Guru, The Mad Monk

At the medieval Lost Souls Church of Motavia, Father Guru has fallen on hard times. Seems this particular church is on an island in the middle of nowhere and Mommy Church has all but forgotten all about it. Guru is forced to make ends meet by imprisoning losers brought over from the mainland and seeing to their eternal damnation. He'll get a bonus (I guess, some of it's a little hazy, and I was also dealing with an ear infection while I was trying to watch this) if he punishes them in a corporeal manner. The church is actually the least of Guru's worries, since he has a couple of special needs mouths to feed - Igor, his hunchbacked assistant, who is, um, a hunchback (apparently Milligan was a big 'fan' of the crippled and included a crippled character in many of his films), and Olga, his lady friend who has an austere diet, meaning, um, she drinks blood.

Just as things are looking their worst, the lovely Nadja is brought in kicking and screaming, condemned by the church because she was thought to have murdered her newborn baby. Seems that it was all just a big mistake, because the baby was actually stillborn and Nadja was just trying to give the poor thing a proper burial and forget the whole nasty business because the baby was actually the product of Nadja's being raped by a gypsy king who had also imprisoned her. Luckily, her ex-boyfriend Carl (how's that for a medieval name?) has taken a job as Guru's lackey and finds Nadja locked up. Carl decides he'll appeal to Guru on behalf of Nadja and hopefully get her released from the church jail.

Guru agrees fairly readily, at least I think he does, but instead of just letting her go free, he devises a plan in which Olga will mix up a potion causing Nadja to just appear dead so they can smuggle the body out of the prison and resusitate her with an anecdote also prepared by Olga. Guru's mad, now, don't forget, and there is a catch to this plan. In return for sparing Nadja's body, I mean, her soul will still be condemned to eternal damnation, Carl has to get dead bodies from several towns over and sell them to medical students in exchange for gold. A man in love's gotta do what a man in love's gotta do, and Carl sets about his mission wearily.

First things first though, Olga wants in on the deal too, and she's not gonna part with the potion until Carl offers to get her some fresh blood. She's sick and tired of having to eat the coagulated blood left over from the Guru's executions. It's just not the same as some nice fresh product and I can't say that I blame her. No blood = no potion, so Carl's gotta add that to his grisly shopping list.

Meanwhile, we get to see the Guru in action, saving souls. And by saving souls, he executes people. It's an eye for an eye literally here, for the unfortunate peeping tom. The shoplifter gets her hands cut off. I think a branding iron is also used on somebody (my ear infection was making it really hard to concentrate). Don't expect any stellar gore here - the maiden's dismembered hands are obviously mannequin hands; the peeping tom's eyeballs look more like ping pong balls or maybe even marshmallows, it's hard to say. But Guru ain't all bad, because, true to his word, he manages to slip Nadja the potion here, and she is whisked away by Carl.

Carl's delighted to have Nadja free and alive, but before they can run off into the sunset, the Guru drops the nicety and demands Carl go out on another body snatching errand. This is when the monk really flies off the handle, arguing with himself in a mirror (Taxi Driver, anyone?). He goes from nice, kind Father Guru to batshit crazy Guru the Mad Monk. He says, 'You really should be nice to Igor, he really does love you.' Then crazy comes out and retorts, 'You go to hell!' It's seriously a tour de force performance, because I feel like Guru really does want to be good, and I enjoyed every second of it. His evil side just keeps gettin' stronger and stronger. It's actually almost sort of believable and I actually almost sort of felt bad for ol' Guru.

If things couldn't get any worse, Mama Church, who hasn't forgotten about Guru after all, has sent Father Polanski to remove Guru from his post at Lost Souls because of his blasphemous relationship with Olga, who isn't necessarily crazy, but was once bit by a beast at some undisclosed location and turned into the Soul of Darkness she is today. But Guru loves her and has promised to care for her. And I think (I know, I need to stop thinking so much) that Guru was also bit by a similar (?), the same (?) beast that turned Olga, so that's why they have this special connection (?).

