When filmmakers love to make movies, and they really love the genre they're working in, it is apparent from the very first frame to the last. You don't have to question it, you don't have to analyze it very deeply. It's there. Period. It's like the old sayings about both pornography and art: "I don't know exactly what it is, but I'll know it when I see it."
THE SUPER is the grindhouse-infused labor of love from New York indie filmmakers Evan Makrogiannis and Brian Weaver, and there's no mistaking from the word "go" that this writing/directing team cut their B-cinema teeth on all the gritty, grimy classics of the Seventies - most definitely William Lustig's controversial masterpiece MANIAC, but also the work of everyone from Lucio Fulci, Frank Hennenlotter and Gary Sherman, to Alfred Sole and Abel Ferrara. Weaver and Makrogiannis followed the trail of bloody breadcrumbs left to them by their predecessors, and they've used it to take the audience by the hand and lead them to a cottage of carnage, the likes of which hasn't been seen since directors like David Schmoeller and Charles Band first picked up a camera.
Another first premiere at Dallas' Blood Bath 2 Film Festival, this was probably the initial introduction of these gents to many, and it won't soon be forgotten (the Festival's Best Feature Film prize is overwhelming proof of that.) The terrifying, tawdry and ultimately tragic tale unfolds as we are introduced to George (the amazing Demitri Kallas), the super of the title to the rundown tenement somewhere in the city that he owns and somehow keeps together. This immigrant jack-of-all-trades, who is also a Vietnam vet, appears congenial and friendly on the outside...the kind of character who certainly wouldn't be unwelcome even in the fantasy confines of a place like Sesame Street. But underneath that sweet, hard-working facade lies the jagged shards of a shattered soul, fractured by the scars of war, the loss of many of the only people who understood and helped him - his war buddies, and the pressures of an ever-changing world he is finding it harder and harder to understand, let alone fit into.
One of the few bright spots left in his life is his wife, Maureen, beautifully played by genre veteran Lynn Lowry, (THE CRAZIES and I DRINK YOUR BLOOD). As a beacon of light, she alone helps to chase away the dark shadows, at least for a time. Until that darkness encroaches in its most compelling and most overpowering of forms: a darkly seductive, menacing tenant named Olga (a star turn by indie staple Manoush), who is in turn attracted to the darkness she senses lurks within George, and helps to draw it out of him in twisted and terrifying ways that will effect and explode within the lives of everyone they come in touch with...meaning just about everyone in the building.
Dark, brooding and as industrial-strength vicious as the best of anything the Seventies had to offer, THE SUPER is not for the faint of heart. Even so-called jaded, hard-case grindhouse fans may find themselves temporarily taken aback. Which is even more proof that the hard work that Weaver and Makrogiannis poured into this movie is eclipsed only by the level of their talent. These guys know exactly what the hell they're doing and how to do it.
And it shows especially in the casting. Kallas and Manoush are rare indie finds, and the chemistry they spark on-screen together electrifies every scene they share. They are easily slasher horror's answer to Sweeney Todd and Mrs. Lovett...if old Nellie were more into leather, whips and chains, rather than making human pot pies.
The "innocent antagonists" side isn't as well represented, but in classic form, you learn just enough about them to care before they wind up on the business end of George and Olga's "new friendship." The standouts, of course, are mostly the more unpleasant characters: Tony Bava, the racist, narcissistic bodybuilding meathead of a tenant (Bill McLaughlin); a detective named Sardusky (Ron Braunstein), so soul-deep despicable, he could make Vic Mackey look like Mother Teresa, and the comic relief which arrives in the form of the completely-off "Franny The Tranny" (the unforgettable Brandon Slagle). Rounding off the "victim's corner" are Edgar Moye and Ruby La Rocca as an attractive interracial yuppie couple you just know aren't bound for "happily ever after"; Kathryn Zarwiski as a tenant who's just unlucky enough to be around when George has a REALLY bad day, and in an all-too brief cameo, indie goddess Raine Brown, whose unfortunate fate practically introduces the picture.
If you fondly remember the old days of Times Square, when taking a stroll through could mean taking your life in your hands, and the theaters that showed the greatest of the genre movies of that period (when they weren't showing porno of every stripe imaginable), either your name is Quentin Tarantino, or you were actually there. In any case, you have the day to look forward to, when you can catch THE SUPER at a festival near you, or (fortune being kind) pop it into your DVD player when it becomes available. (Squishy theater seats and sticky floors not included.)
