THIS is what the cover is supposed to look like, thank you very much. |
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It was a sultry summer night, 'lo those many 14 years ago, when I meandered my way into the horror section of Tommy K's. As was my Saturday night ritual from time out of mind, I was there to load up on junk horror and spend the weekend blissed-out in a Pepsi and Sno-Caps-induced coma while watching innocent people bleed from places where I didn't even know people had places. However, this trip was to be different, and my life would never be the same.
Because this was the night that I saw the cardboard stand-up for a film called DEAD-ALIVE, which thusly proclaimed itself to be the goriest film ever made. I gasped with astonishment. Like this: *GASP* Who could have made such a false claim? How could my beloved local video store foist such a blatant untruth upon their bleating, ovine masses? Gorier than Brian Yuzna's masterful SOCIETY? Lucio Fulci's sphincter-winking ZOMBIE? Stuart Gordon's RE-fucking-ANIMATOR? I think not. Surely this was a villainy that must be set right, this lie torn to shreds for all to see. And I had just the teeth for the job.
I arrived home with the offending VHS tape in my hot little hands, full of righteous indignation and orthodox horror rage. Under the guise of being open-minded and giving the movie its fair day in court, I popped it into the VCR and got ready to prove its dirty, shameful boast untrue. Those of you in the know already know what my next sentence will be: I was wrong. This was truly, honestly, before a god and heaven that I don't believe in, the goriest goddamn movie ever made. And that was before I scored a dub of the film in its complete, unedited version, from the Japanese laser disc, under the original UK title BRAINDEAD (damn, I'm a geek).
I goggled at faces being ripped off, spines being torn out, and an extended scene of a lawnmower mowing what it was never intended to mow. The experience was so beatific that I ended up watching it three times that weekend, and have since seen it in numbers with two digits, often while horrifying unsuspecting friends by telling them they "must watch this really awesome movie." Which might explain why I don't have many friends.
Now, the important question behind this story is, who on earth exposed this genius to celluloid and became the scion to gorehound grandfathers such as Herschel Gordon Lewis and George Romero? Well, I just so happen to have the answer, and you're not going to like it, so hold on to your hairy little Hobbit feet:
Peter Jackson.
That's right. I can sense Elvish ears twitching in confusion. "Zombie Boy, do you mean to say that our favorite video-game-as-movie designer was not cultured in a Petri dish in Bob Shaye's lab for the sole purpose of flogging our fantasy fantasies?"
That's exactly what I'm saying. He's actually a Kiwi, born in New Zealand in 1961, fittingly enough on Halloween. At the tender age of eight, the original KING KONG clicked his brain over into filmmaker mode, and later the original TEXAS CHAINSAW MASSACRE clicked his brain over into horror filmmaker mode. The third film in the Holy Trinity that paved the way for the next film I want to discuss, his first, is none other than THE EVIL DEAD.
You see, Jackson had set out to make a short film, a pleasant little cannibal story by the name of ROAST OF THE DAY. But after getting 
Oh, did I forget to mention that this was Kate Winslet's first film? |
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more than fifty minutes of footage in the can, and having recently seen Raimi's own first film, Jackson decided that there was no reason he could not just go ahead and keep shooting until he also had his first feature. And shoot he did.
For four years.
The final result is a gleaming piece of cinematic gold called BAD TASTE. This movie is more than just a sickeningly disgusting tale of aliens come to earth to make us all into meat patties for their celestial fast food restaurant (Crumb's Crunchy Delights). No, it is an exercise in sheer determination. Peter Jackson, having no formal film-schooling whatsoever, shot this movie on the weekends, with no script, and not only produced and directed it and played two roles, one of them fairly major, but also did all of the special effects (the reason the aliens' heads slope backwards slightly is because that was the only way they would fit into his mother's oven, which is where he baked them). And as if the guerrilla-style of film making wasn't time consuming enough, a loss of the audio soundtrack forced the meager cast/crew to have to ADR the entire film. Yikes.
Now, with a lesser filmmaker, such a grueling experience would be enough to sour them on the art form altogether, but we are not talking about an average person here. Jackson jumped back in with both feet: not only was his second film equally disgusting, but it was done with puppets. MEET THE FEEBLES seems to be a favorite with Jackson's true fans, and while I admire the talent that went into making this technically brilliant film, I've never been able to like it. The film is a mixture of full-size creature suits and traditional puppets on miniature sets, and tells the tale of a Muppets-esque variety show, containing every sleazy, no-account, psychopathic character you can think of. From an over-sexed bunny rabbit to a porn-filming rat to the bastard child of an elephant and a chicken, this movie has something to offend everyone. Need to see a fly in a toilet bowl eating a turd with a spoon? FEEBLES has got you covered. Need to see an anteater penetrating a cow with its snout? Just let the film roll. (I should also point out that contrary to what I read in a review at this very website, FEEBLES is the first film to feature the collaborative efforts of Fran Walsh, the woman Jackson met during the filming of BAD TASTE who would go on to be his producing/writing partner, as well as bearing both his children).
