Basket Case (1982)

 

Genre: Horror/ Comedy

Time: 1h 31mins

Director: Frank Henenlotter

Quick Summary: A young man carrying a big basket that contains his extremely deformed, formerly conjoined twin brother seeks vengeance on the doctors who separated them against their will.

(Warning: Gore Image below)

Nothing beats a good grindhouse film.

I enjoyed this film so much I ended up rewatching it a couple of days later. This is awful, but the good awful. You love it because it's so bad. I know this is a comedy but everything about it is so funny. 

The non-demformed brother duane, falls in love with this woman within five minutes of meeting her, his delivery for all his lines are so bad it's brilliant, he feels a little campy to be honest with how clueless the poor guy is towards everything. The deformed brother, is a masterpiece of creature design. The thing itself looks ridiculous, but honestly if I saw that in real life I would probably pee my pants and run. There are some brilliant moments when he just falls to the floor with a loud thump, or bursts from the basket literally screaming (which is what he does for most of the film). There was even one moment where his brother leaves him alone in a room to go meet this woman, so the deformed brother crawls out and goes on a rampage in the room and it honestly sounds/ looks like a squashed monkey running around throwing things. 

Everything is washed out with red and blue neon, every location is dirty and grungy, the film itself is beautifully grainy. The gore is actually incredible. Sure it's over the top but for such a low budget film it's brilliant. My favourite part is when a doctor gets loads of surgical knives smashed into her face. As well, considering this is so low budget, the stop motion for the demfored brother is honestly really good. 

I'll tell you what, this beats many blockbuster film for me as I was invested the whole way through. It's so captivating to watch this gorey, terrible film, and I can say proudly I adore it. An alternative story about revenge and funnily enough, brotherly love, though I wouldn't recommend you watch this with your family. I love the scenes were duane is just pacing back and forward talking to his brother, but it's basically him talking to himself as we don't hear the responses, and the emotions this poor guy goes through during these are hilarious. 

If you haven't seen this I do recommend you do, as it's wild and wonderfully sleazy. Right up the ally for most horror film fans. A hidden gem. 

9/10

"Duane Bradley: No, he's deformed. A freak, he looks like a squashed octopus!"