Bleading Lady (Review)

Bleading Lady aka Star Vehicle

Bleading Lady aka Star Vehicle (2011)

Directed by Ryan Nicholson

Let's just be real.

If you know of Ryan Nicholson's previous Plotdigger films, the last 2 being Gutterballs and Hanger, you've come to either be on the side of "his films are fuckin awesome" or "what a piece of shit these films are".

Ironically I'm still on the fence. I praised Gutterballs for being a brilliant exploitation masterpiece while destroying Hanger for being to gross and boring. I figure Star Vehicle (renamed Bleading Lady) would be my tiebreaker in the Nicholson filmography.

Well it turned out it didn't break the tie.

Bleading Lady has elements of the good shit I expected. Over the top gore, gratuitous nudity and self aware cleverisms. It also has the elements of what I hated. It's got serious pacing issues, horrible dialogue and minutes of nothingness.

Bleading Lady ends up being a the equievelant of seeing an ugly naked girl getting her armed disemembered. Your like "ewwwwwwwwww" and then "fuckin A!!! That was awesome!". So how did we all end up here?

Boring Plot-O-Matic

"Star Vehicle" follows the downward spiral of movie driver Donald Cardini, a self-professed movie buff with a penchant for explosive violence when provoked. Driving the stars of low-budget movies, along with their fragile egos, to and from locations in the middle of nowhere, pushes Don's buttons in all of the wrong directions.

When Luke, the young and self-absorbed writer/director challenges Don's authority, murder and mayhem ensues. The movie's Scream Queen' starlet, Riversa Red, to her dismay finds herself the target of Don's obsession. With his encyclopedic knowledge of her "body" and body of work, Don worms his way onto Riversa's good side, no easy task. Not knowing whether to fear or friend Don, Riversa finds herself at the center of a cyclone with Luke and Don both vying for her attention. A mysterious Hotel Bellboy and an unknown "watcher in the woods" lend themselves to the growing suspense as the cast and crew hold-up at Forest Grove Lodge...

Awesome Review-O-Matic

It's clear that from the outset we're getting a full on horror film from Ryan Nicholson. It's clear we're getting a little horror movie within a horror movie ala Scream to get our share of boobs, gore and in jokes. Our main dude Don (Dan Ellis) is the driver of the "star vehicle" and his passenger the lovely Reversa Red (Sidney Faraguna). We meet a few others along the way from the scumbag director, the Nicholson easter egg from the makeup artist, some scream queen noobs, another fellow driver and a lodge bellboy.

Don is a horror buff with knowledge of who's who. He adores Ms. Red and is her biggest fan. From bashing a friend's head he is an overprotective father to the scream queen. The movie intersplices scenes from the movie they are making and it at times I was a little more interested in that movie than the movie that was unfolding.

As we trudge along we get the inside of life within an indie horror movie. Making fun of an indie horror movie in an indie horror movie is surreal. Reversa converses with Don on her exploits and having done a "full frontal" nudity scene. He goes all "your talented then these whores" route while Reversa defends how these actresses get into the business. Some of this is interesting take on the inner workings of indie horror.

We even get to see Don break the 4th wall half an hour in as aside from an intro of kills, we see shit. He narrates "I know you are saying to yourself: 'let us get on with the blood!'" and so the movie does. Nicholson knows what we want and I LOL-ed from that bit of 'logue.

With every Nicholon film we do get full on boobs and buckets of blood. The boobs are solid Grade A boobage and the splatter is top notch. Sliced throats, crowbar trauma, severe OJ-ish stabbing will make every gorehound a happy happy boy. It's over the top and it's hilarious in that happy sickening sorta way.

But with all this horror happiness, we get the ugly girl portions of the film. At 70 or so minutes, there is so much emptiness in a lot of scenes that I rang up a decent score on Angry Birds waiting for something to happen. It just felt like 60% of the movie was filler with double talk conversations and our director being a douchebag. Reversa Red is our final girl but does nothing to make us care about her either.

Which leads to the dialogue of the whole film. Some of it was completely incomprehensuble. You know they are over acting and hamming it up in the movie within the movie but when we see the behind the scenes, it's still as bad. What the fuck? And that damn 80s cheesy soundtrack started to get on my nerves as well.

As we go along it seems Reversa's got a stalker and Don's gonna have to be the knight in shining armour. This leads to some slaughter and some tension between him and the director. The body count piles up and as we get to the end Don's making his own horror movie.

The ending is completely out of leftfield. Hell I think it's out of the 20 yard line. Come to think of it, I had no idea what sport I was watching. The movie spun out of control and ended up being one long scene of boring.

Bleading Lady pushes a standard horror film into overdrive with it's mish mash of horror caricatures and inside jokes. The gratuitous is solid in nudity and gore. But as it's racing towards the finish, it crashes into a tree and like an over cliched action movie, the gas tank ignites and blows up the entire car.

