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SLAUGHTERED VOMIT DOLLS - 2005

DIRECTED BY LUCIFER VALENTINE - CANADA 71 MINUTES

Lucifer Valentine (666) obviously not the name this Director was born with has done a very good job of promoting Slaughtered Vomit Dolls. For a start one mention of such a title cannot fail to arouse interest in the jaded cineaste of the extreme. He (well I guess he) has put messages on lots of underground horror and metal forums, inviting people to view the trailer for this feature. Some comments were met with the words, "get lost you sick fuck" but I for one was quick to download this gruelling few minutes of sickness (and this is said in the literal sense). Valentine has claimed to have innovated a new genre of film called "vomit gore" and believe, you me this is a pretty damn descriptive phrase for his movie. However he hasn't really given birth to such a sub genre as the Japanese were way ahead of the game there creating horrible pornographic feasts employing young girls (quite often dressed as schoolgirls) spitting, shitting, pissing and vomiting over each other seemingly for their own and the viewers pleasure. I had one of these untitled sexual odysseys fall into my lap once and feeling the need to try watching everything possible out there gave it a spin and a few minutes later was forced to watch it at 5 times the speed with occasional furtive glimpses at the screen. Lets put it this way, this was not my fetish in the slightest and the sick puppy that I passed this disc onto was welcome to it. The Japanese really do fascinate me with movies like this (strangely often blurring genitalia shots out) and know no bounds with the likes of the Rapeman and Squirmfest series.
Going off on a tangent maybe but from the trailer this is pretty much what I expected SVD to be principally in line with. However I was pleasantly surprised, as what I got was a movie that although extremely harrowing and difficult to watch at times was one that was also moving and tragic in its delineation of a the central character Angela Aberdeen played brilliantly by Ameara LaVey.

SVD is definitely an example of cinema of transgression and has in many ways reminded me of Bunel's 1929 shocker Un Chien Andalou. This is not just due to the eye abuse that we get in the movie but the hallucinatory and dreamlike way the film has been cunningly shot. What is particularly clever is the way you never know what is quite going on, if a part is being shown in flashback or if Amanda is actually asleep and dreaming events. Also there is the constant companionship of her as a little girl with dreams of becoming a ballerina and talking about the future, rather like one of the trailer trash misfits in Harmony Korine's evocative Gummo (1997).
In fact she did not realize her dreams as is so often the case and is reflecting on her 19 year old life as a bulimic, runaway stripper turned prostitute. This is one girl who is most definitely living with eating disorders to such an extent they are causing her to hallucinate and question her very soul as she is plunged into demonic nightmares. Despite the obvious bodily abuse (and the majority of the scenes are played naked) it is obvious that Angela is one sexy girl and it is difficult for the viewer to watch her without being overcome by thoughts of lust when they really should feel pity for her plight. The scenes of disintegration remind me of some other great movie roles played by much more famous ladies and for that reason I can only commend Ameara's brilliant acting skills that could have her going onto much more savoury movies in the future. 3 particularly spring to mind here; Catherine Deneuve in Roman Polanski's Repulsion (1965), Natja Bruckenhurst in Uli Edel's Christiane F (1981) and Isabelle Adjani in Andrzej Zulawski's Possession (1981). Add a bit of David Lynch and a hefty dash of Richard Kern to the pot and you would have a meal that vomited out, would to a large extent resemble SVD. The use of sound is something that also must be mentioned. The soundtrack is exaggerated on the whole with what one could only describe as looped and trance inducing white noise. More in line with the likes of Throbbing Gristle and Whitehouse than anything else, it is cleverly used as a means of describing and accentuating events unfolding on the screen. For instance when vomit splashes and rains down, there may well be a cymbal clash illustrating it hitting the surface. Angela narrates in a fashion that often has her voice slowed down, making her sound like a man, this is really unsettling and makes the whole tone of the movie even more distasteful as far as I am concerned. In one scene she tells us somewhat demonically that she has sold her soul to the devil, a pact that the director also has on his website having claimed (s)he has made it themselves. The first time we see Angela so drunk she falls off the toilet and spreads her legs for the camera, rolling around in her own mess, it comes as a shock and a taboo breaking scene as this is not the sort of thing people would normally find themselves watching for purposes of entertainment. In her dreamlike state Angela watches a violent tapestry of fastly edited torture. The camera is as fast as the scalpel wielding mania of the killer. We see a cut and paste imagery of a woman being cut up and then having her eyeballs removed (in excruciating and realistic detail). The eyeballs sit on a table as the girl then sticks her fingers down her throat and vomits all over them. Another girl is bound, and tortured and terrified in a black and white shot scene, the starkly illuminated scene cuts to blood red as the skin of her face is removed and a Leatherface styled dead skin mask is made. The question you have to ask is who is doing this, is it perhaps Angela herself?

The close up scenes of puking are nasty to say the least and I can assure you they are not faked, you will need a strong stomach to watch this and I admit to being somewhat surprised to realize I was watching them munching on snacks (I would not advise trying this at home though).
The killer strikes again and we are introduced to Henry, we know this is his name as it says so on his belt buckle, we also realize he is the fiend as he has hacked a woman's arm off and proceeds to stick the severed limbs fingers down his throat, ejecting a projectile vomit. I think it is fair to describe ol Henry as a serial vomiter, he could do it for Jim Rose Circus with no problems and enjoys puking in a pint glass, drinking it and continuing in a never ending cycle. At one point he has lopped the top off the skull of a victim and scoops the brains into his mouth eating and puking into the cranium over and over again. You simply don't know whether to laugh (as there is a bit of a depraved Peter Jackson going on here and I am not referring to Lord Of The Rings) or to toss your cookies as you watch it.
I have to admit I was pleased when the film finished and thanked the fact that it was not a full 90 minutes, this would have been way too much. I was also very satisfied with the conclusion as to me the movie finished the only way it could do. Stark, bleak and utterly depressing stuff SVD should most definitely be approached with extreme caution; this is not a movie for most of the human race to view and is only really made to cater for the few who would seek it out. That said it has the scope to become a cult classic in much the same way as the films of Jorg Buttgereit and in a similar way as it presents an utterly illuminating look at the human psyche and the depths of despair and depravity that you can find yourself in being part of this cold, thoughtless and narcissistic world.
Since the movie was released on Valentine's day 2006 it has swiftly sold out and for the moment appears deleted. A copy sold just the other day on EBay for over £40 so it is certainly in demand for a further print run. In the UK Salvation films have been championing the movie and I am sure Nigel Wingrove would release it like a shot but the film has been deemed too extreme for a release in this censorious domain.

Head to the website and watch the trailer or alternatively pay a membership fee and download the movie direct from the site.

Pete Woods

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