Color, 1990, 90m. / Directed by Frank Henenlotter / Starring Kevin Van Hentenryck, Annie Ross, Kathryn Meisle, Heather Rattray, Jason Evers, Ted Sorel / Synapse (US R1 NTSC) / WS (1.85:1) (16:9) / DD2.0
Our story picks up with the closing moments of the original Basket Case as Duane (Van Hentenryck) and his deformed, separated Siamese twin brother, Belial, plunge from the neon-accented awning of their seedy New York hotel. The ensuing media frenzy reveals their grisly secret life to the
Fast-paced and utterly strange, Basket Case 2 veers way over the top early on with Ross' impassioned speeches while dressed in quasi-religious white gowns, surrounded by mutated inhabitants with faces resembling moons and tree stumps. The influence of Jerry Springer tabloid culture is unmistakable here and gives the film a nice twist; while the gore is kept to a surprising minimum (this time out the MPAA easily gave it an R rating), the barrage of outrageous make-up effects keeps viewers off balance from start to finish. Van Hentenryck gives an assured comic performance (even doubling as Belial's face in some shots this time out), and Henenlotter follows up his psychedelic Brain Damage by getting even more stylized and extreme with his lighting and camera angles. Top it off with a catchy score by Joe Renzetti (Dead and Buried) that can only be filed under "quirky" and a memorably sick little ending, and you've got an instant cult favorite.
Ushered to video by Shapiro Glickenhaus back in the early '90s after a handful of token theatrical screenings, Basket Case 2 disappeared from view for nearly a decade afterwards when the DVD era hit (though a mediocre-looking UK release popped up pairing it with the even more absurd third installment). Synapse's DVD restores much of the brightly-colored luster to the film that couldn't be appreciated on a home screen before; the wild color schemes really pop here like never before, and the anamorphic presentation looks terrific. Also, the stereo soundtrack is more spacious than expected with the music rising up quite effectively during the opening clips from the mono, flatly-recorded original. FX artist Gabe Bartalos hosts the biggest extra, a 20-minute featurette entitled "Behind the Wicker." Packed with camcorder footage of the creation of Belial and the other freaks, it's a fun, low-tech short with Bartalos (who has to be subtitled on occasion due to the loud industrial setting) showing off the shooting locations, sharing a chatty walk with Henenlotter while talking about the shooting, and turning the camera over for a reminisence with Henenlotter and Jim Glickenhaus. Dawn of the Dead's David Emge pops up for the second featurette, a five-minute quickie called "The Man in the Moon Mask," in which he talks about how he landed up appearing in his memorable and completely unrecognizable role as "Half-Moon."
Color, 1990, 85m. / Directed by Frank Henenlotter / Starring James Lorinz, Patty Mullen, Louise Lasser, Joseph Gonzalez / Unearthed (US R1 NTSC) / WS (1.85:1) (16:9) / DD2.0
Though some critics railed against Frankenhooker for its supposed misogyny and bad taste, the film is far too absurd and playful for these criticisms to hold up.
Frankenhooker first appeared on video in both R-rated and unrated versions (the former missing quite a bit of exploding hooker footage, for example), with the former only available for years on DVD thanks to a shoddy budget release from Simitar. (The unrated version did turn up on German disc, albeit from the same old lackluster tape master.) Unearthed's much-needed revamp looks light years ahead of past editions, with rich, deep blacks and perfect detail. The widescreen framing is also a huge improvement over the previous full frame (open matte) editions, which threw all of the compositions out of whack. The stereo audio sounds
On the extras side, Henenlotter turns in another jovial, fact-packed commentary track, joined by frequent FX collaborator Gabe Bartalos. (If you're a fan of the Basket Case sequels, this would play nicely as a companion to them as well since all were shot closely together.) The various locations, FX necessities, and cast wrangling are covered in fun detail, painting an enjoyable portrait of fast-and-cheap New York filmmaking that doesn't really exist anymore. Though Lorinz is strangely nowhere to be found, Mullen picks up the slack with an entertaining featurette, "A Salad That was Once Named Elizabeth," in which she reminisces about the casting process, working with Henenlotter, and the nature of her make-up and demanding performance. Co-star Jennifer Delora also appears for "Turning Tricks," offering a somewhat more B-movie-based take on the film with few memories of her work on other horror and softcore projects as well; her photo scrapbook is also included as a nice additional supplement. "A Stitch in Time" focuses on the special effects, which are all charmingly latex-based and much more naturalistic than CGI could have provided years later. Finally, you get a hefty helping of production photos, the giddy theatrical trailer, and a batch of trailers for other Unearthed releases like Nails and Bone Sickness.
