This week mutants we need to party! It has been a long school year, and I have a little bit of time to cut loose between my obligations as a middle school theater teacher and my capstone project for my masters I have to start in a few weeks. It has been a year filled with heated debates over what rights teachers and parents have in the classroom, parents outraged at school board meetings, and substitute and teacher shortages that have caused me to spend three quarters of my prep periods in someone else's classroom while creative writing papers don't get read. I think there is no better horror director in which to feature this weekend other than the strange Frank Henenlotter, the maestro of exploitation and sexploitation whose filmography may not be prolific, it is still significant in the history of horror.
To celebrate this bizarre horror auteur we will be having a 42nd street theme. No there will be no transsexual hookers and blow, but we will have a dive bar set up, complete with dart board and snacks and you may drink such classics as a 7 and 7, or a Barton's screwdriver. We will be serving New York deli food. Yes I am making a pastrami from scratch. The brisket is in the refrigerator right now defrosting as you read this. This weekend is a weekend to let it all hang out and relax, and get a little messed up before we have responsibilities again, or at least until I have responsibilities again ha, ha.
And what movies are we watching you ask? We will be watching two of the strangest movies in horror history. Love them, or hate them, they are definitely creatively unique and like no other film you will see. Ever. They are the immortal 1980s cult classics: "Basket Case" followed by the film "Brain Damage," two of the three of the Henenlotter 80s trilogy, the third one being "Frankenhooker".
To understand these movies we must first understand Frank. He is the writer and director of these exploitation masterpieces. And that is what Frank would prefer them to be called. Though he has a deep love for horror he considers himself a director of exploitation film first and foremost. Frank dives right into subjects that people don't want to tackle in the mainstream. Subjects such as: bizarre sexual relationships that might be kinky but are too weird to be deemed erotic, extreme gore, drug addiction and alternative lifestyles. The definition of an exploitation film is a film that markets itself through subject matter that is considered shocking. A Frank Henonlotter film, is definitely that: shocking. In fact his first ever film was a 1972 short called "Slash of the Knife" and this was featured with John Water's infamous "Pink Flamingos" in various grindhouse and drive-ins throughout the country. "Pink Flamingos" is widely considered one of the most revolting, disgusting, perverse movies ever made. It features an obese, transvestite eating a.....well never mind we're here to talk about Frank.
Frank grew up in Long Island, New York and he was admittedly just kind of a peculiar kid. One fateful day his school was going on a field trip the Museum of Natural History. The bus drove through 42nd street, passed all the lights and hustle and bustle of the heyday of grindhouse theaters in their prime; Frank was hooked. This is where he wanted to be. This is where his art would live. Frank would take the subway to 42nd street as a young teenage and watch as many as six movies a day in the shady grindhouse theaters, either by sneaking in or lying about his age. It is here that Frank would gain his love for exploitative film and become one of the world's premier historians of the genre.
Frank's movies would mostly take place on the famed 42nd street, which by the 1980s was filled with peepshows, grindhouse theaters, hookers, dive bars, pay by the hour motels, and a street filled to the brim with illicit drug addicts, scammers and hustlers. Frank was known for stealing camera shots without a permit and capturing the real life inhabitants of 42nd street in his films. The world of Frank Henenlotter is grimy, filthy, with a sense of humor that makes you laugh so that you don't vomit. The best way to describe Frank's earliest films are to imagine an early Scorsese film namely Taxi Driver or Mean Streets, then turn that film into a horror comedy and throw in a bit of supernatural exploitative horror added in because why the hell not?
That brings us to the first film "Basket Case" which was a film shot for $35,000 dollars and it would go on to make about 2 million. It got it's world premiere at the prestigious Cannes Film Festival in France. Precisely two film critics saw this movie at its world premiere.