If that whole deal wasn't enough to get Guru excommunicated, Polanski takes it upon himself to interview Nadja, who's been holed up in the vestry while Carl's off on his corpses for gold mission. Nadja tells Polanski of the parishoners who arrive but never leave, like Christine, a young pregnant woman who Olga drained of blood, or Lars, a sailor, who wants a mass before leaving for sea, who Guru took the opportunity to dispatch and add to his growing body count. This is all Polanski needs to hear, and the whole thing swirls out of control for poor Guru and Olga - Guru even tries break up with Olga and get her out of his life so he can go on business as usual. But Olga doesn't take this news very well and stabs herself. It's mutiny after this and a happy ending (maybe?) for Carl and Nadja. Fin.

Oh, that Andy Milligan! He had actually admitted that Guru was his worst film and disowned it. I thought it was a blast, as well as a very overt attack on organized religion, and Lord knows I love an overt attack on organized religion. The subtext don't run too deep here, folks, and if the dialouge doesn't tip you off right away, Guru's (aforementioned) actions will. At one point, Guru says, 'I preach one thing and continue believing another - self survival.' He preaches about God, yet he kills people, damning them to hell. So he's a duplicitous character; he's also a hypocrite.

Jimmy McDonough, in his fascinating look at Milligan in his book The Ghastly One, says, 'strip away the medieval costumes and canned music in Guru and everything can be viewed in terms of a street pickup. The exchanges are all so sleazy and desperate. Don't trust anyone, every man for himself, perhaps I'll do for you if you do for me' (219). Everyone's out for themselves; we see how easily Guru's willing to forsake Olga to save his own ass. Even the 'happy' ending is unconvincing - what's going to happen to Carl and Nadja after all they've already been through?

Despite the serious stuff, Guru is a great sleazy time! The costumes are a scream, fabric everywhere! I'm assuming Andy made all those outfits because despite being degenerate indie director and all-around sleaze ball, Milligan was also quite the accomplished dressmaker. All the characters are totally fucked up and no one really gets out unscathed. I'm not desperate to take a shower after watching this, maybe I would be if it had lasted longer (it's only about 55 minutes), but I'm sure Milligan could make me want to bathe in scalding water given the opportunity. I'm sort of a novice when it comes to his movies - this is my third; but I'm willing to start the shower now in hopes of being really repulsed (in a good way) later.

Since we're on the subject of Milligan , I've been after an original Midnite Video VHS copy of the Rats are Coming! The Werewolves are Here! forever now - since before I even knew Milligan's name. I love that title! I think it might even be the BEST title EVAR!

Andy Milligan's The Ghasly Ones

So I recently posted about reading Milligan's biography, which was totally sleazily entertaining. Some of it even read like fiction it was so over the top in its putrescence. But it's like slowing down to gawk at a car accident, no matter what disgusting-ness you might witness, you want to see it any way. And Milligan has earned his reputation as a THE sleaze peddler of the grindhouse era of 42nd street. The Ghastly Ones is my first filmic foray into the works of Andy Milligan. There have been attempts made by me to procure a VHS copy of The Rats are Coming! The Werewolves are Here! for many, many years now, to no avail. I have actually purchased it on numerous occasions, only to have the money refunded to me because the seller didn't have the tape. If anyone wants to get me a pressie, my half-birthday is coming up, so if you have a spare copy of Rats! Werewolves!, email me, and I'll pay the shipping! Anyway, onward with the review.

1968's The Ghastly Ones opens with a nice hetero couple, Ada and Robert, prancing around a private island. They're dressed in period garb and carry an ornate parasol but they speak as if it's present day. Ada gets tired and decides to have a rest, while Robert goes off exploring. Robert quickly meets a gruesome end, becoming the victim of a disembowlment via some lunatic's bare hands. Ada quickly comes looking for her lover, natch, and meets a similar fate, although she's hacked to bits with a machete. Roll opening credits. (Sidebar: all the costumes were made by Milligan's dress shop, Raffine. I think it's weird that sleazemeister Milligan was a skilled dressmaker. That's just me.)

