SPARE PARTS – Some Riot Grrl-esque punksters are abducted and welded to bits of Meccano in ‘Spare Parts’, a gladiatorial horror flick set in a brutal shanty town. The frequent flashes of gore struggle to offset the sense that ‘Spare Parts’, after it settles into a rhythm of fight-scene / build up / escape plan / repeat etc, is all a bit one-note. Still, in a way it’s a nice updating of a sort-of WIP scenario. Worth a shot if you like contemporary feminist action horror with splattery combat involving big metal pincers.
SCARY MOVIE – This odd little labour of love follows a nervous guy, who happens to look a bit like Ian Curtis dressed for Sunday School, as he frets about various issues near or within a Halloween funhouse. Meanwhile, item – a dangerous madman has escaped en route from a carceral facility. What will happen? Maybe not quite what you expect. ‘Scary Movie’ is a sort-of ironic take on the whole slasher cliché, and spends most of its run-time wrong footing the audience one way or another. It drifts along, lazily taking in a succession of great Halloween costumes and pageantry, not really focussing on much beyond nervous guy and the local punks who stand around waiting for the carnival to happen. The Butthole Surfers play on the radio more than once before Roky Erickson pops up as the end credits roll. It’s very dreamy and just kind of floats by, not really caring whether it makes sense or not. I really enjoyed it, a 16mm backyard flick hewn from the same dark matter as Horror, but not quite of it.
HONEYDEW – Takes the standard backwoods horror route, then stylises it to oblivion. At some points, I was thinking that Peter Greenaway would appreciate the level of artifice on display, but the overall vibe is Lynchian – odd characters, weird mannerisms, dreamy nebulousness vying with the grotesque. Either you’re with that kind of thing or not, and I’ll say straight up that if you’re not, then you’ll probably find ‘Honeydew’ tedious to the point of aggravation, because the main draw here is sheer atmosphere, and a pretty curdled one at that. ‘Plot’ is as alluded to above – city types stranded off the highway out in the sticks happen across hostile locals, then a friendly farmstead… friendly in a TCM vein, ha ha. Lina Dunham pops up, oddly enough, just as things get sicker and sicker. Countless rural American horrors are referenced, but I do wonder whether the makers saw and took note of that tawdry bit of Brit-grot from back in the noughties, ‘Mum and Dad’? That’s kind of where we’re headed. Anyway, recommended if it sounds like your bag.
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