31 Days of Halloween, Day 19- Slaughtered Vomit Dolls (2006)

Directed By: Lucifer Valentine AKA Shawn Fedorchuk

MVP’s: Brandy Petry, Maja Lee, Pam McCartney, First Victim Actress (Name Unknown), Fourth Victim Actress (Name Unknown), Allen Michael Dillard, Kevin Vitto

Plot: Teen prostitute and bullimic, Angela Aberdeen, makes a pact with Satan. And a lot of disgusting murder stuff happens. And a lot of disgusting puke stuff happens.

Response: Fucked by the devil. The deep unpleasantness is the point. An eyeball is plucked in extreme graphic detail, then placed at the level of the forehead like a third eye. The hatred is the point. The alchemical mix of puke and eyeballs. The evil of filming, the evil of watching. “Blisters” is written on a woman’s body. Everything is transactional. Should we watch because of the real atrocities being committed daily? Should we not watch because of that?

Review and Background: This is “Lucifer Valentine”’s first film in his Vomit Gore Trilogy. “Vomit Gore” is not really a thing. It’s certainly not a horror subgenre. It’s just Fedorchuk’s branding for his trilogy (but really there’s like five of ‘em) of emetophillic, fake-snuff, old-skool Satanic, edgelord provocations. Branding is an important component of these works which I’ll get back to soon.

But first, let me try to get this out of the way. This isn’t art.

“But J-Man,” you’re saying, “ain’t art subjective? One man’s flowers, another man’s mulch, and that sort of thing?”

I’m not sure art is as subjective as all that, or at any rate, it means too much to me to be so open to discretion. But I haven’t finished JF’s book on the subject, so I’ll concede the point. Only to say that a lot of the discourse around this film revolves around its artfulness or at least artsiness. And words like “experimental” and “surrealist” are thrown around. When, to me, this is just kinetic MTV editing around puke, misogyny and graphic violence. Nothing really expressive. Nothing revelatory. Nothing for the soul to nourish on but plenty of the opposite. So it just bugs me is all. And I think, without having the energy to aggressively disprove the statement, that it’s wrong. That this is not art.

Writing about this movie is tricky. Come on too hot indicting it and you run the risk of adding to its hype machine. React to it to dismissively and you miss the moment to not be complicit in the hatred of women. It’s kinda best not to talk about it all, but fucken, here we are.

For this movie blog I try and feature a wide array of films from every decade and from multiple countries. Not just scary shit but wondrous stuff too. Anything with that je ne sais quoi of Halloween (a holiday I’ve always loved). That’s why, between this year and last, I’ve watched heart-warming B-movie indies, Hallmark rom-coms, lots of old elegant spookshows, kid’s movies, rock operas, dumb holiday comedies, Spookley: the Square Pumpkin, etc.. This is all by design. For one, diversity is the spice of life. But also, I wanna eat all the flavors. And especially, I’m kinda working to challenge the perception that horror is just the blood-and-guts genre. That said, I can’t lose my horror bonafides, and for my fellows who keep coming back to scare pictures for the harder and harder hit of the stuff I try to have that stuff represented too. What was it Stephen King said? That he tries to horrify and if he cannot he’ll terrify and if he can’t muster that, he’ll go for the gross-out? Something like that. Gotta keep space for the real gross shit, too. So for the second year in a row I’ve tried to reserve a day for at least one supremely fucked-up one. Last year’s messed-up movie was Bone Sickness. A film about a dude who tries to cure his friend’s terminal bone disease by feeding him pulsed-and-pureéd, robbed-grave corpse bits (talk about green juice!) which of course makes the friend explosively puke and shit worms, become a “necro junkie”, become a serial killer and start the zombie apocalypse. It was 98 minutes long and the last 60 are just gore. And real, disgusting, mean-spirited shit too. But despite all that, Bone Sickness had heart. Bone Sickness was made by metalhead kids outside Boston who studied Tom Savini masterclasses and drew inspiration from diverse cinematic luminaries like Lucio Fulci and John Woo. Bone Sickness had goblins in it, for pete’s sake! Yes, the evil folkloric sprite! So while Bone Sickness is a film that is most decidedly not for everyone, it had redemptive human qualities. Bone Sickness was art.

This year, I thought I’d force myself to watch Slaughtered Vomit Dolls. I mean, great, gross, dumb title right? And hey, I hear its artsy! I like punk shit.

One of the angles I wanted to explore early on, was Fedorchuk the workman. After all, in addition to being in punk bands and making these “vomit gore-o’s” this was a guy who, for a time, was getting regular emmy nominations for his work editing title card sequences for TV shows like True Blood. I thought focusing on the journeyman and hired hand qualities of the filmmaker would do a lot to demistify the dark fart cloud of evil around him and these films. But it turns out that cloud is pretty pervasive. I’m actually beginning to think that the film is a dark satanic spell, which is exactly the kinda hyperbole and accidental endorsement I was hoping to avoid. Dude gives no interviews except for in old punk magazines where he tries to build up his mystique by saying a lot of edgelordy stuff like how he took sexual advantage of his sister with intellectual disabilities. Ok fine, cool story, bro. But then there’s a lotta Me Too cancellations. Discussion about his taking advantage of Brandy Petrie (the film’s star credited as Ameara Levay) and other women. Then there’s the tragedy (unrelated to Fedorchuk) of Petrie’s death. Double homicide from a drug deal gone wrong. All we hear about is death, violence and abuse. All we see on screen is death, violence and abuse. Even the righteous in this story are gross, opportunistic, Youtube influencer bro’s who film a “gotcha” I guess. Dark fart cloud of evil wherever you turn.

