Cover Art

Credits

Director: Philip Cruz Starring: April Billingsley, Maury Sterling, Heather Joy Budner, Justin Capaz, Faye Canada, Ron Jeremy Screenplay: Philip Cruz, James Hyde Country: USA

Andre the Butcher has an opening that reminded me of Violent Shit II: Mother Hold My Hand's, but thankfully the fight choreography is better. Given VSII's villain is Karl the Butcher, maybe this was some sort of tribute, but the idea of someone paying tribute to an Andreas Schnass movie hurts my soul.

Anyway, the story is about a team of cheerleaders, the Beavers, who get in a fight with their rivals, the Game Cocks. After kicking ass, two of the Beavers decide to celebrate with a little freeway fellatio, which leads to an accident. Stranded, the group come across a deserted home, and break in. Naturally, they decide to make themselves at home while waiting for help. Meanwhile, two escaped convicts are making their way towards the cabin, and let's also not forget Andre (Jeremy) himself, a killer with more spunk in him than anyone since Orville Ketchum in Hard to Die.

While a few things are definitely borrowed from other sources, like a blender/love scene reminiscent of Braindead, the movie does have its own amusing moments. There's a piss gag that actually works, and the dialogue, while at times annoying, is generally somewhat clever. The youth's hormones are revved to satirical levels, and the climax has the most imaginative creation of holy water I've ever seen. However, there's a lot to dislike as well. Some of the humour is less subtle than a whale hiding in a puddle. The gore is often shoddy, and isn't widespread enough for a ridiculous slasher like this. Over half way in, I was definitely ready for Andre to turn up and cause some carnage, because there just hadn't been enough action. I understand that some viewers can be distracted by light petting scenes, but given there was only one person in the film willing to get naked, and she was a body double, I lost interest in the sex scenes real quick. The film is also a bit morally pompous, which is bound to annoy a few people.

My main problem, though, is that I got Andre to see Jeremy hamming it up. I don't know that I qualify as a true fan of Jeremy's, given that I've never seen him in what most people would consider his main body of work, but he often makes me laugh in his non-hardcore performances. Jeremy does what he can when he's there, but is often doubled waaaaaaaay too noticeably. Perhaps moving on from his ability to self-suck, Jeremy performs auto-anthropophagy in one rather gross scene.