…back with two reviews from a test screening of POULTRYGEIST: NIGHT OF THE CHICKEN DEAD.
All that needs to be said is that this film has a heavy musical component, is about zombie chickens, and is directed by Lloyd Kaufman . That’s good enough for me!
Here’s Nameless Numberhead Man with the first review...
Last night, Troma had a test screening at NYU of a rough cut of their new
masterpiece POULTRYGEIST: NIGHT OF THE CHICKEN DEAD. As you can no doubt
already tell from my word choice, I am a big fan of this flick. It's like
FAST FOOD NATION meets SHAUN OF THE DEAD.
The movie is far from finished -- what they screened was a video output of
the film, although it was shot on film (no shoddy TALES FROM THE CRAPPER DV
filmmaking here). Also, at about two hours, it is currently way too long
for a chicken zombie movie.
Where to begin describing it?
I guess I could give you a little of the
plot. Arby and his girlfriend Wendy graduate high school. Wendy goes off
to college, while Arbie stays in Tromaville to take care of his retarded
parents (who we never see). Arby goes back to the old Indian graveyard
where Wendy and he spent their last night together, dry-humping. Only now
the graveyard has been replaced by a fast-food chicken restaurant, the
American Chicken Bunker, and Wendy, thanks to college, has turned into a
"lefty lipstick-lesbo liberal" (as Arby puts it) who is protesting the
restaurant with her new girlfriend Mickey (I don't remember them saying her
last name, but I'm guessing since almost all the characters have a fast-food
restaurant chain for a name, her last name probably begins with D. Get it,
Mickey D?).
To get back at Wendy, Arby gets a job at American Chicken
Bunker where he meets all sorts of colorful characters like Denny, the sassy
black manager, and Paco Bell, the gay Mexican fry cook who masturbates in
the food, and Carl, Jr., the redneck employee who is into bestiality (even
if the chickens are dead, yiccccch!), and also Hummus, the birka-wearing
Muslim character who dreams of being a suicide bomber like her father.
Yikes!!
As you can tell, Troma is not afraid of pushing anyone's buttons,
and the movie addresses a lot of political and social issues with a lot of
fearless satire, even though the main idea of the movie is just to see a
bunch of chicken zombies (infected with the combined spirit of the
pissed-off Indians from the graveyard and the pissed-off chickens from the
restaurant) massacre people (and when they do later in the film, it's an
amazing extended set-piece). However, the writing balances enough smart
ideas with sophomoric poopy humor (there is one shit scene that will no
doubt scar anyone who sees it for life -- in a good way) that I dare say
that this probably is Troma's best movie yet.
Troma chief Lloyd Kaufman directed this one, and he also has a role in the
movie (whenever he popped up on screen, the audience in the screening went
bananas -- people love this guy). Also, he wears a thong during the movie
(long story) and his balls make an appearance onscreen in close-up. For my
one friend, his balls were too much to take, but my other friend thinks it's
the funniest part of the movie.
Another major thing I can't believe I didn't already mention is that the
movie has a bunch of musical numbers. In an interview I read, Lloyd Kaufman
wanted to stress that the movie wasn't a musical, but that it just had
musical scenes, like in Miike's HAPPINESS OF THE KATAKURIS. And I can see
what he's talking about. The songs seem to be focused largely in the first
half of the movie, before the zombies appear, and then there is only one
short song at the very end after the zombies have come. So it's not quite
ROCKY HORROR, which was a full musical.
It's more like the songs are there
to spice up the slow building set-up of the movie, because while the
filmmakers do figure out a way to get some good gore in the first half, the
chicken zombies don't appear until the second half. My one friend (the one
who didn't like Lloyd's balls) thought the singing was kind of lame, but my
other friend and I -- who have both love KATAKURIS as well as Troma's
CANNIBAL THE MUSICAL -- thought it was a hilarious touch.
Overall, the chicken massacre section is a gorehound's delight, but there's
enough other stuff going on that this isn't like FX-porn for nerds. This is
a fully realized (and currently, a bit overlong) feature film that might --
just MIGHT -- find an audience much larger than the Troma cult.
Now, here’s Fabfunk with another write-up…
It's directed by the great Lloyd Kaufman, and it's current subtitle is "Night Of The
Chicken Dead", proof positive that this is not anything close to a new Troma
approach. I understand that a "Fast Food Nation" film is being released
later this year, and if it's half as topical as this zombie chicken odyssey
is, I suppose it will be quite successful.
This completely gruesome,
extremely tasteless and hilarious stew uses the conflict between
hypocritical anti-corporation liberals and dishonest opportunistic
capitalists as a backdrop for an all-out zombie-chicken orgy. Seems as the
ancient Tromahawk tribe isn't happy about a new fast food fried chicken
chain opening on their burial grounds, and together their souls team with
the spirits of dead chickens to infect the food and cause all who eat it
into chicken-faced flesh-eaters. Our hero is an inept fool who joins the
American Chicken Bunker corporation in order to defy his ex-girlfriend,
campaigning against the torture of innocent chickens with her new lesbian
girlfriend, though he soon finds that he's leading a dead-end life trying to
support his "retard mother and blind dad."
"Poultrygeist" touches on the franchising of economic America, the workforce
struggles of America's youth, sexual identity, the current immigration
debate, Muslims and racism post-9/11, the affect of alcohol on the Native
American population of the country and atheism- no wonder the damn thing
runs far too long at over two hours.
Still, it's nothing a little editing
can't fix. As per Troma requirements, all actors seem to be
non-professionals, and they play to the cheap seats, though everyone onboard
is having a great time. For the lack of shine given to Troma's productions,
there's a let's-put-on-a-show spirit that underlines all of their efforts,
whether they are asked to smear shit on their faces or take a zombie finger
up the ass- indeed, in this cut, there's more assholes than the Republican
National Convention. Do we really need to see morbidly obese Troma regular
Michael Herz taking a shit from the toilet's perspective?
Once the zombie chickens kick in, there's a sequence with a solid twenty to
twenty five minutes of unbelievable zombie chicken action. In my time as a
zombie film afficionado, this audacious, often surprising sequence is the
closest we've come to the final onslaught of "Brain Dead". It's that cool-
I hope they don't cut any of it.
Some of it is just plain silly, some of it
actually achieves disturbing status, but the best of it- a zombie tearing
off a woman's face, then eating it in front of the victim's husband, saying,
"I know it's fattening, but I love the skin!"- does both. Soon after a
near-brilliant "Birds" homage, things grow slack and too self-referential
but it finishes with a clever bit that had the audience cheering. Though
they could stand to lose the Ron Jeremy coda.
Can’t wait!
Thanks for the reviews, guys.
You can access the film’s official website HERE. You want to…you know you do...
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