Which brings me back to Satanism.

It’s clear Fedorchuk loves this shit. “Lucifer”, “Levay”. I know the Satanic Church has sought to do some image adjustment in recent years and that, in our weird topsy-turvy times where American Christians continue to follow Authoritarians who strip women’s rights, the Satanic Church has come out for women, gays, and Palestinians. I also am sure, that there’s a ton of interesting stuff in Anton Levay’s Satanic Bible. But the aspects of that book that could be summed up as proto-maga, love-letter to Ayn Rand and Ragnar Redbeard, solipsistic, man-o-sphere libertarianism*, those aspects Fedorchuk seems to emulate here. Also, the Satanists knew magic. There’s John Dee, sacred math, Enochian angel shit in Satanic Bible too. So, that dark cloud of mystique that even I, in my best attempts, am incapable of clearing. That’s a cast spell. Every bit of attention we give it, feeds it. Unless. Unless we can make it dumb and reveal its inner dumbness and transmute it through love. And how do we do that? By being dumb ourselves. By being human.

There’s some duuuuuuumb shit in this movie. It’s total fetishization of puke becomes an accidental punch-line. A dude eats someone’s brains then pukes in his skull. A woman crawls around looking for her eyes and when she finds them, she pukes on them. I find that a lot of “transgressive” exploitation movies have these scenes that transcend the fatalism to become a rejoicing stupid. Its like they push us so far into the uncomfortable that they accidentally reveal their limits and our spirit comes bounding back to point at them and say “ha-ha!” In Nekromantik, its the close-up of the dude’s pissing cock**, in Anti-christ its the heavy metal fox saying “chaos reigns.” There just ain’t enough evil out there to ever kill joy.

I know I’m playing with fire. That even talking about this shit is like poking a hornet’s nest.

Anyway, not an endorsement, but this movie did bum me out and give me nightmares for a little while***. The images here are effective which is not the same as saying they are skillful or artistic. Remember, shock value shit is low-hanging fruit. So, while nothing here is scary per se, still I gave it high marks in Scares & Chills out of honestly for how disturbing it is.

When I was watching it, I took a break, and Laura tried to galvanize my spirit by showing me images of Mr. Rogers hanging out with Koko the gorilla. It didn’t quite work because in my traumatized imagination I was like, is the gorilla gonna rape Mr. Rogers and rip off his head?

But I feel like we’ve given enough air space to some old edgelord attempt at dark Enochian magick. The comedian Mary Beth Barone has a joke about how if she was killed it would be good for her career cuz they’d make a streaming mini-series out of it. The punchline is on us. “You’ve gotta consume content where women are alive” Barone says.

Rest in peace Brandy.

Can Kid’s Watch It?

No.

Halloween Score:

Autumn Vibes: 0/5

Scares & Chills: 4/5

Cultural & Cinematic Importance: 0/5

Monster Action: 0/5

Second Opinions:

“I thought I might like this because I love gross shit and gore, but guys, no.” - Kodiak on Letterboxed

Youtber Jojo Lyons speaking to his punk-rocker father, Glimmertwin32: The film we should do next is a film called August Underground.

Glimmertwin: Has it got a story? Is there a bit more to it than just violence against women?

Jojo: Yeah?

Glimmertwin: Good. That's a good start.

"As the anarchic inventor, director, writer, designer, camera operator, editor, scorer, and samizdat paroxysmal distributor of the debased gag-inducing ‘Vomit Gore Trilogy’ (Slaughtered Vomit Dolls 2006; ReGOREgitated Sacrifice 2008; Slow Torture Puke Chamber 2010), Valentine surfaces – like the cult interloper Alejandro Jodorowsky explored in chapter three – as an ostentatious auteur entirely immersed in his distorting lollapalooza work." - David H. Fleming, Unbecoming Cinema

“This film is a heartbroken, pulsing black wound of vulnerability. Visceral despair permeates every minute through visages of bodily abuse, extreme (fake) gore, and harsh, surreal filmmaking, wherein a fractured mind descends into an abyss of hopelessness…I'm not sure I feel so comfortable calling this something good or bad, a masterpiece or garbage. I deeply empathise with the sentiment of those who criticise the film and its origins. I see the gross manipulation and opportunism behind its creation. However, this is Ameara's performance, this is her suffering, and only she knows what she truly felt while making this film. What I see is something, for better and worse, true, powerful, and without equal.” - Eleanor M. on Letterboxed

“This is why I pray to the good lord jesus christ who died on the cross and forgave our sins.” - Lexie Tibbs on Letterboxed

“Better than Skinamarink, Melania, and 3 Adam Sandler movies.... that's all I got!” - {Todd} on Letterboxed

“if this is art, then i hate it. the more i explore the most disturbing movies iceberg the more i come to the realization that our world is literally hell - especially for women.” - Ana on Letterboxed

Still Wanna Peep It?

Shit, I hadda know this was a bad idea. Listen, don’t give Fedorchuk money, the whole thing’s up on EffedUpMovies.com

Hint for Tomorrow’s Movie:

Nothing cleanses the palette like “Dracula”. But I’ll do you one further and reveal that the film is neither from the states nor Europe.

* Dear Anton, please forgive this too-easy character assassination!

** That’s how I remember it anyway.

*** Sometimes I watch ahead to be able to pull off all the drawings and image resizings and whatnot. To give a sense I’m currently up to Day 24 on what I’ve actually watched.