It has the smashing homage awesomeness of Gutterballs but the stupidness of Hanger and ends up with the standard 2 spinkicks from the jaded viewer. Like I said before, it's an ugly girl getting her arm chopped off. Somehow its ugly and cool at the same time. But I expected more. I expected a hot naked girl getting beheaded in full slo mo glory.

Weren't we all?

Gore-ipedia

Throat slashing
Slice and dice
Crowbar trauma
Stab and jab

Nude-ipedia

Full frontal boobs
Top and bottom full frontal nudity

WTF moment

I predicted the twist 10 minutes in. I was like WTF! It can't be that obvious can it?

The Jaded Viewer's Final Prognosis

Bleading Lady comes out on DVD March 29th from Breaking Glass pictures via their Vicious Circle Films label. If you have to watch every Plotdigger and Ryan Nicholson film, than you'll need to watch this flick. If your a noob to RN, start off with Gutterballs because it has all the stuff your looking for and more.

The movie was filmed in Maple Ridge and Vancouver Canada.

The Vitals

• Bleading Lady via Breaking Glass Pictures
• The official site

Rating:

Check out the trailer.

Bleading Lady (Trailer)

For me, Ryan Nicholson has been hit or miss. I thought Gutterballs was viciously wicked while Hanger was too nasty in my opinion. But the one thing you can count on is his films will leave a lasting impact.

So via Vicious Circle Films (via Breaking Glass) comes Nicholson's newest film Bleading Lady. Here be the plot:

Don is a chauffeur and a movie buff who takes his job seriously — very seriously. When his latest assignment takes him to the set of a low-budget horror film, he’s overjoyed to learn he’ll be driving Riversa Red – his favorite B-movie “Scream Queen.” While escorting his beloved idol, Don assumes the role of bodyguard and turns fiercely protective, especially after learning that Riversa has a stalker. Hell-bent on protecting his queen and fueled by paranoid fantasies, Don’s usual temper tantrums go to fatal extremes. Soon he proves to be not only Riversa’s biggest fan, but her worst nightmare as well.

So with one hit and one miss, Bleading Lady is going to be a tiebreaker. From the trailer, it looks appetizing yummy with gore and nudity. But those elements can't save a movie if you don't have a solid hook. We'll see what this one brings.

Check out the trailer below.

Hanger (Review)

Hanger

Hanger (2009)

Directed by Ryan Nicholson

Well Hanger is a movie that alot of our female horror bloggers are NOT going to watch and certainly not review.

Sometimes horror is still a boys club.

There is still a part of the horrorsphere that is still extreme,vulgar, disgusting and nasty. Movies that throwback exploitation and grindhouse and make it tampon fuckin bloody. This isn't your sanitized Tarantino/Rodriguez shit. This is over the top fucked up shit. Lowest Common Denominator gave us Black Devil Doll (review here). Header (review here) gave us a new term for some fucked up shit. And Frank Henenlotter recently spawned Bad Biology (review here).

But Plotdigger Films Ryan Nicholson whose Gutterballs (full review here) and Live Feed are smack in the middle of this extreme horror genre is back with his 4th film Hanger. I loved Gutterballs, ranking it #6 on my Top Horror Movies of 2008. But I'll say straight out, as much as I appreciate all the glorious exploitation shit of old, I just couldn't dig the flick. But that isn't to say it doesn't have its moments.

Put the kids to sleep and get your barf bag ready, it looks like we're DeLoreaning back to the VHS horror of old.

Boring Plot-O-Matic

Pulled into this world to take you out! HANGER is a horrifying tale of revenge...beginning with a back-alley abortion and ending with a bloodbath so vicious that it brings a new meaning to "an eye for eye".

From pimps to dealers, from hookers and junkies..."Hanger" washes the filth away with their own blood, cleaning the streets and making way for the ultimate showdown of good vs. evil. Diving headfirst into the depths of human depravity, Plotdigger Films plans on turning the world of horror inside out and letting it all hang out to dry!

Awesome Review-O-Matic

(Warning! This review is probably filled with language that will offend some. Just because the movie is highly fucked up and offensive itself)

It's easy to get psyched when you see one flick you love and anticipate the next film of that director. So Hanger got me hyped after watching the trailer. But oddly this was 80% extreme nastiness, 10% porn and 10% plot. Gutterballs for all its nastiness had some balance in the equation, Hanger seemed to be overflowing like a clogged up toilet.

So lets breakdown the equation.

