There are many reasons why I love the insane, and insanely entertaining, Killer Tongue. Melinda Clarke being in the lead role is the main one but none of the other reasons really make much sense. It’s just a matter of personal taste (no pun intended).
Melinda Clarke plays Candy, a loving woman who we see pulling off a successful robbery with her beau, Johnny (Jason Durr). Unfortunately, Johnny is then caught and has to do some hard time in the company of people like Wig (Doug Bradley) and under the ever-watchful eye of the sadistic prison director (Robert Englund). Candy goes into hiding in a nun but when the time comes to move on she’s out of there quick-sharp. Taking her three dogs along, she leaves just in time – a newspaper photo reveals her location to the two men she and Johnny ripped off in the aftermath of their big score. While she waits for Johnny, Candy makes soup for her and the dogs and, wouldn’t you just know it, a killer tongue from outer space lands in the soup and gets into her body, transforming her into a black-haired vixen with an appetite for . . . . . . . . . more than soup. And her dogs are transformed into three camp young men (including one Jonathan Rhys Meyers). Johnny is trying to get to Candy, upset criminals are trying to get to Candy, a determined nun is trying to get to Candy but Candy is probably best left alone while she struggles with her new, lively tongue.
Yes, you read the above paragraph correctly. Killer Tongue IS that insane. It’s also got some laughs here and there, a few blood-spattered moments and a layer of eroticism as Candy grapples with the tongue.
Writer-director Alberto Sciamma is clearly a little bit bonkers, but the good kind of bonkers. He elicits over the top performances from most of the actors onscreen (Nigel Whitmey, as Chip, gets arguably the best moment with one explosive fit of anger revolving around clothing) and fills the screen with equal parts colour and grime. Clarke is a good sport in the lead role, and as gorgeous as ever, and the other big presence in the movie is Robert Englund, brilliantly portraying a character who is all sleaze and nastiness.
Top things off with a cheesy, bouncy soundtrack and a couple of amusing conversations between a woman and an alien tongue and you have something that’s certainly not for everyone but that should be enjoyed by more warped individuals. Like myself.
7/10.
7/10.
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Hey, I posted a comment about this yesterday, but it isn't here--did I end up in the spam filter?
ReplyDeleteFirst of all, thanks for even mentioning the spam filter as I was unaware of it.
ReplyDeleteSecondly, I have now just checked and there is no comment in there. I can only assume there was a general bug in Blogger at that time as we've exchanged messages here before with no problems.
Sorry :-(
Ach! I've learned about the spam filter the hard way over time--my words seem to find their way there with shocking regularity!
ReplyDeleteIn brief, I thought this line...
"...a layer of eroticism as Candy grapples with the tongue."
...was terribly funny, and worthy of this very nutty film. I like Mindy Clarke a lot, and I'm really surprised she hasn't had a bigger career than she has. At the very least, I expected her to grow into a major genre icon after RETURN OF THE LIVING DEAD 3.
Absolutely. The whole movie is enjoyably preposterous. As for the beautiful Miss Clarke, I couldn't agree more. I talk to people who sometimes raise the question of "hottest zombie ever?" (I know, a strange lot haha) and I always go for her great role in that enjoyable zombie flick.
ReplyDelete