Just saw the poster for the new monster-in-Los Angeles-at-Christmas flick The Blackout, debut feature of Robert David Sanders. I love a good monster-at-Christmas movie, and will try not to hold it against the movie, but this is some pretty shameful poster copying. Here we have The Blackout, 2009 …
…and then the art for Feast, 2005 debut feature of John Gulager.
I wasn’t sure what to make of the first Feast, and I’m not sure what to make of the second. The first flick, born out of the Project Greenlight movie-competition TV series, is an odd creature and a movie greater than the sum of its parts; this is because most of these parts are stupid. Self-aware, overreliant on super-fast-mo action, deliberately tasteless with a teenage sense of humor, I somehow found myself enjoying it, and there were moments when I had to admit what was onscreen was something I hadn’t seen before. Sort of terrible, but undeniably energetic and occasionally creative, it might not hold up to a second viewing, but there is credit due for the things it does right.
The second relies more heavily on the same tricks, with much more deliberate boundary-pushing. It usually feels overeager, but better any number of funnish flicks elbowing you in the ribs a little too hard, pushing boundaries with stupid glee, than one more drab August Underground exercise in simulated snuff for the purposes of extremity.
Feast’s gross-out humor is magnified tenfold in [sigh] Feast 2: Sloppy Seconds, and there was at least one moment when I felt vaguely like throwing up, which one has to think director John Gulager would consider a big MISSION ACCOMPLISHED. If you happened to casually mention that there was a new horror flick coming straight to DVD with little-person wrestlers, half-naked Suicide Girls, three members of the director’s family prominently involved, and jokes revolving around at least three different bodily functions, I would happily acknowledge that there is a target market for that film, and that it isn’t necessarily me, and go off to my Netflix copy of The Nameless.
But Feast got me again, with non-winky performances from Jenny Wade and stalwart Clu Gulager, a couple creative bits, excellent pacing, solid and at times even very good photography, and that same dumb, juvenile exuberance. The ending is make-or-break; I dug it. We’ll see where they go with it in [sigh] Feast 3: The Happy Finish.
Clu Gulager’s kid, John, had moderate success with his directorial debut Feast, a low-budget (just over $3 million) but slick splatterfest hatched out of the Project Greenlight TV series. The movie’s an odd creature, plagued by some bad clichés and 180% too much sped-up strobe in anything resembling an action sequence, but still fairly entertaining, and not without a few legitimately surprising and daring moments (which in a monsters-attack-sequestered-humans-overnight flick is worthy of at least a little admiration).
Co-writer Marcus Dunstan mentioned to Fangoria magazine The Weinstein Company’s interest in commissioning Gulager & co. for second and third installments of Feast. As with the first, it’d likely be released by TWC subdivision Dimension. Late in 2006, The Weinstein Company signed a four-year contract to supply DVD rentals exclusively to Blockbuster (if you’ve driven past a Blockbuster and wondered why there was an eight foot poster for Bobby in the window, this partnership is the reason, and not anybody’s misguided faith in Bobby).
It’s a strange arrangement, given Blockbuster’s squeamishness and the Feast makers’ obvious intent to push the envelope – but then, Blockbuster seems to have no problem with extreme violence, as long as it’s stickered UNRATED and not NC-17. With theatrical release unlikely — the first film, even with a season-long TV presence worth of visibility, barely hit theaters — it looks like Netflix users will have to illegally download these.