Coming up with a whole fantasy season 11 for MST3K would require some work and frankly, its 7AM here...so, forget it.
However, I will suggest a great gobbler of a film called BLOOD SYMBOL (not to be confused with the non-craptastic Coen bros. film Blood Simple). I am partial to this film because my cousin wrote the music for it, but still, believe me...this film is MST3K gold. Very much in the same vein as Manos. No, I'm not exaggerating. Really.
The 'plot' is as follows: There's this ancient cult of evil monks that track down girls who they believe are marked with the 'blood symbol', perform these special rites to make the symbol appear on the back of the girls' necks, kill the girls and drink their blood which makes them immortal. One such monk (Olam) has survived several centuries and is hanging out in Laval, QC where he is tracking the star of the film, Tracy, a slightly lumpy softball-playing college student.
Sounds like a million horror films, I know, but it has some great faults that make it choice MST-fodder:
I grew up with this film and it was only late last year that I found out that it wasn't dubbed (I had always assumed that it was originally French). But no, they are speaking English…it's just that they couldn't afford sound (like Manos) and dubbed it in later (like Manos) and the director dubbed in his voice (like Manos) as the voice of Olam (whose only lines consist of him breathing, "Tray-ceeeee". He does this about 40 times throughout the film) and many of the secondary characters (pretty much all the characters are secondary, even Tracy). The funny thing is, as most of you know, actors rarely recite the script word for word, so there are many subtle alterations that have to (well, should) be taken down when filming sans sound. Of course, you guessed it, these brainiacs didn't. If I remember correctly, I don't even think there was a proper script in the first place, so 90% of the dialogue dubbed in later (and poorly, I might add) is guess work by the director/writer.
Ah, the writer/director/producer/editor/actor: Maurice Devereaux. He also 'stars' as Tracy's boyfriend. He got so into his role that he made a pass at the actress playing Tracy that she left the production midway. What does one do when your principal actress leaves (and you can't force her to stay because you weren't paying her anyway) and you can't afford (this film is so low-budget, the director sold his comic book collection to help fund it) to re-shoot her scenes? Hey, why not shoot the rest of the film using a stand in and film her from a long ways away? Seriously, this is what they did.
Other points of interest:
* It was my cousin's first time working with putting music to film (he was in university) and he was not familiar with the equipment so the score is also out of synch (i.e. impact notes are early or late for 'scares' etc. and the music does not fit to the rhythm of the action)
* They couldn't afford a dolly so they stole a wheelchair from a local hospital and duct-taped the 8mm cam to it (it's kinda wobbly)
* Late in production they came by some money (some idiot thought he could make money by putting cash into film…well, you can…but not Blood Symbol) so they actually rented a stedicam and a sound boom! This creates further hilarity as the film opens up in fair quality 16mm and after the opening credits it drops down to some awful grade-z 8mm film that looks like it was dragged through an ashbin and processed at the local Kinko's.
* If you follow this link to the
IMDb, you'll notice that Blood Symbol has a staggering crew of 12 people (if you don't count the guy who did the title drawings-which are the highlight of the film-incidentally, that guy is also the guy who wrote the plot summary on that page)…and that there is NO LIGHTING department. And that is quite telling as there is very little light in this film. Tracy's college looks like it's in the middle of a power failure. Ambiance and mood are one thing, but it's ridiculously dark in the hallways (the only light being natural light coming in the windows…and this is no Dogme 95 film).
* The acting is quite hilarious, particularly the director as Steve and Tracy's friend Brenda who reminds me a lot of Daphne from Hobgoblins (except she's not a total slut).
* The dialogue is also hilarious. When Tracy is telling her friends and boyfriend that this creepy guy (Olam) is following her, Brenda says there is no need to worry, "Yeah, its not as if he grabbed her derriere or something!". Derriere?
* Olam, our villain, has pretty crummy makeup. I'm guessing he's supposed to look like he's in his late 100s, but he actual looks like someone threw very lumpy oatmeal in his face. He looks like a white, deformed member of Run D.M.C. with a bad toupee. Seriously, all he's missing is the gold chain.
* Then there's the famous implausibility of a teenaged boyfriend turning down his girlfriend's pleas for him to stay the night (while her parents are away for a month) because she's scared. Talk about 100% chance of bofbleepe. Parents away, scared girl, raging hormones…even the director has acknowledged that this is undeniably unrealistic.
* The director and cinematographer/co-director/producer Tony Morello were childhood best friends…and this movie destroyed that friendship (a small price to pay for high art).
* Tracy has several nightmares where she wakes up (in her bed no less) in a Montreal graveyard. True to form, they did not get permission to film there (and tackily placed the bed over some people's final resting place) and they had to run from the groundskeeper.
* The groundskeeper swiped their reel (for some reason these geniuses were carrying around ALL of the film they'd shot up to that point and had left in a duffle bag in their unlocked car). It was (unfortunately) returned and the groundskeeper said that he'd only taken it because he thought they were grave robbers.
* The music is all played on synthesizers and is very 80s Casioesque (and very grating…sorry Brent).
* Despite being released in 1992, they started filming it in 1985! This leads to a) hilarious 80s fashions, the infamous francophone favorite: HOCKEY HAIR (known as 'mullets' in the USA) and MOUSTACHE and b) huge continuity errors as everyone is visibly older in several scenes.
* You can watch a very blurry clip on
my cousin's site. The shots you will see are mostly of the opening credits (with the not too shabby drawings-like I said, the highlight of the film) and the 16mm footage from the opening and related scenes.
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