Street Trash

"Street trash makes Herschell Gordon Lewis look like Mary Poppins," - Wes Craven"Loathsome, foul and degrading, Street Trash is a real treat for anyone who thinks they've seen it all." - George Romero"Yeah, that's the bits I like." - Den Dennis (The Comic Strip Presents...More Bad News - 1988)Produced and written by Roy Frumkes (The Substitute), and directed by J. Michael Muro, who since done stedicam work on such films as Terminator 2: Judgment Day (1991), True Lies (1994), L.A. Confidential (1997), and Titanic (1997) to name a few, Street Trash (1987) features Mike Lackey, Marc Sferrazza, Jane Arakawa, Bill Chepil, Pat Ryan (The Toxic Avenger, Class of Nuke 'Em High), Vic Noto (Innocent Blood), and Tony Darrow (Goodfellas, Analyze This, "The Sopranos").The story basically involves the activities of two inner city homeless brothers named Freddy (Lackey) and Kevin (Sferrazza), who live in an auto scrap yard occupying a dwelling consisting of old tires. Thrown into the mix early on is the appearance of some funky looking booze called Tenafly Viper, which was found in the cellar of a liquor store by the store's proprietor. Subsequently he decides to pawn it off on his clientele, most all of whom are shiftless, degenerate dirtbags, for a buck a bottle (needless to say they snap it up). Turns out the stuff is rotgut, literally (unbeknownst to the liquor store owner), so much so it causes the individual ingesting the crud to melt from the inside out. Along with the exploding bums Freddy and Kevin also have to contend with Bronson (Noto), a large, sadistic, psychotic Vietnam veteran who rules the scrap yard with an iron fist and a dagger made of from a human femur bone (think a low grade Colonel Kurtz from Apocalypse Now). Things get especially hairy when a local mobster (Darrow) finds out his girlfriend's been murdered (among other things) by the skid row denizens populating the junk yard, and a renegade cop with a serious grudge named Bill (Chepil) starts rousting everyone for kicks.I guess the first thing one should know about this film is that there really isn't much of a story, which, in most cases, would probably be a disadvantage, but not so here (for those of us who tend to dwell in the cinematic sludge this is fairly common occurrence). Probably the best thing you can do is sit back and let the experience envelope you in its grimy, odious, putrid fetidity, which comes off as a sort of sewage laden mix between the films of John Waters and Herschell Gordon Lewis. I did learn a number of things from this movie, including the following...1. One can actually make a home out of discarded tires.2. If you wear baggy enough pants to the grocery store, you can steal enough food to feed at least three people.3. I wouldn't eat anything that came out of a homeless man's pants.4. You can thin out homemade hooch by urinating in it.5. An alley is a great place to pick up broads, especially if you're a greasy bum (and the broad is wasted out of her gourd).6. Your puke breath must be really bad when a bum won't even kiss you.7. Frank, the morbidly obese owner and operator of the scrap yard, isn't adverse to a little necrophilia.8. The homeless don't particularly covet showers.9. A severed ding a ling a can be used in lieu of a football in a pick up game.10. You never defile Bronson in front of the men.If you like your movies messy, in a visceral sense, then you've come to the right place as this spectacularly over the top nugget of gooey nastiness is right at home next to Peter Jackson's Dead Alive (1992). I'm unsure the deal with the Viper booze, but its effects are instantaneous and highly satisfying. There's some seriously nasty melt action here, perhaps my favorite being the early scene with guy sitting on the toilet, taking a slug, and then reduced to a slimy, festering pile floating in the bowl. Along with the gratuitously goopy goodness there's also a whole lot of comedy, a few fights (the most memorable being Bill the cop going toe to toe with Bronson), some female nekkidness, a severed male member, and whole lot more. The acting was pretty rank but it didn't take away from anything for me, especially given the entertaining dialog throughout. The two best lines (at least of the ones I could post here), in my opinion, are the one I used for the title of my review and the following, occurring after one of Freddy's acquaintances, after shoving copious amounts of food down his pants, is busted by a manager in a grocery store ...Store manager: I'd like to know what you're doing with all that chicken in your pants.As I said, there's a decent amount of comedy here, the funniest part for me, beside the flying woody sequence, was when Freddy picked up the drunk broad in the alley, after she just finished puking. As he was dragging her back to his Goodyear abode, she kept trying to kiss him and he kept try to avoid it, given her puke breath and all. To sum things up this is a completely vile and disgusting affair, one definitely worth the time if you have the stomach.This new 2 DVD set released in 2006, entitled 'The Meltdown Edition', includes an anamorphic widescreen (1.78:1) transfer, audio in a newly remastered Dolby Digital 5.1 and the original 2.0 mono, two audio commentaries featuring producer Roy Frumkes and director James Muro, a two hour documentary entitled The Meltdown Memoirs, which details the history and the making of the film, the original 16mm short film that inspired the movie, a Street Trash promotional teaser, a behind the scenes still gallery, liner notes, and the original theatrical trailer. The interesting thing is, while the 2006 DVD release contains a ton more stuff than the original 2005 DVD release, the newer version is missing one really cool element...with the original DVD release there was included two printed label stickers so you could create your own bottle of Tenafly Viper.Cookieman108

