I DISMEMBER MAMA

Welcome to VHS Tuesday, where I dig up one of my old, awful horror videos and share its delightfully stupid packaging. When horror videos first started flooding the market, the marketing geniuses really went to town thinking up the best taglines and the most hilariously literal summaries. Today we have I Dismember Mama, an awful, awful video nasty that I never want to see again. But its packaging: pure genius.
   

This is the cover. Look! It’s Roy Scheider playing a washed-up magician.

   

   
Note the tagline: May she rest… in pieces. Damn. Gets me every time.
     
And the summary:
        

POOR ALBERT IS JUST CRAZY ABOUT WOMEN.

     

Albert (Zooey Hall) is a mentally disturbed young man incarcerated in a rest home run by Dr. Burton (Frank Whiteman).

    
A nurse’s reprimand (Elaine Partnow) causes him to lock her in his room, strip off her clothes and attempt to murder her. Then an attendant (James Tartan) is brutally murdered and Albert escapes. And so starts a killing spree more brutal than any ever seen in the annals of filmmaking. First his mothers servant goes, then a call girl in a series of chilling murders culminating in a terrifying Hitchcockian climax that will leave you breathless time and time again!
      

Not only do we know exactly who dies (and in what order!) but we also know that this is the most brutal, Hitchcockian story ever put to film. God bless whatever minimum wage copy-writer wrote this description. You almost make me want to see this movie again. Almost.

PIECES

      
No words can describe how awesome and derivative this movie is. Oh wait. Words totally can do that! And here they are:
       

PIECES… It’s exactly what you think it is!

   

The year is 1941! A young boy is assembling a jigsaw puzzle of a nude woman, when his mother enters in a rage and tells him to throw the puzzle out. Instead he returns with an ax and hacks his mother to death, tricking the police into believing a maniac had killed her.

   

Forty years later at a Boston college, the terror really begins. A chainsaw-weilding madman is roaming the campus collecting pieces of beautiful co-eds for a ghastly human puzzle he is assembling—and the police haven’t a clue to the crazed killer's identity.

    

CHRISTOPHER GEORGE (MORTUARY) stars in this horrifying adventure into madness, hysteria and bone-chilling brutality.

GINGERDEAD MAN 2: THE PASSION OF THE CRUST

STATS:

Gingerdead Man 2: The Passion of the Crust

2008

Directed by: Silvia St. Croix (a female director!)

Written by: William Butler, Muffy Bolding (the killer from April Fool's Day), and Aaron Strongoni

Starring: Not Gary Busey

WHA’ HAPPENED?

The Gingerdead Man is back for some reason and goes nuts at a movie studio. He makes food puns, kills a bunch of people, and humps a puppet. Then he gets crucified.

WHAT YOU SAY?

“This is gonna be a f#$%ing cake-walk.”

“It’s time to send you back to Hell…’s Kitchen.”

ISN’T THAT SPECIAL?

Aside from having one of the greatest subtitles in the history of filmdom…

…which it totally earns, by the way…

Gingerdead Man 2 is a prime example of latter-day Full Moon videos. It’s full of puppets and gory murders, but it’s also very self-effacing. The film takes places at Cheatum Studios, which is a low-rent direct-to-video company much like Full Moon. Its main franchise is a Puppetmaster rip-off, subbing Leech Woman and The Jester for creatures like “Shit-for-Brains” and “The Haunted Dildo.” It is a pretty brutal statement on the quality of these films.

From a gay standpoint, it has a well-known David DeCoteau cameo, and some clever winks to the gay horror fans out there.

SHIRTS AND SKINS:

There’s some male beefcake (particularly in the Decoteau scene), but a lot more emphasis on women. However, the film has a pronounced affinity for plus-sizes.

Which is weirdly progressive, I guess.

BLOOD AND GUTS:

Limbs are hacked off, eyes dangle, and the killer cookie impales two people with one meat cleaver (which is physically impossible, but slightly more realistic than when he drove a car in part one). There’s also a lot of fake-poop-splatter.

OK. IS IT GAY?

Honestly, I thought this film would be smooth sailing. I thought that with the involvement of DeCoteau (and other horror “celebrities” like John Buechler and Adam Green), the film would be wholesome, inclusive horror. I didn’t expect a prancing queen who gets raped and murdered by a curling iron… and likes it.

No other gay-positive scenes can atone for that mean-spirited murder. The Gingerdead Man calls the character a “creampuff,” a “fruitcake,” and a few other pastry-related puns, and he takes more delight in murdering him than any of the straight victims. It’s not in good fun like the other murders. I have to give this two Pat Robertsons.

 

Leprechaun 3

STATS:
Leprechaun 3
1995
Director: Brian Trenchard-Smith (Dead End Drive-In)
Writer: David DuBos (based on Mark Jones characters)
Starring: Warwick Davis, Caroline Williams ( Texas Chainsaw Massacre 2)… and I’m sure some other people are in this too.

WHA’ HAPPENED?
Everyone’s favorite Ewok is back, and this time he has naughty limericks. Warwick Davis reprises his role as the titular badass, except now he’s in Las Vegas and on a more direct-to-video budget. He was somehow frozen by a magic necklace, and now he’s free to kill people and get back his pot of gold. In the process, he bites our main character and turns him into a leprechaun too.

I’ll cut you.

ISN’T THAT SPECIAL?
No, it’s really not special. I just chose this film because I have a soft spot for the Leprechaun films. They’re trash.

SHIRTS AND SKINS:
Robot boobs. Some busty women. Nothing man-related.

BLOOD AND GUTS:
A woman explodes and the Leprechaun busts out his umbrella to shield himself from the goo. If that sentence appeals to you, then you should watch this film.

We also have a magician get sawed in half. That’s a winner.

Especially if it’s this guy.

RANDOM THOUGHTS:
So if you blast a pot of gold with a blowtorch, it’ll disappear. Is that like a science thing?

So leprechaun poop is green. Not surprising, but good to know.

Sign it was made in the mid-90s: a White Zombie reference.

I don’t think Vegas looks the way this movie thinks Vegas looks.

OK. IS IT GAY?
Before I answer that, I just want to say that this is the most enjoyable of the Leprechaun sequels. It’s kills are memorable, it never drags, and it has a steady stream of jokes that feel organic to the story. Sure, there aren’t any Friends stars in this one…

Can you even imagine? She’d be soooo good in this.

…But it’s overall a really good time.

Is it gay? Not really. But there’s still something special about it, in its own little direct-to-video way… Eric Roberts!