Seen this on dvd recently, dont get me wrong, i adore zero budget flicks, actually prefer them over big budget "safe" flicks.
But this one was disappointing, no production value ok by me, unlikebale characters -ok by me, but no real story and just not really inventive or none of that grinhouse-ish feel at all. No memorable scenes that I can wow...that was f_ucked up...maybe Im desensitised. lol
my 2 cents folks.
I agree but the film does seem real and is engrossing . The way it is filmed is different to most films its so gritty and real. Of course i knew it wasnt . Hell the film for me sucked but i guess its the way it was acted out and filmed that makes it so memorable.
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Personally I think it completely epitomises the old school z grade grindhouse movies. The bad acting, questionable storyline, poor production and then graphic gore at the end. And as previously mentioned it was a lost movie for many years that survived on dodgy vhs copies. Because no one really knew what it was it was rumoured that it could actually have been snuff disguised as a movie (hence the crap acting and production)
She's a fat cat, full of smack, and a slave to the sweat
I agree... watched LHODES just now and found it to be quite terrible. From all the reviews and comments I've read, I was expecting a seriously sleazy and disturbing experience, but the film didn't deliver. I'm fine with crude production values, bad acting and bad camera work, but at least give me a satisfying story or merely an interesting one. It didn't put me to sleep, but I was pretty bored throughout.
shareIt works simply because it's a great subversive film. The movie isn't a horror film or a slasher flick like so many people think, but rather a fascinating look at the intrinsic falseness of cinema, or at least what people perceive is the falseness of cinema.
Remember how Mrs. Palmer thwarts Terry's claim that his footage is "for real"?
She claims that it can't be real, it's after all "just a movie."
There is the film's point in a nutshell. It's not about blood, guts, or violence but about how people both believe in a "true" cinema while simultaneously assuming that whatever is caught on film must be fake.
This is a wonderful film and one of the great released student film works along side Killer of Sheep.
I agree, sarabay; when you get right down to it, this is more of an avant-grade art film then a gore flick. I would even go a bit further and say that it's actually a very well-made film (for the most part). I believe that the filmmaker knew exactly what they were doing; it's a rough and unpolished, but I'm sure that was deliberate, I mean, it's supposed to look like a snuff-film; how many snuff-films have high production values and state-of-the-art F/X (well, a "real" snuff-film wouldn't have any F/X, but that's beside the point...)?
"The movie isn't a horror film"
This is a statement that I disagree with; I don't see how this isn't a horror film.
Yeah, this movie didn't have the charm of most Something Weird grindhouse movies from around the same period. By the time the movie got to the face cutting killing scene, I finally had to laugh.
I can't believe anyone ever thought this movie was "real" and people really lost their lives during filming. Maybe it's because I have hours of police and medical procedural shows like Law and Order and CSI under my belt. I know the shock of conscious amputation wouldn't have allowed someone to keep screaming so vigorously while they were being sawed into.
Not that any of the other snuff scenes were any more realistic.
No two persons ever watch the same movie.share
This could have been a good grade z movie.. IF IT WASN'T FOR THOSE DUMBASSES LAUGHING ALL THE TIME! Aggravating to the max to try and watch a horror/torture/snuff wannabe and have to sit through a 60 minute laugh track.. blehhhh
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Atmosphere. The technical faults don't bother me much, even contribute on some fronts. It could work even without the dialogue, just music & scenery. Its a complete void caught on film- chilly, alien. Its cliche, but 'bad' movies have alot to offer; whereas big budget films are clean & polished to the point of uniformity, something like this remains ugly, rough, imperfect & proud of it. I have to disagree with OP, I don't think I've seen a MORE grindhouse film in my life; you could've been passed this thing in a rusted cannister by a leper hobo or unearthed it in the process of tearing down an old bordello. Palpable in a way something like Avatar couldn't hope to be, even if technically the better film. ....Soul? Its just feels exactly to me like a really bad dream, hazy & indistinct & half-remembered yet rotten to the core.
If the Director's original version was there it might have been more coherent. Then again from what he's said it really wasn't supposed to be an amazing literary project. The director didn't have a script while shooting the movie. He had a basic idea and knew what he wanted before each scene shot, but the actors were there to improvise more than do what was on the page.
It was more the build up to each kill over a brilliant story. Some movies are set up for the visuals over anything else. Come on even AVATAR was more visual than anything.
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Well, for one because it's a classic, and a definite product of its time. It's also amazing because of Watkins himself, but if you don't care about things like that then you probably won't care.
Personally I think it's a great *beep* movie and I love it.
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"It's better not to know so much about what things mean." David Lynch
I think it's liked, or rather "appreciated," for the general effect of it all. It takes the grit and realism of "Texas Chainsaw Massacre" about ten steps further, which is almost inconceivable. The production values show, sure, but the feeling that you're watching something real is pervasive throughout the entire movie. Its incoherence and utter bizarreness only add to it—you feel like you're seeing something you shouldn't be seeing, and it's puzzling because you aren't being given a well-rounded sense of what's going on in the film. It plays with the very idea of film and spectatorship by playing up its cinema vérité moments.
I guess my point in all this is, yeah, it's a Z-grade movie, but the grittiness and the subjectivity of it make it an oppressive thing to watch. It's gruesome and visceral, and basically looks and feels like what I'd imagine a lost snuff movie made by the Manson family would look like. It's unnerving and at times gut churning.
Cool.
shareI dig this flick for both its sheer rawness and fiercely uncompromising nihilism.
I've been chasing grace/ But grace ain't easy to find