarmed as hell, and very unsettled. I had to promise him not to record him in any way. I was a bit put off, but I agreed. So I decided to try my best to remember the conversation after we had it and I would jot it down later.

So for the first half of the conversation everything went pretty all right. He told me stories of his travels on the road, close calls in towns, people trying to mug him, close calls hitchhiking with people who turn out not so normal (ironic really), and places he'd been. He also liked talking up religion a lot. So then he starts talking about one time he camped outside of a town in Minnesota. He tells me how he stops at this diner, and this girl there starts hitting on him. The story got really weird, and long story short, it turned into him trying to run away from this girl after she found him at his campsite and tried to rape him. But I chocked it up as a tale he told to spice up the conversation because he enjoyed my company, and I let it go. 

But then he hit me with a zinger. He told me that he predicted what the girl was going to do. He told me he could predict things because he had power. He started talking about the Bible, God, and the second coming a lot. Then he got in my face and said he thought he could trust me. So he asked me if I wanted to know who he really was. I started getting really unsure about this whole thing, but I said sure. 

He took his hands and placed them on the table, laying them flat. On his palms were holes going straight through, from one side to the other. His feet had them too. He said he was marked as the Second Coming, and he was traveling the country bringing the truth and healing and helping others, and operating a website out of his van. He said he had not yet risen to power, but he would, and when he had met his quota, he would bring Heaven back to Earth. 

All I could think was "Holy shit, holy shit, this guy stabbed nails through his hands and feet. Please don't kill me, Mister. I've got so much to give." A friend of mine came over to tell me we were leaving at that point, and he also saw the "stigmata" on the guys hands. He just stared at it, like "Holy shit, does this guy think he's really Jesus Christ"? The guy told me his website. I looked it up later. It doesn't exist. I swear there was a van outside with a satellite dish though. I almost said there wasn't but then I remembered there was. He told us to be careful on our trip as bad storms would be coming and they would rain on the good and the wicked alike. Sure enough, on our way back days later, we ran through some pretty heavy, tornadic thunderstorms.

I'll never forget that shit as long as I live. I sat right across from a man who stabbed himself in the hands and feet with nails.

Story source.

Image source.

REVIEW: THE COLOUR OUT OF SPACE (DIE FARBE)

I wish I were more familiar with H.P. Lovecraft. I’ve read only a sampling of his work – “Rats in the Walls” and “Re-Animator” – and, like Poe, found his prose to be simultaneously beautiful and antiquatedly tedious. I recognize both Lovecraft and Poe’s skills as literary legends, but perhaps it’s my simple-minded brain that keeps me from fully embracing their bodies of work. Regardless, they have my undying respect for contributing to the genre and elevating it with their presence.

Because of this, I had no real idea what to expect as I sat down to watch The Colour Out of Space. My exposure to Lovecraft at that point had been the aforementioned short stories, as well as other more modern fare that directly homages and honors the author, like Carpenter’s In the Mouth of Madness, or Stuart Gordon’s From Beyond. Lovecraft writes of slimy, distorted, indescribable monstrosities from other worlds – both in a sci-fi as well as a more general horrific sense. Reading a quick summary of the original short story confirms that the film adaptation is mostly loyal, but obviously has to punch it up a bit to expand the story to an appropriate feature length.

Jonathan Davis (Ingo Heise), of Arkham, Massachusetts (a popular Lovecraft setting), is investigating the disappearance of his father (Ralf Lichtenberg). This investigation leads him all the way to Germany, where he meets Armin Pierske (Michael Kausch), who recognizes a picture of Jonathan’s father…not the recent one he has been using to canvass, but another that depicts him as a young soldier. The two sit down as Armin begins to relate the tale of “the colour,” what it did to the countryside after it crash-landed out of space in a meteorite, and how his father comes into play. It would seem that this meteorite contained a radioactive element that caused nearby produce to double or even triple its size – and that's not all; insects, too, rapidly expanded, and bees grew to the size of rats. Lastly, its exposure to human beings left them in catatonic, near-mad states, and once that occurred, there was no redemption for them.

While I can’t speak for the source material (my assumption comes from Lovecraft stories with which I am already familiar), I am sure The Colour Out of Space unfolds in the same sense as the short story; meaning, it probably takes its time. The adaptation sure does – but not in a detracting sense. Like the types of literature and films its honoring, it unfolds one piece at a time, like any good mystery should do. And despite the horror and sci-fi presence, at its core the film is a mystery. Shot in black and white, it recalls the dreary and mystical world of film noir, made most popular during the early 20th century. This choice of black and white was not obvious to me right away – I at first assumed that the filmmakers chose a black and white canvas due to the completely unique aspect of “the colour” said to be wreaking havoc across the land. For a color that had no place within the earthly color spectrum, I assumed this was the filmmakers’ way of skirting such an impossible task as creating an entirely "new" color. I should have given them more credit. “The colour” does make an appearance, and it appropriately remains the only object in the film to be colorized – artificially, obviously, which definitely lends it a very unnatural appearance. No, the filmmakers chose a black-and-white palette to lend it a foreign and almost dream-like look. And it certainly works, at times coming dangerously close to recalling The Cabinet of Dr. Caligari.

Admittedly, The Colour Out of Space did not grab me at first. I was interested in the story, but not invested. And unfortunately the scenes in which our characters spoke English (German is mostly utilized) sounded very tinny and echoey, as if the characters’ dialogue had been recorded in a phone booth. (The film is a German production, so perhaps the scenes featuring English dialogue were reshoots in order to make international sales more appealing?) I can’t imagine this was a purposeful choice, for if it was, there is no clear reason for it. However, I eventually began to lose myself in the story. As previously mentioned, each layer was peeled back to reveal a new development – the giant fruit, the monstrous bees, and catatonia of the nearby residents – and I found myself very intrigued.

If I had one word to describe The Colour Out of Space, it would be ambitious. Our filmmakers clearly did not have a very large budget, but their sprawling, international story feels bigger than life. What scant CGI effects there are look damn good and comparable to what you’d see in modern theaters, and because they are particularly placed throughout the script, the scope feels bigger in recollection. The direction by Huan Vu (a German Asian! I know! Crazy!) is well-assured, and at times even beautiful. The acting for the most part is more than satisfactory. A few minor characters have a couple lines that don’t sound at all convincing, but luckily our leads feel completely genuine. (You will stare at the young version of Armin Piersk and swear it’s Frederik Zoller, star of the fake Nation’s Pride in Inglorious Basterds, but you’d be wrong.)

Fans of Lovecraft would be missing out if they did not give this adaptation a try. Additionally, fans of film noir, German expressionism, sci-fi, and classic tales of horror should also check it out.

BUY ME THIS: PET SEMATARY PROP

This is Judd's (Fred Gwynne) mechanical head from the 1989 Stephen King classic horror film Pet Sematary. The bust can be seen as undead child Gage (Miko Hughes) slices Jud across the mouth with a scalpel in the process of killing him. The bust is made out of urethane over a foam core and has been painted and detailed to appear as if it were the real actor complete with white sideburns and hair around the lower back of the head. The open mouth is covered in dried fake blood and has a cut across it. The most exciting part of this piece is the top piece of the hollowed-out head is exposed with two black levers inside that when manipulated, move the mouth up and down. There are also thin plastic tubes still connected that were used to pump blood through the mouth, completing the gruesome effect. This head is mounted on a small wooden base, is labeled “Fred Gwynne” at the bottom, and measures approximately 19" x 15" x 11" (48cm x 38cm x 28cm). This piece is in good condition.

Wow.

Buy it for me!