I covered his third film, BRAINDEAD, already, so we'll move right along to Jackson's career-defining moment, the incredible HEAVENLY CREATURES. This film pulls off the trick of being Jackson's first non-horror, non-gross out film, while managing to possibly be his most brutal. But it is brutality defined by beauty. It is the true story of Juliet Hume and Pauline Yvonne Reiper, two New Zealand teenagers who murder Reiper's mother in the name of love. The two girls are psychologically damaged in varying ways due to childhood illnesses and the accompanying attitudes their parents take towards them: Reiper being smothered and Hume being shunted off from place to place "for her health." When the two meet, it's like gas on a fire: they essentially become one person. They begin to write a story of intrigue among a fictional royalty, and it soon becomes an 
Nevar fergit!!!1 |
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alternate reality, one much more befitting their emotional needs than the one they currently live in. When they are threatened to be torn apart from each other for good, the final catalyst for the brutality comes into place, in the form of them consummating their love for each other. Pauline becomes convinced that the only thing standing between them staying together forever is her mother, and so they hatch a plan to murder her.
The reason this film resonates so highly is that it does not make excuses for their actions any more than it vilifies them. It simply shows the progression of what happens when normal teen angst is put into a pressure cooker, and has a twinner sociopathic personality to feed off of and into. The imagery throughout the film is quite breathtaking, and we see here the classic Peter Jackson shots first hinted at somewhere amidst the carnage of BRAINDEAD, as well as the inventive graphic representation of the girls' hideaway dimension, Borovnia. It also showed Hollywood that not only was this grungy little Kiwi not going away, but they had better get on the bandwagon before it ran them over.
Thus brings us to Jackson's fifth film, THE FRIGHTENERS. I won't spend much time on this one, as I find it more anecdotal than a serious film. It plays on and amplifies the commercial appeal of HEAVENLY CREATURES, and also begins to flesh out Jackson's soon-to-be role as king of the CGI empire. Sure Michael J. Fox is always fun to watch, and it features the ever-irrepressible Jeffrey Combs, but pound for pound it is the lightest-weight entry in the Jackson oeuvre.
Now, before I end the piece with my typical negativity, a special mention needs to be made for FORGOTTEN SILVER. Not a movie, per se, but still a treat. This is an hour long "documentary" that aired on New Zealand television, and got lots of people super pissy at Jackson. It seems Kiwis can sometimes have an inflated sense of importance, and Jackson played on just that with his fake tale of the fake genius who invented talkies, as well as color film, and built a city-sized set in the jungle to film his masterpiece, his interpretation of Salome. Jackson appears in the film (well, he has a cameo in every one of his films, save FEEBLES, but this time he plays himself), and with some friends and colleagues goes off in search of this mythical set. This piece shows off Jackson's devilish sense of humor even more than FEEBLES, in my opinion. To purposefully piss off your entire home nation? That's balls. But New Zealanders can't really complain, seeing how Jackson has refused, no matter what the budget or pressure placed upon him, to make his movies anywhere else. Integrity and loyalty are not things often associated with Oscar-winning filmmakers.
Okay, I'll admit I was going to end this piece with a rant about how disappointed the LORD OF THE RINGS films left me, but writing this renewed my affection for the man. Sure, I think his fantasy films suck, but they were done out of love, straight from his furry little heart. And since he is rich and famous and I am not, you can guess which one of us is the asshole in this scenario.
[Note: In typical Peter Jackson fashion, he is throwing his curviest curveball to date with his next picture: THE LOVELY BONES. To quote Sheila Broslofsky: Wha-wha-wha-what?!]
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| Agent Provocateur |
Every other Sunday
Eating the flesh of lesser film geeks since '72.
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| Zombie Boy |
Zombie Boy is not a Hollywood insider, just a movie
geek with a big mouth and a strong desire to spew
opinions. His column will concentrate on the things he
feels you need to know about less mainstream cinematic
issues, but probably don't. He strongly encourages
interaction from his readers, just be sure to not put
any digits too close to his mouth.
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