Then we meet Victoria and her husband, Richard. They receive a letter from Victoria's deceased father's lawyer, Dobbs. The letter tells them to meet him in New York but since they don't have the money for the trip, they live in Philly, they seek out Richard's effeminate brother, Walter, to lend them some cash to go meet up with Dobbs. The scene with Walter gives me some serious John Waters vibes. Walter is a overacting queen with maybe a tinge of a Baltimore accent. He spends money like it's water and enlists Victoria and Richard to please stop by Tiffany's for his crystal because he simply doesn't trust the post. He then orders Vicki to fetch the tea since his manservant is out at the moment. He always eludes to an incestuous relationship between his brother and himself. "No one knows how much Richie means to me," following by Richie's retort, "You have abnormal tastes."

Next, we're introduced to William and Veronic, who receive the same letter from Dobbs. Veronica and Victoria are sisters (we'll meet Elizabeth, the third sister in a few moments, at a luncheon), and Veronica and William's presence is required by Dobbs as well. They suck each others fingers and wax eloquent on the power of money - "It always takes money to bring people together" and agree to go to NY asap.

The whole thing seems to be set in present day NY, but all the characters wear period costumes. They speak colloquially, but try to seem overly polite, you know, like people did back in like 1875. So they go to the lawyer Dobbs, who looks like some ancient Russian gypsy lady, and he reads the sisters' dead father's, Mr. Crenshaw's, will, which states, oddly enough, that in order for the will to be carried out, the sisters and their husbands must go to Crenshaw House (the house on the private island in the opening sequence), and live in "sexual harmony for three days." Then the will be fulfilled and a trunk in the attic will be opened. Sounds fair enough. The sexual harmony part comes into play because apparently Mr. Crenshaw did not love his wife, the sisters' mommy, at all, and was only only the island five times. It was in those five visits that his three daughters were conceived, so no sexual harmony was taking place for much time on that island. Weird request, but hey, the girls want their money, and they'll do what it takes to get it.

The three couples then arrive on the island and meet the servants, an imbecile, Colin, with horrific fake teeth, his sister Martha, and Haddie, the matriarch type head servant woman. Upon meeting Colin, he kills a rabbit, a scene I remember as described in Milligan's bio. It seems Milligan actually wanted the actor to kill the rabbit and eat from it, and the actor and the rest of the cast was too squeamish, so Milligan took matters into his own hands and killed the bunny himself. For reals. I can watch any kind of violence towards humans all the damn day long, but I had to watch the bunny murder through my fingers, especially knowing that it was actually real. I'm delicate when it comes to anything involving animals. Okay, so it is effectively demonstrated that Colin, and the other two, are pretty much lunatics. Then the real carnage starts.

Each person is slowly picked off by a figure in a black cloak. I think it's Donald that's killed via a rake through the neck, which is the second movie I've seen in as many days where someone meets their end this way. Elizabeth's head is served for dinner, and everyone starts to freak out and unravel and wonder who's next and who's the killer. (Well, I wonder this, the cast really doesn't. They mostly just cry and hold each other.) Colin is the obvious choice, but he's really too dumb. And I guess it doesn't really matter, because at this point, the film has nearly reached its 72 minute running time, so it's wrapped up quickly, with no real final act to speak of. The second part is all just falling action. The film itself focuses on and proves family's are fucked up and dysfunctional and women are cruel. These are themes apparently explored ad naseum in a Millgan picture.

The Ghastly Ones wasn't really what I was expecting. I was expecting to feel gross after I watched it, like after I watched anything the Findlay's ever had their name attached to. And I wanted to . I wanted to be cinematically violated. But instead, I felt like it was a mediocre horror picture from the late 60's. Maybe this is Milligan-lite? I tried to watch Seeds of Sin after I watched this one, but of course, I passed out. It was like 11:30, waaaaaaay past my bedtime. But Seeds opens with an orgy scene that seems more grindhouse-y and sexploitation-y, so maybe Seeds is more Milligan. At least more of what I was expecting from the man. I guess this was a good starting point and it wasn't without its moments. As I get further into his oeuvre, which I plan on doing, we'll see if he lives up to his reputation.

