INDEPENDENTS

The Dollar Theater is dedicated to the true independent filmmakers. They work with low budgets and without crews beacuse they love the art form. Here you will find articles on their limited release films.

“A FEW SCREWS LOOSE” (2008)

Starring: Randy Tobin, Michael Palermo, Jack Spralja, Trevi Williams, Chase Monroe, Dan Jablons, Ava Rose, Aurelia Scheppers, Stan Yombo, Jesse Lincoln, Dan Jablons, Brian Catlin, Marna Kay, Evangeline Barron, Holly Demers, Darla Parsen, Amie Macabeo, Nuchlynn Bunnag, & Cassandra and Rebecca Buhler
Written & Directed by Craig McIntyre
Official Site

Polly Staffle Rating: ***

To call Craig McIntyre’s “A Few Screws Loose” unconventional is a bit of an understatement. The editing, though it works, is absolutely bizarre with full screens of yellow, red and purple cutting in from time to time, bits of sound looping over and over and jump cuts a plenty. The story is a twisted mess, starting out as a comical look at pornographers that become sunffographers. Shortly, the movie turns into a Herschell Gordon Lewis-like goreathon with a maniacal serial killer that wears a mask, which reminded me of Grandpa from the original version of “The Texas Chainsaw Massacre.” The whole thing switches gears again near the end to become a tale of revenge.

Along the way, there are depictions of people getting their faces bashed in, a castration, the lopping off of limbs, a decapitation, the ripping out of intestines, a young porn starlet drinking urine through a tube and lots of other things that in any other film would most likely be disturbing and unwatchable. But some how McIntyre’s odd blood, brains and boob fest is not only a damn entertaining watch, but also quite hilarious.

The movie starts out introducing a couple of struggling pornographic scumbags – the obnoxious and John Dillinger black hat wearing Extreme Eric (Michael Palermo) and the fake mustache sporting Johnny Hawthrone (Jack Spralja, also known as Jack Blast, the lead singer of Underground Railroad to Candyland). The duo is working on its latest production when the father of their new star busts in with a machete. Johnny’s arm is chopped off (later he gets a prosthetic hook) and a well-endowed guy named Coco Libido has his face hacked to pieces. But Eric saves the day and in the process is inspired to make even more exploitive films than he already was.

Then our story switches over to a loner named Stuart, who is often beat up and harassed weekly as his beat-up car constantly breaks down in questionable parts of town. Randy Tobin (“The American Poop Movie”), who reminded me of a cross between Mike White (“Chuck and Buck”) and Owen Wilson (“Bottle Rocket”), plays our friendless leader. Stuart, who often has erotic dreams that end as nightmares, is addicted to porn, especially the films made by Extreme Eric, and even more so, the one’s Eric has made with his girlfriend Ember (model Aurelia Scheppers). Our introduction to this stud has us joined in progress of his daily masturbation session. After finishing, Stuart goes to work at his fairly new job, where he is schooled by Manager Bob (Dan Jablons) on how to make banana splits and “red” tacos.

While Extreme Eric and Johnny Hawthrone venture into the world of snuff filmmaking, Stuart writes a letter to his favorite porn star. Shockingly Ember calls and Stuart and her meet up… or maybe not. Perhaps it was actually another dream of Stuart’s. To me it was a little unclear. But during the couple’s brief interaction, Ember discloses that Extreme Eric has beaten her and that Stuart couldn’t have had any better timing. “Sometimes I think I am in love with him, but sometimes I think I am just addicted to him,” Ember states.

Soon Ember is worm’s meat. Did Stuart kill her? Did Extreme Eric do it? This too is unclear, but some other poor sap porno guy that used to date Ember pays the price as an all-girl gang kills him. This band of vigilantes (Chase Monroe, Marna Kay, Evangeline Barron, Holly Demers, Darla Parsen and Amie Macabeo), whom I like to call the Girl Scouts from Hell, look like a bunch of Suicide Girls that work at Hotdog on a Stick that were inspired by watching “A Clockwork Orange” and “The Warriors.” The six girls bum rush the guy in the woods with some Beastie Boys combat style. They do it like this, they do it like that, but they sure as hell aren’t using Wiffle ball bats. When the girls are finished, the former boyfriend of Ember’s face is about as recognizable as that guy that was flattened with a fire extinguisher in Gaspar Noé’s “Irreversible.”