The first film critic was Rex Reed who has written for such magazines as "Vogue," "GQ," "The New York Post," and the "New York Times" who today writes his nationally syndicated column "On the Town with Rex Reed" for the "New York Observer," He was disgusted with movie and as he left the theater a funny little man asked the critic what he thought of the film. Reed exclaimed, "This film is sick!" and the funny little man's eyes gleamed with joy as he rubbed his hands together cleverly, because the funny little man was none other than Frank Henenlotter himself! Frank would use that quote "This film is sick!" from one of America's most prestigious film critics, and splash it in big bold letters all over his movie posters advertising the film. Reed tried to legally get his name off the marketing, but as he actually said those words and there were several witnesses of him speaking those words nothing could be done about it. Thus the legend of Basket Case began to grow.
The second critic was the infamous Joe Bob Briggs, of "Monstervision" and "The Last Drive-In" fame who believe that Frank has mastered the horror-comedy balance with 80 percent horror and 20 percent comedy. Joe Bob was actually pivotal in marketing the film for the drive-in circuit in Texas and throughout the South. The original distributor didn't know what to think of the film and much to Frank's chagrin was taking out all of the gore in order to try to market it as a straight comedy. Joe Bob was adamant that he would only write a review and promote the film if "you put the damn money shots back in!" The small distributer for the film wiped their hands of the matter basically saying, "If you know what to do with this trash be my guest." Joe Bob knew what to do and promoted the movie in his movie column and thus Basket Case would live on in horror history having it's United States premiere at the 183 Drive-In in Irving, Texas.
The movie would end up playing unrated and in all its glory at the Waverly Theater, now the IFC Cinema, in Greenwich Village as the weekend midnight movie for the next two and a half years, which ironically is where Frank actually now lives.
Frank would write and direct several other films, but his filmography is short because he refused to direct films for mainstream Hollywood, thus much of his time as a filmmaker would be spent raising money for his weird little movies instead of shooting them. He would finish his 80s trilogy, along with two sequels to "Basket Case" and some very interesting documentaries one on the early sexploitation genre and another about Herschell Gordon Lewis who is considered the Godfather of the Gore genre. He would also direct a dark little film called "Bad Biology" in 2008, which was a strange love story about two lovers with deformed genitalia.
But Henenlotter's day job? He owns a company that restores old exploitation and drive-in films digitally that would have been lost forever without his efforts. He is the premiere archivist of B films in general. He has been known for driving hundreds of miles daily in search of lost films, or to attend screenings of lost B movie gems just because he loves the genre so much. He has a passion for preserving obscure film history.
No one in this film went on to a film career after this it was made. Occasionally when Frank was filming they would find their way in as a cameo or a bit part character role, but this film would launch no one's career in the acting world. Frank would often cast people he would meet at different places be it the gym, or at a topless bar, to use just a couple of examples. Many of the actors here are real people who are just appearing in a weird film for a few hundred bucks, because it sounded interesting, and yet I love the casting choices here, when you watch the film from the bald sweaty hotel clerk to the sultry prostitute next door everyone is perfectly cast in this peculiar little movie.
The lead Kevin Van Hentenryck who plays Duane would become a successful rock sculptor and teach sculpting on the university level.
Beverly Bonner would try to produce a play based on her character as the tough hooker with a heart of gold. Very few people would see this play and she would have very few acting credits beyond this and Frank's other works.
Terry Susan as the love interest would have an unsuccessful career as a New York actress.
"Basket Case" is a disgusting film. Disgusting in the best possible way. It is akin to driving passed a car accident. You don't want to see a dead body, but you you rubberneck through your driver side window, looking for one. In fact there were scenes in this film that several crew members had to reportedly leave the set in order to actually lose their lunch.
I hesitate even saying anything about the plot of this bizarre story. I don't want to share too much, but here's the gist of it. Duane and his brother Belial (a word The Bible uses to define worthlessness) who resembles that of a "Squashed Octopus", whom he keeps in a padlocked basket, travel to New York City to take revenge on those physicians that graphically separated the brothers in their youth (they are Siamese twins). Things get complicated however when Duane has a romance with a nurse and Belial gets jealous and covets that with Duane has.