THE SUPER is the grindhouse-infused labor of love from New York indie filmmakers Evan Makrogiannis and Brian Weaver, and there's no mistaking from the word "go" that this writing/directing team cut their B-cinema teeth on all the gritty, grimy classics of the Seventies - most definitely William Lustig's controversial masterpiece MANIAC, but also the work of everyone from Lucio Fulci, Frank Hennenlotter and Gary Sherman, to Alfred Sole and Abel Ferrara. Weaver and Makrogiannis followed the trail of bloody breadcrumbs left to them by their predecessors, and they've used it to take the audience by the hand and lead them to a cottage of carnage, the likes of which hasn't been seen since directors like David Schmoeller and Charles Band first picked up a camera.
Another first premiere at Dallas' Blood Bath 2 Film Festival, this was probably the initial introduction of these gents to many, and it won't soon be forgotten (the Festival's Best Feature Film prize is overwhelming proof of that.) The terrifying, tawdry and ultimately tragic tale unfolds as we are introduced to George (the amazing Demitri Kallas), the super of the title to the rundown tenement somewhere in the city that he owns and somehow keeps together. This immigrant jack-of-all-trades, who is also a Vietnam vet, appears congenial and friendly on the outside...the kind of character who certainly wouldn't be unwelcome even in the fantasy confines of a place like Sesame Street. But underneath that sweet, hard-working facade lies the jagged shards of a shattered soul, fractured by the scars of war, the loss of many of the only people who understood and helped him - his war buddies, and the pressures of an ever-changing world he is finding it harder and harder to understand, let alone fit into.
One of the few bright spots left in his life is his wife, Maureen, beautifully played by genre veteran Lynn Lowry, (THE CRAZIES and I DRINK YOUR BLOOD). As a beacon of light, she alone helps to chase away the dark shadows, at least for a time. Until that darkness encroaches in its most compelling and most overpowering of forms: a darkly seductive, menacing tenant named Olga (a star turn by indie staple Manoush), who is in turn attracted to the darkness she senses lurks within George, and helps to draw it out of him in twisted and terrifying ways that will effect and explode within the lives of everyone they come in touch with...meaning just about everyone in the building.
Dark, brooding and as industrial-strength vicious as the best of anything the Seventies had to offer, THE SUPER is not for the faint of heart. Even so-called jaded, hard-case grindhouse fans may find themselves temporarily taken aback. Which is even more proof that the hard work that Weaver and Makrogiannis poured into this movie is eclipsed only by the level of their talent. These guys know exactly what the hell they're doing and how to do it.
And it shows especially in the casting. Kallas and Manoush are rare indie finds, and the chemistry they spark on-screen together electrifies every scene they share. They are easily slasher horror's answer to Sweeney Todd and Mrs. Lovett...if old Nellie were more into leather, whips and chains, rather than making human pot pies.
The "innocent antagonists" side isn't as well represented, but in classic form, you learn just enough about them to care before they wind up on the business end of George and Olga's "new friendship." The standouts, of course, are mostly the more unpleasant characters: Tony Bava, the racist, narcissistic bodybuilding meathead of a tenant (Bill McLaughlin); a detective named Sardusky (Ron Braunstein), so soul-deep despicable, he could make Vic Mackey look like Mother Teresa, and the comic relief which arrives in the form of the completely-off "Franny The Tranny" (the unforgettable Brandon Slagle). Rounding off the "victim's corner" are Edgar Moye and Ruby La Rocca as an attractive interracial yuppie couple you just know aren't bound for "happily ever after"; Kathryn Zarwiski as a tenant who's just unlucky enough to be around when George has a REALLY bad day, and in an all-too brief cameo, indie goddess Raine Brown, whose unfortunate fate practically introduces the picture.
If you fondly remember the old days of Times Square, when taking a stroll through could mean taking your life in your hands, and the theaters that showed the greatest of the genre movies of that period (when they weren't showing porno of every stripe imaginable), either your name is Quentin Tarantino, or you were actually there. In any case, you have the day to look forward to, when you can catch THE SUPER at a festival near you, or (fortune being kind) pop it into your DVD player when it becomes available. (Squishy theater seats and sticky floors not included.)