A Popko/West Double Feature, Part One : “Monsturd”

When you’re a low- (or no-) budget film production outfit, you’ve gotta live by three simple words : never say die.

Seriously, even if you mange to hustle up enough funding to get your flick “in the can” (not the greatest choice of words given the movie we’re about to discuss, but —), often times the real work is only just beginning — you’ve gotta promote your work both relentlessly and endlessly. Case in point : 4321 films, the brainchild of northern California-based writers/director/producers/actors Rick Popko and Dan West, is still hard at work getting the word out about their two feature-length films, Monsturd and Retarded, even though the former came out way back in 2003 and the latter in 2008. I know this because, in modern parlance, they “reached out” to me via twitter only a couple of weeks ago offering a couple of “screeners” of their flicks for review. I sad “sure,” and just a few scant days later “legit” copies of their DVDs, released under the auspices of Brain Damage Films and complete with cover art, extras (what few there are) etc., showed up in my mailbox. No email link to a Vimeo account. No plain-wrapper “sleeve.” These guys do it old-school, like everyone who wanted their movies reviewed way back when I started this blog used to do it, and I appreciate that. But would I appreciate their efforts both in front of and behind the camera as much?

I watched ’em in chronological order, and aesthetically speaking, it’s gotta be said that Monsturd looks every bit like the $3,000 production it is. Essentially a series of one-take scenes strung together with “wipe” transitions of the sort you (or anyone) can master in a matter of moments with the old Windows Movie Maker program, it nonetheless has quite a bit going in its favor for fans of Troma-esque “insta-cult” trash : psychotic serial killer Jack Schmitt (played by Brad Dosland) is on the run from the law after having made a daring jailbreak, and finds himself chased into the sewers of Butte County (yes, all the jokes really are this lame and obvious — would you expect anything less? Or more?) where, unbeknownst to him, evil scientist Dr. Stern (Dan Burr) has been pumping the contaminated waste (including the corpse of a recently-deceased colleague) left over from his dastardly experiments for the Dutech chemical corporation. Jack gets covered in all this sludge, as you’ve no doubt already surmised, and ends up a grotesque half-human/half-shit monstrosity who still can’t let go of his burning need to kill. In fact, it seems to have grown even more pronounced. So, ya know, let the  antics begin.

One unwritten rule of so-called “B”- movies is that law enforcement always has to be totally incompetent — even more than they are in real life — but it’s a sort of “fun and harmless” incompetence, free of the kind of devastating consequences that the families of Philando Catsille, Mike Brown, Eric Garner, Tamir Rice, etc. are all too painfully and tragically familiar with.  Sheriff Duncan (Paul Weiner) is the head “Keystone Kop” trying to bring shit-man to justice in this one, with his faithful deputies, Dan and Rick, being played by — well, there’s no way you don’t have that one sussed out, is there? FBI agent Susan Hannigan (Beth West) is the closest thing to somebody who actually has a handle on how to do her job, and she knows Schmitt best because she spent years on his tail, so the situation isn’t totally hopeless — just hopelessly stupid. Hijinks ensue, run-arounds become the order of the day,  at some point you may just want to flip on the commentary track on the DVD because it’s actually reasonably informative and engaging and you can pretty much predict all the dialogue you’d be missing out on, anyway.

Which is really sort of the point here, isn’t it? Purposefully ridiculous horror-comedy hybrids like Monsturd are in the business of offering the familiar : don’t tax my brain, don’t surprise me, just give me a healthy dose of exactly what the fuck it is I knew I was letting myself in for — and in that regard, Popko and West perform their task admirably. Both direction and acting are as deliberately over-the-top as one can imagine, the plot is rote and unimaginative stuff, and the turd-monster him/itself — the real reason you’re even watching this thing in the first place — is a very cool and suitably repulsive piece of dime-store practical FX wizardy that would make the late, great Don Dohler proud. They obviously blew their entire budget on this creature, and that’s exactly as it should be. Top it all off with some fun fairy tale-style narration from Hannah Stangel and a groaningly absurd ballad that plays out over the end credits, and you’d have to be a really hardened piece of shit to walk away from this flick with anything less than a smile on your face. There ain’t much blood, and there are no boobs, but everything else you’re looking for (presuming this even is the kind of thing you’re looking for) is present and accounted for.

Lastly, if you’re as tired of misleading and duplicitous cinematic marketing as I am, rest easy — Monsturd doesn’t pretend for a moment to be anything other than what it is : an absolute pile of crap. And I wouldn’t have it any other way.