You haven't lived until you've seen a Troma movie in a theater hosted by the legendary Lloyd Kayfman. I was able to do just that this last Thursday at the NJ premiere of Father's Day at The Showroom in Asbury Park.
Made by the Talented guys at Astron-6, Father's Day packs everything you'd ever expect from a Troma movie; horror, humor, gore, over the top characters, insane plot, a cameo by Lloyd, and boobs!
The story revolves around Ahab (Adam Brooks), who as a child witnessed the murder of his father, and then had one of his peepers cut out, by the antagonist of the film Chris Fuchman (Mackenzie Murdock). And now Ahab is looking for revenge. Problem is, Eric Fuchman is not some ordinary killer. He has become an urban legend and about as easy to track down as any urban legend could be. Following the trail of raped and disemboweled and eaten fathers, he takes on the help of a naive but determined Father John Sullivan, charmingly played by Matthew Kennedy, and a street twink named, appropriately enough, Twink (Conor Sweeney). How is this urban legend still around and causing such paternal carnage? Well, there's also a Fuchmanicus involved. Yep, a Fuchmanicus.
The film looks like crap. And that's a beautiful thing. If this film had been shot in flawless HD, it wouldn't feel authentic, it wouldn't work. It's essence would be lost much the same way I believe the essence of a really old blues recording would be ruined if they remastered it and took out all the hisses scratches and pops that give it it's unique personality. Now, I'm not saying that the film looks like crap on accident. I'm saying the movie looks like crap because that's exactly how Astron-6 wanted it to look. All the scratches and blemishes unquestionably add to the look rather than take an ounce away.
The sound of the film was surprisingly good. Loud and satisfying shotgun blasts, car engines, gurglings, and just about every kind of gross noise you can think of, were all very clear and well-defined. The spatial sound of the score had me look to my left several times thinking some knucklehead had left his cellphone on and was getting a call using some odd ringtone.
Father's Day is a conundrum. Although it undeniably has grindhouse elements, it's too good to fit comfortably into the grindhouse category. And although it has incredible moments of disturbing horror, there was also an equal amount of laugh-out-loud comedy and Astron-6 did an impeccable job of balancing everything. The only semi-controversial are of the film is about two-thirds into the movie when it breaks for a commercial. The commercial is a Astron-6 made trailer for a bogus movie called Space Raiders. Lloyd Kaufman suggested they leave it out of the final cut, but they decided to leave it in. Some may find it to be to jarring a change of scenery. Admittedly, it does offer a nice jolt of culture shock to be watching a dark horror movie one moment and then alien blasting interplanetary travelers the next, but I found it as entertaining as the rocket ship sequence in Monty Python's Life of Brian.
So what do we have here? A horror? A comedy? A black comedy? An "A" movie? A "B" movie? A Grindhouse movie? A Mainstream movie? I think it's all these things and it's Astron-6 saying look, we can do anything, and do it well! In the end, what it is is a good film! and that's all that counts.
Father's Day homepage
Astron-6 homepage
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