Smash Cut (2009)

Undescribable Perfection

So much average

Entertaining from beginning to end, it maintains the spirit of the franchise while establishing it's own seal with a fun cast

As somebody who had not heard any of this before, it became a curious phenomenon to sit and watch a film and slowly have the realities begin to click into place.

Worst movie i ever seen. Makeup was awful and more than unrealistic. I could do it in dark and two minutes. Situation too unrealistic and too stupid, people, even those who live in cellar all life are more educated and could do things better. Stupid, unrealistic, unfunny, not scary, really awful movie. What? why i should write ten lines? Where's the logic? If i have nothing more to say about that? I have said everything already. Worst movie i ever seen. Makeup was awful and more than unrealistic. I could do it in dark and two minutes. Situation too unrealistic and too stupid, people, even those who live in cellar all life are more educated and could do things better. Stupid, unrealistic, unfunny, not scary, really awful movie. What? why i should write ten lines? Where's the logic? If i have nothing more to say about that? I have said everything already.

I will be completely honest, the main reason I wanted to see this film was because it starred a very well-known former XXX hardcore porn star, I knew she professionally acted later in the Steven Soderbergh film The Girlfriend Experience, so I was keen to see what she was like, and I guess I was up for a cheesy scary movie. Basically the latest film from director Able Whitman (David Hess) has had many negative comments from cinema goers, poor reviews from critics and very low box office takings, and frustrated his only entertainment and distraction comes when he goes into a strip club. There he meets and takes home stripper Georgina Carson aka Gigi Spot (Jennilee Murray), and he is most interested in her that he may like to cast her in his next film, a sequel to the one recently getting the negativity, but they end up in a road accident killing Gigi, and he has to do something with the body. In a moment of madness he remembers cinema goers saying that all his gore effects look fake, so he decides in convenience to use parts of the dead body he has and "disguise" them as set pieces and props to use in his new horror film. Meanwhile television news celebrity April Carson (former porn star Sasha Grey), Gigi's sister, joins forces with private investigator Isaac Beaumonde (Jesse Buck) to help find her sister, and with Whitman being the last person to have apparently seen her she pretends to be a wannabe actress and get a part in his latest film being made. The new set design and the new "more realistic" props are met with praise by the crew members and studio heads, and when more "props" are needed the madman resorts to going on a killing spree murdering crew members for their blood and body parts, and he even drains some of his own blood. Whitman gets going on a return to good form for the film industry, finding a long lost film to open the audiences to before his brand new film is presented, but obviously his evil plans are discovered, and not long before he can finish and premiere his "masterpiece" he is killed. Also starring The Hills Have Eyes' Michael Berryman as Philip Farmsworth Jr., Herschell Gordon Lewis as Fred Sandy / Radio Announcer, Ray Sager as Reverend Roscoe Boone, Michael Dubue as Alan Dackman and Barry Blake as Armand Parys. Hess is alright as the psychopathic filmmaker, Grey at least shows she can act a little – but I'd have to see more of her (in acting, and flesh terms technically, LOL), the rest of the cast are hardly worth mentioning, especially Buck who was dreadful, well, actually it was the whole film that was dreadful, the plot and story are pointless and not all that imaginative, it is predictable and most of the time tiresome, no body parts and blood spattering can rescue it, I would not waste my time watching it because it is an awful horror comedy. Pretty poor!

Two things might attract you to this movie; if you're like C, it's the prospect of seeing adult film actress Sasha Grey doing something other than swallowing massive meat (although why you would want to see her doing anything but that is a mystery to me), or you're like myself, and want to see a movie that is a tribute to the life and works of the God Father of gore H.G. Lewis....The gore, or lack of it, is another disappointment. The effects aren't really the problem, I realised that they were obviously fake to mimic some of the questionable gore props used in the 60s and 70s however I distinctly remember most of Lewis' gore being quite revolting and of bad taste. In 'Smash Cut' they are all played for a laugh which was a bit of a shame. In addition to this, and contrary to much of Lewis' ethos, many of the gore scenes are remarkably weak, nothing much is shown. On occasion the gore is there with some guts and plenty of blood, but certainly nothing which sticks in your head like in Lewis' movies.'Smash Cut' delivers an experience which is occasionally close to the great Lewis movies of old, too often though it forces the formula too far, with the 'bad acting' coming off a little to camp, and many of the jokes coming too close to seeming like a bit of a micky take. There are many aspects of the movie which fall short, but overall, the main problem remains that for a movie attempting to pay homage to the God Father of gore, it's not anyway near gory enough.Read the full review at: beyondthegore

For a porn actress seeking to cross over to the mainstream, taking a role in a B-(or less)-movie might seem like a heaven-sent opportunity, but if your name's Sasha Grey (real name Marina Ann Hantzis), you might want to think twice about appearing in a Lee Demarbre flick.For the uninitiated, Demarbre is a Canadian film maker whose credits include the cult film Jesus Christ Vampire Hunter, which was shot on a budget of $45,000.His latest offering, Smash Cut, which made its world debut at Montreal's 2009 edition of the Fantasia Film Festival, is an equally low budget nod to schlock impresario Herschell Gordon Lewis (Two Thousand Maniacs, The Wizard of Gore). While such a film would seem like a natural opportunity for someone from the adult film realm to use as a segue into the mainstream, a later production – Steven Soderbergh's "The Girlfriend Experience" also starring Grey - was released well before Smash Cut, making this look like her second mass market role, when, in fact, the reverse is true. All of which is too bad for Grey, who is the only member of the cast who displays anything remotely approaching acting talent.The story, such as it is, is thin, and one can suppose that Demarbre was merely looking for a vehicle for tongue-in-cheek humor and gore. A down on his luck director by the name of Able Whitman (played by veteran shock horror actor David Hess of original Last House on the Left fame), dismayed by the critical reception to his cheap films special effects, decides to use real human body parts to impart realism. His first victim turns out to be a relative of April Carson (Grey), a reporter for a local television station. With the backing of her station manager (H.G. Lewis) she sets out to infiltrate Whitman's production by responding to a casting call.None of this really matters, though, as the film's true mission is to emulate the low budget schlock of Lewis' films, which it does admirably and is about the only critical compliment I can give this film.Overall the story is poorly executed trash. In keeping with the Lewis factor, everyone involved with the exception of Grey seems to be trying to outdo each other on the bad acting scale. Lines appear to be not merely improved, but takes are used that show actors struggling on the fly to think them up.Grey, whose acting is wildly uneven, is the only cast member who shows any potential of being able to believably take on a role, whether or not this was by choice or accident, given the atrocious performances turned in by the rest of the cast, is a matter for further debate.What's unfortunate, however, is that this movie will be released after Grey's performance in Soderbergh's "The Girlfriend Experience", and look like a step down from a promising debut.What's not in question here is Grey's acting ability, but the projects she chooses to appear in from here on in. Some of this may not be within her control, given her ongoing career in the adult realm, but choosing to appearing a mainstream film that has all the look, feel, and production values of a porn film (minus the sex) can hardly be taken as a wise career move.