10% plot

Debbie Rochon plays Rose, a whore of whores who gets knocked up then subsequently killed by her pimp Leroy. (Leroy also disposes of a tranny as well (Lloyd Kauffman in a cameo)) Leroy is a bad ass brotha, with gear and anger issues. Because Rose can't trick due to her "pregnant, fat ass" he kills her by hanger abortion trauma, thus killing mommy and deforming the unborn son. 18 years later, Rose's favorite John, gets Hanger (the deformed son) out from the streets, gets him a job at a recycling plant and gets him some pussy. (not necessarily in that order)

Soon Hanger is hanging out with Russell, another freakazoid working at the plant. Russell is a Chinese pornhound that cares only about drinking and getting laid. Wade Gibb plays Russell and does the old yellowface act (white man playing a stereotypical Chinese caricature) and somehow turns in stellar, hilarious performance. His Mr. Woo like rambling gave me a few ha ha's and its something you think would be offensive but comes out as funny as hell.

Suffice it to say, John and Hanger go seeking revenge against Leroy because he killed their momma and favorite ho, respectively.

10% porn

Well lets get our Nude-ipedia out of the way right? Lots of breasts and boobage galore in this one. This isn't your Vivid shit here. More like Bangbus. Whore boobies and a gratuitous masturbation-interruptus scene involving Candice Lewald. Round boobies, sagging boobies and wallpaper of porn. Thank you Ryan Nicholson.

80% extreme nastiness

Most other Gore-ipedia scenes involve a killing of a hooker, a fat Jehovah's Witness and some man rape via roofies. It's typically gore-max and it's all done in a utter violent nasty streak. Somehow most of these scenes you'd think would be the shock value you signed up for end up blah. Blah, blah blah. Clocking in at 80 minutes, I guess there was no time in the movie to set any of these scenes up. Shit happens, kill scene, next.

The nasty of the uber nasty is seeing Hanger's fucked up face. He's not just deformed but seriously scarred. Russell is a little yucky too as is another worker at the plant Phil. They throw poop diapers at each other and sort all the gooey and vomitus garbage.

The dialogue is cluttered with every vulgarity and sexual nastiness you can think of. Blowtorch mediaval torture. What else can I say? The only creativeness is Russell's diatribes as he talks to Hanger. Blowjobs, tossing salads and abortions are the vernacular. If you can't stand the heat, get out of the fuckin city. With that, the ending is a little too anticlimactic and a big SHOCKER scene is no where to be found. When a movie offends you this much, you want them to go over the edge and just go "Fuck it, how can this scene be a little more fucked up?".

Hanger lives up to the movies Nicholson has created. It's Troma-ish and has that piss ass drunk feel in movies like Street Trash, Maniac and Combat Shock. It's definitely not for everyone but Hanger claims the top spot of being the nastiest film of 2009.

Ryan Nicholson takes each of the genres of old and makes his version. And trust me his versions are meaner, sicker and more depraved. As much as I like Gutterballs, Nicholson's street revenge, exploitation flick is fucked up, but without the creativeness I was looking for. Maybe he'll make a shaky cam BWP or PA like flick, unsanitized for us grindhouse fans. You listening Ryan?

WTF moment

Seeing Hanger's face for the first time

The Jaded Viewer's Final Prognosis

The DVD released November 17th. More from the MySpace site and the official site.

If you want to watch what the extreme fans watch, go see Live Feed or Gutterballs first. Then when your ready, you can watch Hanger. Also, to build up your stamina for these type of flicks go see the others I mentioned. If your a noob, go see Cannibal Holocaust first. If you can stand that, you can be ready for this flick.

Rating:

1/2

Check out the trailer below.

Hanger (Trailer)

Was I the only one who actually liked Gutterballs? (full review here). Yeah I know, the anti argument were the characters were vulgar, it had a gratuitous 20 minute rape scene and the slaughter was laughable 80s slasher fare. But I kinda dug it because of all those things I just mentioned.

The fact that I ranked it #6 on my Top 10 Horror Movies of 2008 kinda says it all. I'll defend that pick as I will all my fuckin picks. So there.

Anyway, Ryan Nicholson, the director of Live Feed and Gutterballs is back with his new flick called Hanger. Put the kids to sleep and get your barf bag ready, it looks like we're DeLoreaning back to the VHS horror of old.

Hangar looks like a cross between Street Trash, Maniac and all the glorious exploitation shit of old. I mean its got hookers, degenerates, pimps, drug dealers, mutants and Debbie Rochon!
What more can you ask for? A plot? OK..see below.

Pulled into this world to take you out! HANGER is a horrifying tale of revenge...beginning with a back-alley abortion and ending with a bloodbath so vicious that it brings a new meaning to "an eye for eye".

From pimps to dealers, from hookers and junkies..."Hanger" washes the filth away with their own blood, cleaning the streets and making way for the ultimate showdown of good vs. evil. Diving headfirst into the depths of human depravity, Plotdigger Films plans on turning the world of horror inside out and letting it all hang out to dry!

Check out the trailer below. The DVD releases November 17th. More from the MySpace site.