Thursday, June 09, 2011

Thursday's Ways Not To Die

.

Alright, listen. Sometimes, in my ever-widening search for the cinematic insane, I find myself lead to strange places. Strange... unexpected... places... where I might not be able to unsee something I find. Frank "Basket Case" Henenlotter's 1988 film Brain Damage turned out to be one of those places. Those of you who have seen this film, you probably know what's coming. It's not the sort of thing you forget. But I suspect most of you have not seen this movie, and therefore are like I was when I popped the DVD in and do not expect what is coming. I am sorry for that. We're in this together! This is just something that apparently exists, in the world, and once discovered could not be left uncontemplated.



So Brain Damage tells the story of an attractive enough young fellow named Brian, played by future soap star Rick Hearst, and the talking mythological parasite named Aylmer that dopes him up with bizarre cerebellum-electrocuting juices via a hole he drills into Brian's neck, and then uses his body to kill others and eat their brains. You know, tale as old as time stuff.



One night the parasite leads an especially junkied-up Brian to a punk  rock dance club that all the edgy kids in the East Village were grooving to in 1988 and finds a saucy, willing dame... and this happens.

(Oh and it's NSFW - or anywhere, any time - 












Photobucket
I mean... yes. That happens. Of course that happens. Why wouldn't that happen? Anyway that happens for awhile, too long an awhile to be honest, and in far more graphic detail than I'm going to cap - don't bother thanking me for my discretion, not with what's coming - and then this happens.


Photobucket

Yeah. You're welcome? I just... what do I say?


I'm the one that brought it up so I should obviously say something but... what do I say? Okay let's try a little. I think the film's pretty clearly attempting to tell a story about a young man having... issues... with his sexuality. The film uses Aylmer as penis substitute elsewhere in the film...

Photobucket
.
... and I should note that the above is Brian's response to hearing his own girlfriend having sex with his own brother (his brother who is played by Holly Hunter's real-life hot babydaddy Gordon MacDonald), which naturally leads him to fantasize this:


His brother's sexualized constantly, including lots of laying around in his underwear.



And when Brian hits rock bottom, the film includes an extended shower cruising sequence.



But that alleyway scene really is so far and beyond the call of duty that it leaves one speechless. Good job, movie-makers. You have blown my mind, along with hers. I'm just gonna include several more caps of import  from this movie now and call it a day.