Requested gift, recipient appreciated

In just the first two minutes of the awesomely awful Street Trash, we are treated to instances of bad acting, shaky editing, implausible plot, garish title credits, and horribly hokey, electronic music. And none of it matters, because Street Trash is the most unapologetically glorious and ghoulish film the good folks at Troma never made (but probably wish they did).With a diabolical sense of humor and hilariously hard-boiled (and highly quotable) dialog, Street Trash is also quite possibly the dirtiest movie ever made - and I'm talking about dirt in the "dug out of the earth" sense, not dirty in a sexual sense (although there is a bunch of nudity, a dash of necrophilia, and a touch of wiener-tossing for good (or bad) measure (the last of which brings a more literal meaning to the word "dismemberment")).Featuring fantastic sets (including quite possibly the greatest junkyard hideout in cinematic history) and authentic Skid Row New York locations, the grime is so gratuitously applied and supplied to places and faces that some of the actors' lips seem glow-in-the-dark bright by comparison. The grossout effects are also surprisingly good for such a low budget filth fest (they were realistic enough to make me cringe, anyway). For sure, a lot of this film's fun comes from watching each person having their, shall we say, colorful meltdowns...Street Trash features the first work of such eventual cinematic luminaries as Jim Muro, the cinematographer of Crash (as well as The Last Mimzy!) and X-Men and Usual Suspects director Bryan Singer. Equally notable is James Lorinz' hysterical first acting outing as the outrageously disrespectful doorman. Plus one of the greatest end credits songs of all time, performed by Sopranos' stalwart Tony Darrow.Stay away from this film if you're weak of stomach, but definitely feel free to use this delightful piece of cinematic grotesquery as a dieting aid, as this movie will do such a good job of making you lose your appetite that you'll be looking for it for days! Ultimately, I think the best indication of the raunchy, sleazy ride you're in for with this flick is expressed by one of the last acknowledgements in the end credits, which reads: "Thanks, Anita, for taking me to see 'I Drink Your Blood' when I was six."Yup, that about sums it up. Thanks, Anita!

This movie felt like a bunch of litttle offensive episodes all glued together with slime.It follows soooo many characters it can't halp but feel that way.(Cemetary Man had a similar episodic feel, if you've seen that one.)That being said, this flick was wildly enjoyable,amazingly offensive,and so cheesy, you could bait a mouse-trap with it!!It's basically about several homeless denizens,their junk-yard turf, the psychotic vietnam-vet who rules over the homeless kingdom,and a liquor called Tenefly Viper that will melt any who drink it, into a puddle of paint, in a matter of seconds.The dialogue is witty albeit painfully offensive to all.And the gore is so over-the-top, you'll laugh as the bodies start to pile er......pool.A plethora of cheesey special effects make this flick an absolute must own!!It's the epitome of "so bad it's good" horror flix!!!Essentially, it was waaaay ahead of it's time.The two scenes at the end are the creme de la creme of both horror & comedy!Not the mention the infamous game of keep-away involving an all too private possession. LOL!!!**BONUS**This particular edition of "Street Trash" comes with 2 Tenefly Viper stickers, so you can make your own bottles of the "Viper"....and melt your friends into puddles of joy.MORAL OF THE STORY:Tenefly Viper!!It's the drink that melts in your mouth AND in your hands.