Color, 1988, 86 mins. Directed by Frank Henenlotter / Starring Rick Herbst, Gordon MacDonald, Jennifer Lowry, Theo Barnes, Lucille Saint-Peter, Vicki Darnell / Synapse (US R1 NTSC) / WS (1.85:1) (16:9) An elderly woman looks at her bathtub filled up with water and lets out a shriek. Her husband joins her as they frantically ransack their apartment, screaming "He's gone! He's gone!" Cut to their neighbor, Brian (Rick Herbst, later Rick Herst on The Guiding Light), who shares an apartment with his brother, Mike (Gordon MacDonald). Brian wakes up with a strange headache and discovers a crusty, eel-shaped creature lurking in his room. Even weirder, the creature talks and occasionally slips a needle-like appendage from its mouth into Brian's neck, whereby it injects the young man with a psychedelic chemical causing euphoric hallucinations. Brian goes out on a surreal nighttime walk climaxing at a junkyard, where a run-in with a security guard results in the creature scarfing down the guard's brains. Unaware of his new friend's murderous tendencies, Brian blithefully ignores both his girlfriend Barbara (Jennifer Lowry) and his brother in favor of spending hours in the bathtub splashing Surprsingly stylish for such a low budget ($600,000, according to the commentary), Brain Damage knowingly winks at other genre titles like Altered States and even includes a very funny in-joke for Basket Case fans (look closely on the subway). While the basic narrative thread of the film will be familiar for anyone well-versed in other "horror as drug parable" titles like The Hunger, the real joy lies in Henenlotter's curious little detours along the way. The aforementioned nightclub scene remains a jaw-dropping bit of sick cinema guaranteed to bring your next movie party to a dead halt, and the finale takes some unexpected turns away from the expected Basket Case-style wrapup. The performers generally do a nice job, with Herbst managed a nice balance between comical hysteria and genuine pathos. Though uncredited, Zacherley makes a definite impression as Elmer, droning out wisecracks and tormenting Brian with a Tommy Dorsey tune for good measure. Street Trash auteur Jim Muro handles Steadicam duties with his usual skill, and Elmer himself, giving Belial a run for his money, makes for a strangely endearing little critter. Synapse's DVD is everything a horror fan could ask for, featuring the U.S. trailer (and the Basket Case one tucked into Henenlotter's filmography for good measure), a beautiful letterboxed transfer (matting off unnecessary information from the full frame 35mm original), and even an isolated score track! The real treat, though, is the commentary by Henenlotter himself, joined by Bob Martin (who wrote the novelization) and Shatter Dead director Scooter McCrae. The three casually chat about the making of the film, swapping observations and anecdotes, and basically just make the viewer wish Henenlotter would go make another movie, as it's been way too long since the last Basket Case. In the meantime, along with the director's valiant efforts to corrupt audiences around the world through his series with Something Weird Video, this nifty DVD treat will do just fine.