If the plotline hasn’t lost you yet, the scene involving porn star Ava Rose (“Lady Scarface,” “Pulp Friction,” “Dark City” “Roller Dollz”) jogging and being attacked by a Neil Young-looking hippy hitman might have you scratching your head, if not, at least winching while holding your head. The guy jumps out of the bushes with a hammer and gives the jogger a few whacks to the gulliver before raping her. She is bleeding pretty bad, so he assumes she is dead. But when he turns his back, the jogger jumps up and does more damage on him than he did on her. She hammers away until his skull is cracked open and oozing blood, and then keeps on pounding the guy’s head till the scene ends. This completely out of place moment is sandwiched in between Stuart getting attacked by Extreme Eric and Johnny for watching movies with Ember in them, and Stuart giving himself a Travis Bickle pep talk prior to donning a headband and doing some “Rocky” and “The Karate Kid” training to exact revenge.

Though the film drags a bit towards the end, especially during Stuart’s martial art training, I highly recommend “A Few Screws Loose,” which was wrote, directed, edited and produced by McIntyre over the course of several years, for fans of underground cinema. Though it’s been compared to Shane Ryan’s “Amateur Porn Star Killer” and Lukas Moodysson’s “A Hole in My Heart,” “A Few Screws Loose” is more like something you’d see Sub Rosa Studios release. Think the films of Ryan Cavalline (“Dead Body Man” trilogy) or the duo of Germán Magariños and Fernando Giangiacomo (“Sadomaster”) and you get an idea of what you are in for (dark humor and fake gore) and the tone of this project (about as strict and serious as Jim Norton at a porn convention).

There are a few scenes that are disturbing, such as the death of young Asian girl, but mostly McIntrye seems to be trying to provoke laughter and is usually successful. The project definitely lacks focus. It rambles aimlessly in a number of directions and features lots of scenes that seem to be there just to be there. A Larry Clark/Harmony Korine-esque moment early in the film is a perfect example. In it, two lollipop girls shop at a grocery store. Sure, they mention Ember at one point, they pop up in the Girl Scouts from Hell gang later and even later one of them is killed in a parking garage, but overall McIntyre could have snipped this segment. I would have liked to have seen him develop the girl gang a bit more and had he, this scene is fine, but as is, it doesn’t really add to the story.

Aside from the girl gang, the whole aspects of snuff and pornography aren’t really used up to their full potential either. But it’s best to keep in mind that “A Few Screws Loose,” McIntrye’s directorial debut, is an indie film shot on a budget of less than $5,000 and a lot of these nitpickings are easily forgivable. With the twisted mind of this special effects and makeup veteran (“Cremaster 3,” “Space Truckers,” “Buffy the Vampire Slayer,” “X-files,” “Species II” and “Thumb Wars”) behind a project, there’s no telling what McIntrye could accomplish with a bigger bankroll and a crew.

In addition to McIntrye, the biggest find in this film is Jack Spralja, who has been called a white Flavor Flav. He is wonderful as Johnny Hawthrone. He sort of has a Giuseppe Andrews air about him that no matter what he does – freestyle rapping, typing at a keyboard with his hook, coercing young girls to be in Eric’s movies, or crying “this is no place for a gangster” - he has me smiling and laughing. Spralja, a long time friend of McIntrye’s, also provided music for the film’s soundtrack. His rap project Full Blast delivered a track “fff” that has the lyrics “Put your mamma in a gang, put your daddy in a gang,” etc., etc. Spralja also composed other songs for the film under the name Composer Zartan.

- CCF, September 2008