Glenn Danzig's Verotika isn't Very Erotic, or Violent

One of my most anticipated movies for 2019 was Verotika from the horror-rock legend Glenn Danzig, and even though I'm extremely disappointed and think that this film is terrible in any possible way, his next film Death Rider In The House Of Vampires is one of my most anticipated movies for this year.

I've seen so many "bad films" and low budget films that low budget isn't an issue anymore for me in order to enjoy a movie. What I like in low budget and debut films is that you can find very talented people with fresh and bold ideas, creative minds experimenting with new methods, people with passion for film-making who manage to overcome technical and budgeting issues.

Then it's the other kind of bad films, the ones that are "so bad it's good", movies that are unintentionally funny, that even though they are full of flaws you still enjoy them for their absurdity, films that are a guilty pleasure ...and then it's movies like Glenn Danzig's Verotika that are plain bad.

Let's get something straight from the get go, if Verotika's budget is a million dollars, it is not a "no-budget" movie for me, it's not even a low budget movie. I've seen films with 500.000, or 100.000, or even 10.000 that are much better from Verotika from every aspect. I'm saying this because I saw reviews defending this film for it's budget. The problem here is not the budget, it's the skills and the story. It seems that Glen Danzig has no idea how to shoot and direct, at some points it looks like he never watched a movie in his life! If he had I assume that he would have noticed all these flaws on screen. Even Plan 9 From Outer Space wasn't made so poorly! There is some proper lighting here and there but there is a director of photography so the credit goes to him.

I'm not going to write about the horrendous writing and acting because it's not a big deal for me (?), meaning it's not the worst thing about this movie, but I will write about the editing. This is the worst editing I've seen in a movie, and I've seen movies that were literally butchered but because they were really good at some other points, the bad editing or some other flaw added to the "cult" experience. This is not the case.
At the end of every scripted scene the film keeps rolling and the actor (or the horses) is left alone with no direction, not knowing what to do, looking so awkward and uncomfortable that the viewer feels embarrassed on behalf of them! and after a couple of excruciating long minutes of silent screaming the scene to end ...we go to a fade out. Every scene ends with a fucking fade to black!

Even with all of the above I could still enjoy the movie if there was some cool gore, some sexy scenes, or some whatever crazy thing happening but there wasn't any! The worst thing about this movie (and the most disappointing because of Danzig's name) is how lame, tame, boring and uninspired the story and the vision of this movie is. It's not creepy, not shocking, and for a film called Verotika it's not sexy or erotic enough. There isn't any nudity except a pair of saggy tits (or a pair of plastic tits with eye-ball nipples) and a making-out scene that it's so soft it's family friendly. The gore is as lame as well. It's not just that it's poorly executed (looks like blood tubes and dripping blood plastic knifes bought for a Halloween costume) it's the ideas that are super cliche. A strangler, a girl who skins faces (really?) and Elizabeth Bathory (REALLY?). For his next film I'm expecting a killer with a knife, Frankenstein's monster and ...a ghost. Unfortunately the technical flaws are the only thing worth mentioning about this film.

P.S. The soundtrack is lame too! How did he managed not to have a killer soundtrack?

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Under The Skin

An alien came to earth, wore the skin of Scarlett Johansson and made an album with Tom Waits covers....Oh wait, that happened in real life! Let's talk about the film now.

An alien comes to earth, wears the skin of Scarlett Johansson, wears another skin of an animal on top of Scarlett's skin (A woman's skin is not enough for Scottish weather, it doesn't have enough fur) and roams the roads of Glasgow. She flirts with ordinary working class plebs, falls on her face (it happened for real) gets back on her feet and starts flirting again (like another Friday night) and of course nobody recognises her because in Scotland don't watch boring films (many flirting scenes were shot with hidden camera, like a prank, so the guys had no idea they were on film and they actually believed someone was flirting with them, poor bastards). Some of them (the real actors) ended up in her house (not the one is space), where she stripped and danced and finally seduced them into her jacuzzi of black goo (and endless void). The guys probably thought it's this black goo you rub on you for scaling, or peeling your skin ..which they were not completely wrong, it just not peels the skin out of you but you out of the skin (if it makes any sense).

I never liked Scarlett or the films she is in, but I enjoyed this one, it's very different from the rest of her filmography and this role fits her like a ... skin. This bored, indifferent, sleepy, confused look of hers made me like her a little bit (and not because of the scene where she is naked touching her self).

Fun fact: The guy who plays the horribly deformed guy? He is not playing, he is really deformed and he is a successful actor.

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Der Goldene Handschuh AKA The Golden Glove

"What's that awful smell" people ask when they enter Honka's flat, and if you watch this, you will ask the same thing. This film is so filthy that you'll need a shower after the end credits roll (or even before). This is the true story of a serial killer in Germany, in the 70's, but it feels more like a nightmare because every character looks like a degenerate caricature and every place is deprived, depraved and depressing. Every frame is so sleazy and sticky that you can't escape it, you're stuck there with Fritz Honka, forced to live his meaningless, miserable and degrading life between his alcoholic violent outbursts.

Having said all that this film is an eye candy (?), I couldn't get my eyes off the screen and it's very well paced, I wasn't bored at any moment and the running time felt much shorter. The cinematography and acting are excellent and the only reason I'm not giving it 5 stars is the lack of gore. There are kills and other horrible acts on screen but they are very careful misplaced, so that you can see what's going on but not in detail. Also, there are off-screen mutilations that disappointed me and took away this extra punch that could have made this experience unforgetable .

Oh I forgot to mention that this film is a dark comedy. It's like a cocktail of 50ml Barfly, 25ml I Stand Alone, 30mg nicotine and 25ml Henry: Portrait of a serial killer, all stirred well with a pair of piss stained fingers.

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