A late-80s horror flick, one that I don’t recall hearing about in the late 80s. There was mostly garbage for horror movies in 1989. A whole lot of “Part Threes” and “Part Fives” basic a.f. watered-down sequels, aside from “Shocker,” “Pet Sematary,” “Warlock,” and “Tetsuo: The Iron Man” not a damned thing stands out as being much good at all. So why the hell had I not heard of this one back in them Gen X’y olden days?
The first inkling that this movie isn’t going to be a normal affair is the first scene. A rich girl is getting dressed for a party or something while her rich kid brother plays basketball outside… all normal stuff, save for a small bronze sculpture of a dude slobbing his own knob on her dressing table. Wait… what?!?! If you blink you’ll miss it, seems almost Easter Eggy, but there it is. The first of a bunch of randomly weird shit scattered about this flick.
Also, in the opening the most important credit to be noted is “surrealistic makeup effects by Screaming Mad George.” Whatever must have happened in this guy’s past? He’s just delightfully-damaged!
On the surface it’s a fairly ordinary 80’s teen horror romp, even a little dull. There were plenty of dull teen horror romps in the 80’s, “Sleep-Over Party Mutual Masturbation Nightmare” and “Summer Camp Slap n’ Tickle Massacre” and “Night Of The Satanic Heavy-Petting Beach Party Murders.” If I didn’t know better I might have suspected this was a spoof, with of all the tropes of 80’s teen horror on shameless display. I’m watching the first half hour or so and thinking “Why would my friends recommend this completely unimaginative piece of shit?”
The story centers around a rich kid and his rich family in rich society. Super-duper. Rich Kid’s sister goes off to her coming-out party (It’s a weird thing rich people do, it’s a snooty banquet to celebrate when a teenage rich girl is officially “on the market”) and Rich Kid’s (he has an actual name, by the way. William/ Bill, but who cares?) friend that the family disapproves of (on account of his Jewishness) opens his junior spy DIY espionage kit and takes out a tape recorder, and plays a tape of Rich Kid’s family doing some straight-up weird maybe-sex recordings from a microphone bug he planted into her earring. Weird shit… but then when Rich Kid plays it for his shrink it’s all normal, not quite so incesty and, I dunno, squishy? It sounded kinda wet and squishy. Now Rich Kid is suspicious of his family.
Rightly-so, of course. People who become crazy rich didn’t get that way because they “worked real hard.” Probably owned and/or trafficked a bunch of humans generations ago, or bankrolled civil wars in the Third World for a piece of their natural resources, or perhaps some garden variety Nazi stuff. Mansion- rich is basically proof that someone made a deal with Satan, and then the tacky way they decorate that mansion is proof that Satan has a sense of humor.
FYI, while I’m thinking about it, there are plenty of options where you can stream Society, including an option to watch it free on Sling. If I could make a recommendation – just pay for it. When you watch it for free it’s heavily-censored. 80’s-style “Bleeps” in place of dirty words, blurs over anything remotely sexy, like butts in swimsuits. For three bucks on Vudu (or “Slaptastic” or whatever they call it now) you can just watch it like a normal movie rather than a censored-for-80’s-television version. Plus, if you pause it for a moment and go off to make poops, when you get back to it the Sling player will kick you off and you’ll have to start the movie all over again and then fast-forward to where you left off, and that’s just super. No one should be punished for making poops. They should only be punished for where they leave those poops.
Halfway through the movie there are no real surprises, though something is definitely “off” in every other scene. “How do you like your tea? With milk? Sugar? Or would you like me to pee in it?” Rich Kid is being tipped off about a conspiracy or some sort and is trying to track it down. That said, the movie is still not really knocking my socks off. Rich Kid is either onto something or he’s just hallucinating everything, and everyone is sweaty all the time.
Then we get to the last 20 minutes in the movie. I have to tell you, the last 20 minutes of hallucinogenic fever dream is worth sitting through the first 75 minutes. Mido and I probably need some therapy now. That’s all I’m going to say about it, you butthead.
