Starring Brian Benben, Cinthia Moura, Directed by John Landis
Review by Louis Fowler | Anchor Bay Entertainment | Buy from Amazon.com
Starring Angela Bettis, Erin Brown, Directed by Lucky McKee
Review by Louis Fowler | Anchor Bay Entertainment | Buy from Amazon.com
You can have your FAHRENHEIT 9/11s and all the anti-Iraq war docs you can carry. For me, the most important piece of protest art to come out of this ordeal is, believe it or not, a friggin' episode from the Masters of Horror series.
Yeah, I'm as shocked (and awed) as you are.
GREMLINS director Joe Dante's entry, HOMECOMING, should have been, by all accounts, nothing more than another piece of liberalized propaganda (not that there's anything wrong with that, of course) that does nothing more than preach to the choir, the converted, the like-minded many. But instead, Dante does away with pure politicos in favor of a broad satire of the whole damn mess in general.
Homecoming starts off with a Crossfire-style show where glib conservative spin-doctor David Murch (the usually-annoying Jon Tenney) and an obvious Ann Coulter-type (with a slight S & M fetish, mind you) argue back and forth about how important and necessary this current war is. I'm sure you've heard it before. The host broadsides David by having a grieving, anti-war mom (which seems like an obvious nod to Cindy Sheenan) placed in the debate. Being a slick master of spin, he patriotically consoles the grieving mother and tells her he wishes that all the soldiers who have died in this war would come back to tell us how they feel about it. And before you can say “monkey's paw”, they're back, piling out of their flag-lined coffins. But, in an “I-bet-he-didn't-see-that-coming-twist”, instead of supporting the current administration, they're back to vote him out of office. They also eat a few people. But mostly vote.
I know, especially after rereading it, it sounds silly summarized. But the truth is is that it's actually a very inspiring, anger-inducing episode that, I'm predicting, after all this is over, will be looked back on as an important piece of anti-war subversiveness.
So how do you follow that entry up?
There's no way around it: if there's anyone who deserves the title “Master of Horror”, well, dammit, it's Italian horror-god Dario Argento. Creating a genre unto himself, no one makes films like Argento – SUSPIRIA? OPERA? PHENOMENA? I don't need to go on because I'm sure you've already seen them all. At least I hope you have.
With all this, it's only fitting that his entry in the Masters of Horror series is also the most stylishly creepy of the lot – if one thing, you're at least delivered an always-stylish, always-wonderfully-colored take by Argento. Adapted (by star Steven Weber – yeah, that Steven Weber!) from a 70s Creepy magazine story by Bruce Jones and Bernie Wrightson that I haven't read or heard of but have been reassured is a classic, JENIFER is the story of a horribly disfigured girl, aptly named Jenifer, with no past and the havoc that ensues as she enters the life of a depressed cop. And if you're a fan of Argento, you know no one does disfigured psychos better than him. No sooner than Jenifer enters the house cop Weber is entering her, multiple times, multiple ways.
And while this is all well and good, problem is that Jenifer has a tendency to eat the occasional housecat or little girl. Hot sex or not, I'm pretty sure if this were you or me, her hair-lipped nonsense would be right out the door. But, not wanting to give up that freaky ass, Weber overlooks this and moves into a cabin in the woods, starting over and hoping that the seclusion will calm Jenny down a bit. It doesn't.
The make-up for JENIFER is quite disturbing, but, as shown in the special features, the most disturbing parts were left on the cutting room floor. They include a well-placed penis chomping and – how do I describe this one? Well, Argento wondered what a blowjob done with a disfigured mouth would look like.
I won't even get into (no pun intended) the aborted (no pun intended again) vagina mold.
But, you know, it's things like that that makes Argento a master. Pushing the boundaries, no matter how diseased they are. Anything to freak-out the audience. I admire that. And honestly, that's why you can't get better than Argento.
Of course, I'm sure that'll be topped next month when Takashi Miike's banned episode IMPRINT makes it to DVD. Is it as good or is it all just hype? We'll see...
