I just watched it on Google and went to this forum to get some perspective on it. I thought it was a really pretentious and interesting film. Without to much slasher exploitation crap. So what do i find on this board? A whole bunch of people talking about cordless drills?! To much dialog?! Ferrara was trying to make a real movie, not slaher porn...
Ferraras biggest mistake was to name it Driller Killer. Its not a horror flick. I would think that the title was choosen to make promotion easy. Selling it as a drama would not work... Its not a top notch movie, it does loose some tension at the end of the movie, and the acting is not to good. The sound is pretty bad and important cuts are really quick so you probably have to watch it twice to get the story with the father and the homless.
In the end its a really original and daring piece of indie, made on a tiny budget.
You got to sell a film where you can and even though strictly speaking it's not a horror movie, it'll do it's best billed as a horror movie. Having said that I think it was perfect calling it The Driller Killer. It gets more people interested rather than something like Unravelled Mind. You've got to think of the audience and I think that's an achievement. I have to agree the acting was a little poor in places but I've seen worse acting than that so it's fairly competent.
I have to agree with the idea that this movie was a lot more than just horror. I found that the horror aspect was just a side deal and that this movie was more of an art house film than anything else. I know that many thought the acting was bad but I actually liked it and it fit the mood of the movie. I found the whole piece to be very much so visually interesting through the use of color. The whole undertone of the movie is great and I think that looking at it as something other than horror, you can grasp a different perspective of the whole piece.
I dont get it when ppl say that it 'clearly isnt a horror film' and 'nothing happens'.
It's a gore-fest and a guy, at one point, rampages through New York drilling people.
It's a horror, it's advertised correctly. It's hard to emphasise on a movie's drill killing gore AND tell an audience that it has artistic merit all in a trailer or a poster.
'Driller Killer' is a fine name aswell, the movie may be gritty and artistic, but it is also about a man who kills homeless people with a drill. Abel may have wanted to make something a bit different compared to the other eploitation movies at the time but, at the end of the day, he consiously knew that he was making a violent exploitation film and played to the genre.
And the name 'The Driller Killer' alone makes you want to see the movie.
There was nothing wrong with the advertisment and the name. It's just the fact that it's hard to advertise this sort of film without bunching it into one genre.
Baron Frankenstein: "To know death Otto, you have to *beep* life... in the gall bladder!"
It's not a gorefest. There's hardly any gore in it. There's a drill-to-the-head sex-ish scene where he skullf_cks a guy with a drill. It's a bloodfest in that scene. GORE, though? Nah.
And Abel FErrara said in many interviews that this film is intended as a comedy. I haven't thought -- in the 12 years this film has been in my life -- that this was a horror film, either. It just has a horror atmosphere.
Is The Addiction a horror film? Nah... and hell, Ms. 45 is more of a slasher film than this. Dangerous Game and Bad Lieutenant are more HORRIFYING than this. And no one accuses any of them of being horror films.
And Abel FErrara said in many interviews that this film is intended as a comedy.
That actually makes sense in a lot of ways. I didn't really find it comedic the first time I saw it, but after watching it a couple other times, it's easier to see the comedic aspects.
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I consider it to be a horror film but just barely. It's more about the lives of the three people living together and how Reno's lousy life leads him on a downward spiral to murder. Almost a drama with a few gory murder scenes sprinkled in. I do like it though because it is bizarre and surreal which are two qualities I cannot resist in a horror movie.
I remember during the "Video Nasty" controversy of the 80s seeing an article in one of the redtops where they showed a still of the scene where Renos drilling the guy through the head.There was also a TV doc on the telly at this time about kids being exposed to violent movies where they showed two clips from Driller Killer,the afore mentioned scene and the other one where he straddles a tramp and drills him through the belly.For years I thought this had to be the bloodiest film ever before seeing it.