Wonder why Milligan, who has received a growing cult status over the last decade or so, based certainly in part on Jimmy McDonough's excellent bio on the filmmaker, isn't as revered as John Waters, Ed Wood, David Friedman, Doris Wishman? Hell, even Michael and Robert Findlay.  Something to ponder....

The Ghastly One: The Sex-Gore Netherworld of Filmmaker Andy Milligan

I'm probably the only girl on the planet that received exploitation filmmaker Andy Milligan's biography for Valentine's Day. I don't know many other women that like the kind of movies I do and I don't know a single other person who has even heard of Andy Milligan, let alone want to read his bio. In fact, I'm not too familiar with Milligan's oeuvre myself. But after reading The Ghastly One by Jimmy McDonough (a biographer brave enough to actually live and work with Milligan after hearing all the 'horror' stories after the man, but I'm getting ahead of myself) I'm ready, truly ready, to embark on the long, strange, incest-laden, mysogynistic, and homosexual odyssey known as the films of Andy Milligan. Oh, and there's some cannibalism, too. Can't forget about the cannibalism. And the bestiality. And S&M. 

For those uninitiated, Andy Milligan was not a nice person. I can safely say that after reading his bio. He was, to say the least, intense. Strangely, he didn't drink or do drugs, two vices that would consume his friends and colleagues for decades. He had yet another vice, and that was trolling the streets of 1960's NYC looking for anonymous sex in grindhouses, alleyways, and abandoned freight trucks. Betwixt satiating his love of rough trade, he managed a rather prolific output of exploitation and horror films, as well as writing and directing a large number of stage plays, spanning nearly three decades, before his AIDS-related death in 1988. McDonough's book does everything it can to chronicle Andy's life and those that lived, worked, and rode the exploitation train, so to speak, along with him, going as far as moving to California to live and work with Andy, and care for him right up until the very day he died. I don't know of many biographers who go to such lengths for their subjects, but McDonough's book really hit hard in this respect. He obviously had such admiration for the man, he was willing to wipe his ass, literally. 

It's fascinating stuff. At times you fucking hate Andy, he's a misogynist, he's a tyrant. His only direction to his actors, Just do it, babe. His themes in his films repeat themselves, the maniacal mother, dysfunctional families, the conniving woman, hookers, drugs, rough trade. The characters and themes of his films mirror his life. Somehow, no matter how much you think Andy is a terrible, and at times, downright evil, individual, people are drawn to him. Just when he alienates a bunch of his friends and actors, a new group will pop up to support him in whatever endeavor he was currently embarking on. It's a strange phenomenon in the bio; street people, drug addicts, male prostitutes, these people were drawn to Milligan and he put them in his movies and stage productions. He'd use them up and a new group would arrive. You know, there are people that there is just something about them, you can't put your finger on it, to sound trite, but Andy Milligan must've been one of these people. His life reads like the sleazy kind of movie 42nd street was so popular and will forever be famous for. And I think that is special. Because I can't think of a better word. Andy Milligan was gross, he had a gross, nasty life, full of abuse, sexual, mental, and otherwise, and became a personal that abused. Yet he goes down in history, well, exploitation history anyway, as a talented artist. Which I have no doubt that he was. There's some interesting commentary on art and artist in the bio, which I have no time to recount because I'm off to work in five minutes. One day I might write a halfway decent, non-rushed review of something here. One day. 

But my quickie review is this - this book absolutely oozes with sleaze, sex, and is the embodiment of sexploitation. As much as I sometimes regret being born to late to never experience the Deuce as it once was, this book made me feel safe because I hadn't. Some of this stuff is so sick, you might need shots after reading it, and I have no doubt Milligan's movies will make me feel much of the same way.