--------------------------------------
Previous Ways Not To Die: Fur For The Boogens -- White Hot Bunny Rabbit Rage -- Dragged To Hell -- The TV Van That Dripped Blood -- Don't Mess With Mama -- Heads Ahoy -- Martyred For Sheep -- Heads Nor Tails -- He Loves Me Knot -- The Great Bouncing Brad -- Miss Kitty's 8 Mishaps -- Boat Smoosh -- Meeting the French-Tipped Menace -- A Magic Trick -- Slick Suck -- We Who Walk Here Walk Alone -- Raptor Bait -- Kneegasm'd -- Dare to Dream in Fincher -- Reach Out and Throttle Someone -- De-Faced -- Voluntary Drowning -- Cross Borne -- Pulled Up Hell's Sphincter -- An Arrow Up The Ass - The Numerous Violent Unbecomings of Olive Oyl -- Ack! Ack! Zap! -- Baby's First Acid Splash -- Chop, Drop and Sashimi Roll -- Forever Rafter -- Can't You Hear Me Now? -- Daisies Ways #5 - Harpoony Side Up -- Acid Dip -- On a Wing and a Prey -- For Standing in the Way of Sappho -- Busting Rule Number Three (For The Purpose of Number Two) -- Daisies #4 - Window Dressed To Killed -- Hands Off the Haas Orb -- Bullet Ballet -- A Single Vacancy at the Roach Motel -- A School Bus Slipped Thru The Ice -- Trache-AAHHHH!!!-tomy'd - For Mel Gibson's Sins -- A Wide Stanced Slashing --- Daisies Ways #3 - Scratch n' Snuffed -- The Victim of a Viscous Hit & Run -- Curled -- Kabobbed -- Daisies Ways #2 - Aggravated Cementia -- Boo! Nun! -- 2009's Ways Not To Die -- Bug Scratch Fever -- Daisies Ways #1 - Deep Fat Fried in My Own Unique Blend of 500 Herbs & Spices -- By the Yard End of the Stick -- Screwed From A Very Great Distance -- A Righteous Bear-Jew Beatdown -- Fisted By Hugo Sitglitz -- Xeno Morphed -- Fuck-Stuck -- A Vengeful Elevator God: Part 4 -- Lava Bombed -- The Cradle Will Rock... Your Face Off!!! -- The Food of the Nilbog Goblins -- The Slugs Is Gonna Gitcha -- Phone Shark -- Hide The Carrot -- Sarlacc Snacked -- Avada Kedavra!!! -- Hooked, Lined and Sinkered -- "The Libyans!" -- Axe Me No Questions -- Pin the Chainsaw on the Prostitute -- The Wrath of the Crystal Unicorn -- The Ultimate Extreme Make-Over -- Drown In A Sink Before The Opening Credits Even Roll -- The Dog Who Knew Too Much -- Don't Die Over Spilled Milk -- Inviting the Wrath of Aguirre -- An Inconceivable Outwitting -- The Five Point Palm Exploding Heart Technique -- Nipple Injected Blue Junk -- Your Pick Of The Deadly Six -- Thing Hungry -- Don't Fuck With The Serial Killer's Daughter -- DO Forget To Add The Fabric Softener -- Any Of The Ways Depicted In This Masterpiece Of Lost Cinema -- Rode Down In The Friscalating Dusklight -- Good Morning, Sunshine! -- Mornin' Cuppa Drano -- The Cylon-Engineered Apocalypse -- Tender-Eye-zed -- Martian Atmospheric Asphyxiation -- Maimed By A Mystical Person-Cat -- The Sheets Are Not To Be Trusted -- Handicapable Face-Hacked -- I Did It For You, Faramir -- Summertime In The Park... Of A Pedophile's Mind -- A Vengeful Elevator God: Part 3 -- Strung Up With Festive Holiday Bulbs By Santa Claus Himself -- A Vengeful Elevator God: Part 2 -- A Vengeful Elevator God: Part 1 -- Decapitated Plucked Broiled & Sliced -- Head On A Stick! -- A Trip To The Ol' Wood-Chipper -- Pointed By The T-1000 -- Sucking Face With Freddy Krueger -- A Pen-Full Of Home-Brewed Speed to The Eye -- Motivational Speech, Interrupted -- A Freak Ephemera Storm -- When Ya Gotta Go... Ya Gotta Go -- Hoisted By Your Own Hand Grenade -- Having The Years Suction-Cupped Away -- Criss-Cross -- Turned Into A Person-Cocoon By The Touch Of A Little Girl's Mirror Doppleganger -- Satisfying Society's "Pop Princess" Blood-Lust -- Done In By The Doggie Door -- Tuned Out -- Taking the 107th Step -- Rescuing Gretchen -- Incinerated By Lousy Dialogue -- Starred & Striped Forever -- Vivisection Via Vaginally-Minded Barbed-Wire -- Chompers (Down There) -- Run Down By M. Night Shyamalan -- Everything Up To And Including The Kitchen Toaster -- Sacrificed To Kali -- Via The Gargantuan Venom Of The Black Mamba Snake -- Turned Into An Evil Robot -- The Out-Of-Nowhere Careening Vehicle Splat -- "Oh My God... It's Dip!!!" -- Critter Balled -- Stuff'd -- A Hot-Air Balloon Ride... Straight To Hell!!! -- Puppy Betrayal -- High-Heeled By A Girlfriend Impersonator -- Flip-Top Beheaded -- Because I'm Too Goddamned Beautiful To Live -- By Choosing... Poorly... -- Fried Alive Due To Baby Ingenuity -- A Good Old-Fashioned Tentacle Smothering -- Eepa! Eepa! -- Gremlins Ate My Stairlift -- An Icicle Thru The Eye -- Face Carved Off By Ghost Doctor After Lesbian Tryst With Zombie Women -- Electrocuted By Fallen Power-Lines -- A Mouthful Of Flare -- Taken By The TV Lady -- Bitten By A Zombie -- Eaten By Your Mattress -- Stuffed To Splitting -- Face Stuck In Liquid Nitrogen -- Crushed By Crumbling Church Debris -- Bitten By The Jaws Of Life -- A Machete To The Crotch -- Showering With A Chain-Saw -- In A Room Filled With Razor Wire -- Pod People'd With Your Dog -- Force-Fed Art -- Skinned By A Witch -- Beaten With An Oar -- Curbed -- Cape Malfunction -- In The Corner -- Cooked In A Tanning Bed -- Diced -- Punched Through The Head -- Bugs Sucking On Your Head
.

3 comments:

RDaggle said...

I'm a little stunned that you have not seen this movie until now. Surely it had all the right ingredients: dismemberment, semi-zombies, claymonsters, bathroom cruising, addiction -- what was the delay ...?

hmmm, well, there was that musical number ...

Jason Adams said...

I know, it's shameful! I'd been sitting on a copy for a couple of years now and just never gotten around to it. Maybe it's that I hated Basket Case? I dunno. It has, as you say, everything one would ever need, and I feel richer for having finally brought it into my life.

Steve K said...

Thank you for bringing my attention to this post, 11 years later....