Vintage Ad Mat Invasion

 

I'm not sure how I did it, but I snuck into this heavily policed flicked on a school day and got momentarily groped by an old bloke reaching for his coat. The grope was more shocking than the movie. Polanksi is interviewed and shares some vague views on "snuff", but the purported snuff film in the movie is segments from Wes Craven's Last House on the Left. Ripped off!

Now, the "snuff" we imagined back in those days has been well and truly eclipsed by the reality of atrocity videos posted on the net. For sheer, sickening brutality, nothing comes close to the Mexican chainsaw beheading video currently doing the rounds, or the truly horrendous videos (there are a couple) documenting the real life murders of innocent people by the 'Dnepropetrovsk Maniacs' (thankfully tucked away in prison). 

Wiki link:  h*tp://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dnepropetrovsk_maniacs    (replace * with 't', of course)

Back in the 70's, nothing could have prepared us for the extreme nature of  this material, or predicted the means by which it would be globally 'distributed' and propagated. 

For mine, the whole "snuff" myth never made sense, anyway, because nobody could possibly get away with marketing and distributing a movie in which "actors" were actually killed. What gets done in private is what gets done in private, but the issue of publicly exhibited "snuff movies" is an issue for idiots.

 

Melbourne had a healthy grindhouse culture in the 70's and I made sure I was part of it. Unfortunately, I wasn't even a teenager for half of the 70's, so my grindhouse ambitions (and cred) were thwarted by age and my mother's Catholic sensibilities.

And speaking of Catholic sensibilities... My mother bought a Catholic newspaper called 'The Advocate'. I had no use for this rag until I discovered their extensive film listings. A priest with cinephilic yearnings would review the good, the bad, and the ugly playing at the 'pictures'. He would then sort his past reviews into four or five categories including Highly Recommended, Recommended With Reservations, Not Recommended, and, the granddaddy of them all, ADVISED AGAINST

It became quickly apparent to me that under the Advised Against category was a cinematic stew of exploitation magic. Films I remember appearing in that section were The Night Porter, The Passage, Straw Dogs, 'Tis Pity She's A Whore, A Clockwork Orange,  Cruising, The Decameron, Vampyres, and, of course, The Exorcist and Tower of Evil -- essentially, the movies that would shape my entire pulpy life and the lives of folks reading this blog.

I don't know who you were, Father Film Reviewer, but I thank you for advising me against the films I grew to love... and a bonus thank you is also in order for you because you practiced cinephilia on me, not  pedophilia.   

     

  

I feel sorry for youngsters today who'll never know the magic of exploitation triple bills at sleazy hardtops and drive-ins.

 

A bucket load of false advertising and a collage of bald-faced lies. Dave Prowse's 'Monster' turned up for the ad mat, but his Horror of Frankenstein is MIA from this program. In Aussieland,  Horror was initially paired with Scars of Dracula. 

One of Russ Meyer's ladies is lending her face to the ad, too, but there's not a Russ movie in sight.  

I saw none of the triple bills above at the time, but I did get a schoolboy kick out of the title Spermula. Unfortunately, I also got a kick from my father when I walked around the house yelling "Spermula is cumming!" over and over again to my siblings and mother.

 

I saw this double at Melbourne's wonderful Silver Screen Art Cinema, the notorious home of Killer Fish's notorious three month long run.

 

First in line for this one. Hot for Barbara Bach, too. What young lad wasn't? 

A couple of years later, the Dendy Collins Street went porno.

 

Rode my bike to the Burwood Drive-in to see the first film on this program, The Decameron. Couldn't stay for the other two because my bedtime was around 10 pm. Damn parents and their damn school night rules!

 

I was on a first name basis with the manager of Detroit's Northgate theater. The place smelt of butter spilled decades ago and the carpets were stickier than a bukkake set. 

 

Fairly obscure poster for the brutal and nihilistic Death Wish 2. 

Will Eisner's Darkest Work?

This short film from Germany, The Super (Der Super, '85), is a troubling and extraordinary piece of work.

It is based on A Contract With God, and Other Tenement Stories by Will Eisner. The novel, which was published in '78, is about the residents of Dropsie Avenue, a Bronx tenement.

This adaptation, set in Depression era Germany, detours much from the original in terms of specific plot points, but the source's grim tone is intact.

Erich Bar is 'Scuggs' (love that name!), a fat, freakish bully who pushes around the Jewish residents of his building.


Scuggs' applecart is well and truly knocked over, though, when he stomps upstairs to confront a tenant about a plumbing issue... and comes face to face with the seemingly angelic Rosy (Natalia Bitnar).

Recovering from his encounter with Rosy, Scuggs retreats to his filthy quarters -- to masturbate and reflect on his desperate existence.


Despite the Super's surly nature, we see a softer side of him in this sequence.




Though not invited, the mischievous Rosy slinks upstairs and visits the vulnerable Scuggs at his lowest ebb, and proposes a deal.



I must note that the luminous Bitnar's performance in The Super is quietly incendiary. Somehow, she walks a fine line between vixen and victim without a single misstep. That she didn't do more acting is a great shame.






Erich Bar, too, is amazing as Scuggs, bouncing effortlessly from surly to strangely child-like.



Although the presentation of this "seduction" sequence is restrained, its power is palpable, and we find our sympathies entering a strange spin cycle.



When Scuggs pays Rosy, the little girl absconds with his cashbox.



As any normal bloke would would do, Scuggs sends his hound after the thieving moppet.



But she conveniently drops a poisoned bone on the stairwell, quickly ending the pursuit.

It becomes obvious at this point that the little vixen's visit to Scuggs' den of greasy desire was part of a more elaborate scheme.









Let me be up front here -- Der Super fucks with us from the very beginning. What we see is never what we ultimately get, and when we do get something, we're not sure it's what we want.

That is the film's magic. That's what elevates it to the pinnacle of transgressive art.






Adapted from the Eisner graphic novel by director Tobias Meinecke, the film is extravagantly photographed by Czech DP Igor Luther, who shot The Tin Drum (and close to a hundred other features and shorts), and smells of Polanski's The Tenant. Music by Gunter Winkler, which swings between music box and dark strings, is the perfect compliment to the potent imagery, and never overwhelms.

Meineckie's depiction of the tenement's frightened residents and portrayal of general paranoia mirrors the current Child Sex panic that is sweeping the globe. I guess something had to replace the Reds under the bed. Now it's Reds (or is that Peds?) in your kid's bed?



Is Scuggs a pedofile? A pathetic opportunist lacking a moral compass? Or a victim of truly dark forces?

Is Rosy just a little girl oblivious to her emerging sexuality? A calculating devil in the body of a juvie?

The answers to these questions are left to the audience.




Like all good fairy tales, this one comes full circle.

A new Super is sought after Scuggs' demise and the little darling is on the front step to greet the first applicant.



He has a dog, too. Though probably not for long.


The film was produced by Klaus Schreyer and quickly fell into obscurity.

News has emerged that A Contract With God... is heading for the big screen again with four directors to helm one story apiece.

It's difficult to imagine how any new take on Der Super would even come close to Meinecke's almost forgotten masterpiece.