To make one film this disgusting and find success is one thing, but all of Frank's films are like this. This takes us to the second film of the evening, "Brain Damage," another film I don't wish to share too much about plot-wise. It tells the story of Brian who while trying to sleep off a case of the flue becomes the victim of a phallic wormlike parasite named Aylmer who looks like a veiny blue penis with Frank Sinatra come hither eyes, a goofy smile and a large head in the shape of an oversized brain. Did I mention the slug loves to sing old Jazz classics pre-1950s?
When the monster opens up its dorky grin it reveals that it has the mouth of a vampire fish with a long proboscis that inserts it's way into Brian's brain and gives him euphoria by streaming a blue liquid right into his gray matter. Aylmer is all to willing to keep Brian hooked to his "juice" as he calls it. All he wants in return is a bathtub filled with warm water to live in and plenty of the only food that will keep him alive...brains, preferably human. A struggle of wills between an addict and his dealer ensues.
This is another homage to 42nd street, only this time rather than a weird exploitation film that focuses on an outsider's view of the terrain it's taken from the point of view from someone who is on the top tier in that environment, who falls prey to drug addiction, satirizing the ravenous crack epidemic in New York, City circa 1988,
The movie stars Rick Hearst as Brian. Rick is a prolific soap star who has worked on every soap opera I can think of: Guiding Light, Days of Our Lives, The Young and the Restless, General Hospital and The Bold and the Beautiful. Though originally embarrassed by the film, worried that it would ruin his career, which it did not, he has come embrace the film and its dedicated cult following.
John Zacherle would play the voice of Aylmer. He is a song and dance man with a voice of velvet, having spent a large amount of his career in radio. He was also one of the first ever horror hosts broadcasting horror films in New York and Philly in the 50s and 60s.
Henenlotter was a fan of Zacherle, however the former horror host had been long forgotten from the general public and was down on his luck with financial troubles. When Frank went to a local agent asking for someone with a posh upper class accent, the agent gave him a list of several different names and headshots and Frank saw Zacherle on the list. Frank was appalled by his low fee. The agent explained that no one wants him anymore. He's a dinosaur, forgotten in the world that didn't need horror television hosts, in a time when radio was at perhaps its lowest point with cable, portable music devices, and MTV filling the niche radio once did. People watched games at home on television and rarely listened to them on the radio. Indeed most people only listened to radio in their cars, and this would be a decade before the conservative talk radio explosion, and even more so for the eruption of the podcast. Entertainers such as Zacherle would struggle finding work throughout the 80s.
Henenlotter would leave Zacherle's name off the credits so that he could avoid getting fined and losing his pension by the SAG union (Screen Actor's Guild) and get a paycheck for being in a non-union film. Frank and Zacherle would become fast friends after this film and collaborate on several different projects and Zacherle would spend the bulk of the rest of his life with a reinvigorated radio and occasional horror host television career. He would be inducted into the Broadcast Pioneers of Philadelphia Hall of Fame in 2010 finally getting the recognition he deserved. He would die in 2016 at the age of 98. God bless, you Zacherle for your contribution to horror history.
Gordan MacDonald as Brian's Brother would go on to a moderately successful career as a working New York actor, getting work where he could and being on six episodes of "Law and Order" which is typical of working New York Actors. He would also star as Private Earl in "The Thin Red Line" and have a recurring roll as Hut Flanders in the television show "Saving Grace." He would eventually have two sons with actress Holly Hunter, though they would never marry.
Brian's girlfriend Barbara played by Jennifer Lowry would pretty much fall of the map after this film, which is too bad, as I believe she is great as the worried conflicted love interest, who is lonely and trying to understand her boyfriend's sudden onset of bizarre behavior.
This weekend we salute you Frank Henenlotter the man who has described himself by saying, "I'm just an eccentric strange little person."
Yes Frank. Yes, you are.
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