As the 1980s closed out, horror movies found themselves in a very weird place. The slasher craze had run itself into the ground with self-parodies of characters like Freddy and Jason, and the MPAA began cracking down harder than ever before to aid the
growing power of big studios at the multiplex. Red-soaked, monster-friendly outings were soon sequelized and given a heavy injection of goofiness, as witnessed with wildly varying degrees of success in the follow-ups to Evil Dead, Re-Animator, Return of the Living Dead, Child's Play, and so on, with even all-new efforts like Society and Dr. Caligari drenching their stories in weird, Day-Glo late '80s satire. Perhaps the wildest of them all, the two Basket Case sequels arrived eight years after the original with director Frank Henenlotter shooting them back-to-back (along with Frankenhooker), replacing the gritty, comic gore of the 1982 classic with broad, cartoonish freakshow visuals and goofball humor straight from the consciousness of a caffeine-addled junior high monster fanatic. Basket Case 2 will completely baffle anyone who doesn't remember the dawn of straight-to-video mainstream horror, but it's a unique, highly eccentric entry in the horror sequel sweepstakes all the same.
public, so their protective aunt, "freak's rights" activist and writer Granny Ruth (Ross), spirits them away to her remote mansion where she houses a wild menagerie of freaks. Belial soon falls for Eve, a similar freak (with whom he couples in a scene unlikely to leave viewers' memories for weeks), while Duane becomes apprehensive about his status as the only "normal" person around except for Granny's daughter, Susan (Rattray). Meanwhile a snooping tabloid reporter (Meisle) follows the brothers' journey and tries to infiltrate the haven, with utterly grotesque results...
The last excursion into Upper East Coast depravity to date from director Frank Henenlotter (Basket Case), this whacked-out spoof of Frankenstein managed to
attract the attention of sleaze gourmets and VHS consumers everywhere with its wild ad campaign, including an irresistible video box that, when pressed, literally shouted out, "Wanna date?" Luckily the film lives up to its deranged potential with the story of forlorn Jeffrey Franken (Street Trash's Lorinz), a drop-out fledgling scientist whose beautiful fiancee, Elizabeth (Shelley), is gruesomely ground into chunks by a new power lawnmower at a birthday party. Luckily Jeffrey's skill with electricity and anatomy (which has already yielded a functioning brain with an eyeball in a jar) comes into play when he keeps Elizabeth's head and concocts a plan to bring her back to life. The first step, of course, involves a journey to Times Square, where Jeffrey rounds up plenty of hookers for potential body parts and gets more than he bargained for when a new, explosive form of crack cocaine sends them flying to bits all over the room. With his beloved finally reassembled, Jeffrey unfortunately realizes the error of his ways when his new, neck-bolted creation turns out to be a statuesque killer hooker with an appetite for the blood of johns!
The sight of killer crack blowing up a group of lingerie-clad ladies of the evening in a crackling electrical explosion is one of the most unforgettable moments in the Henenlotter canon (and there's certainly a lot to choose from there), and the table-turning twist ending is an amusing touch obviously designed to ward off any charges of hatred towards women. Lorinz is absolutely perfect as usual, dishing out sardonic one-liners without ever breaking character; likewise, Mullen proves to be a good sport with a role requiring her to go from a victimized, wholesome girl to a shambling, grimacing streetwalker. Joe Renzetti (fresh off the back-to-back production of Basket Case 2) turns in an amusing, pitch-perfect score, and the gaudy production design packed with gaudy colors pins this perfectly as a film produced during the waning hours of the 1980s.
rich and well-defined throughout. No complaints at all.
How do you follow up a smash hit cult movie? Well, if that movie is 1982's Basket Case, you just take what worked in that film and try to make it even better. The result, of course, is Brain Damage, an outrageous little gem that ran into trouble when its distributor decided to release it with an R rating in the U.S. As a result, the film lost two of its most over the top sequences (one involving a club girl getting her brains literally boffed out, and the other featuring a nasty string of brain matter being pulled out of an ear). The watered down version still managed to find an accepting cult audience, especially after its release on video from Paramount, while horror fans managed to track down uncut copies from the U.K. and Denmark. Well, the wait is finally over; Americans can finally Brain Damage in all its uncut glory, in pristine quality, thanks to the latest labor of love from Synapse (could there be a more appropriate company for this one?).
around with his fix-providing pal. After a few more grisly murders, Brian's neighbors eventually catch on and inform him about the history of this creature, called the Aylmer ("You named him Elmer?!"), which has been bought and traded over the centuries. Determined to hold on to his codependent prize, Brian refuses to hand over the Aylmer, resulting in tragic and highly surreal consequences.
