Everyone has their staples for Halloween watching, like John Carpenter’s “Halloween” and “Nightmare Before Christmas.” But be forewarned, gentle reader, because your master of Scarimonies (God, I sound like the Crypt Keeper), Dukey Flyswatter, will suggest some gems and themes that may have flown drastically under your radar, like a schizophrenic Vampire Bat. Week three we focus on drive-in gems and Just plain weirdness.
Sunday Oct.16th Tetsuo: The Iron Man (1989)
Director: Shin’ya Tsukomoto Stars: Tomorowo Taguchi, Kei Fujiwara.
A wholly original piece of gonzo cinema, this movie is like a Japanese David Lynch film on steroids. The plot is surreal and vague, and there is probably no more than five minutes of dialogue in this stunningly visual nightmare.
A crazy guy known only as “The Metal Fetishist,” presumably because he likes to stick scrap metal into his body, is accidentally killed by a downtrodden business man who is out for a drive with his wife. As far as I can make out, the spirit of the metal fetishist then takes residence in the body of the businessman, slowly transforming him into a metallic giant as they both battle for supremacy of his new form and state of mind.
Tetsuo is filmed in gorgeous black and white and there is a great deal of stop motion animation using the live actors who have to move small distances for each frame to give the illusion of flight or super speed. Oh, yeah, did I forget to mention there are some kinky giant drill bit sex scenes? Not the film to show when the family is around, but an art house classic nonetheless. Tetsuo can be rented on the Netflix-owned DVD.com.
