Slime City Massacre (2010) — Triskaidekafiles

SLIME CITY MASSACRE

WRITER: Gregory Lamberson

DIRECTOR: Gregory Lamberson

STARRING: Jennifer Bihl as Alexa
Kealan Patrick Burke as Cory
Debbie Rochon as Alice
Robert C. Sabin as Zachary
Brooke Lewis as Nicole
Mary Bogle as Swan
John Renna as The Mayor
Roy Frumkes as Ronald Crump
Sephera Giron as Ruby
Lee Perkins as Mason

QUICK CUT: A bunch of homeless people seek to protect their meager possessions and shelter from an encroaching threat.

THE MORGUE

Alexa - A young woman just trying to make her way through the post apocalypse. She’s loyal to her boyfriend, and your average nice girl next door.

Cory - Alexa’s boyfriend, who served in the military during the war with Canada. He deserted to run away with Alexa when she was drafted.

Mason - An opportunistic guy that Cory and Alexa run into. He scavenges for goods to sell to make money and set himself up for life.

Alice - Mason’s girlfriend, and they’re a matched set, that’s for sure.

If you can’t do the time, then don’t do the slime.

TRISK ANALYSIS: Welcome back, Triskelions! It's been awhile, so I thought it was time to return to the works of Greg Lamberson, with his sequel to the very gooey and fun Slime City that came 20 years later, Slime City Massacre. So let's get into the goo.

The movie opens up in the late 50s, with a flashback to Zachary, the largely unseen mastermind behind Flesh Control in the first movie, and who slowly took over Alex. And hey, they brought back the actor who played Alex, to play Zach. I like touches like that.

In this flashback, we witness his first meeting with Nicole, and how she joined his cult in the first place. Both of them actually seem like really nice people, y'know, for a prostitute and a cult leader.

Looks pretty good for taking a cleaver to the face.

The movie then jumps to the present day, as Lloyd Kaufman is going about his day, reading his paper, and some sort of bomb goes off, bathing the skies in green light, that causes Lloyd and everyone in the area to burn away. So..not wasting any time here, I see.

Following the credits, the movie jumps ahead seven years which...from when this was filmed, still doesn’t quite reach the actual present present.

Cory and Alexa are making their way through the post apocalypse, just looking for a roof they can put over their heads for a bit. And gosh, they sure do look pretty clean and have real nice clothes for being seven years into the end of the world. But I poke out of fun.

If you strike down Lloyd Kaufman, he will only become more powerful!

And as a nice little easter egg, Detective Irish from the first movie, is seen as they enter a rundown building to join the crowd of survivors. He's muttering "same ugly building" and does little else, but again, it's a nice bit of connective tissue.

Our duo find a locked door, but fortunately, Cory has a convenient set of skeleton keys, that they explain he acquired before the movie. It's a bit convenient, but I'll allow it.

Another nice touch, that really helps this world feel real, is if you watch for it, there is quite a bit of graffiti about Zachary, and his cult. It's never brought attention to, but it's a good detail. My personal favourite is, if I remember correctly, the title of the movie in Spanish markets

They find a nice room to settle into, but find it is occupado already by Mason and Alice. Mason holds the newbies at exposition gunpoint, to get their backstories out of the way. And just a bit of covering my ass, I am certain at some point I will mix up Alexa and Alice’s names.

Fortunately for them, Mason found a door he can't get into, and he hopes Cory's skeleton keyring might help him finally get through, to sell whatever's behind it.

With that all sorted out, Alice welcomes them to Slime City, leading to them settling in, sending us into another flashback.

Pants are in short supply in the end times.

Mostly this sets up the other original characters of the first movie, in their original incarnations, including Roman the poet.

Back in the future present, Mason leads Cory to his secret door, which just so happens to lead to Zachary's old soup kitchen. Ans inside will be familiar bottles of elixir and containers of "Himalayan yogurt" which fortunately doesn't expire.

As they bring Zack's home brew back to their hovel, we get another flashback, mostly with Zachary giving his big flesh control pitch. And it's a nice little speech, delivered fantastically by Sabin.

The green of night falls over the future present, and the core four devour their slime, and drink their elixir, upping the stakes from the first movie. Instead of just Alex and his downward spiral, now we're going to have four people on the bad road to flesh control.

And then the slimy sexytimes start. Eww, sticky.

However, Alice does not have a good reaction to Zach's fine cuisine. So much for inexpireable. She stumbles over to the bathroom, and melts into an orange puddle in the tub.

Cory and Alexa are all slimy like Alex was after his ingestion of the yogurt, and they feel that same urge to get up to some mischief. They cover themselves up in homage bandages, and save a guy from getting beat up buy some preppy dudes. See, they're not so bad.

Unfortunately, the man they save runs into a very blue Mason, who does him in off camera.

While everyone calms down after their little murder part, we have another flashback, with an orgy between Zachary's coven of flesh. So, cutting between sex and violence.

Honestly, they blend in better than you would expect.

The next day, a corrupt real estate mogul rolls into Slime City, with designs to turn it into his next big project. He doesn't care about cutting corners, or the radioactive sky, he can turn them into selling points!

But there is the slight problem of the people that are, y'know, squatting there. Following some discussion, he has his right hand goon call in someone from Black River Security to sweep and clear the place like they're looking for Eric Draven.

Oh, and this real estate mogul? *ahem* Ronald Crump. Huh, rings a bell...

The remaining core four wake up, with no clear memories of their extracurricular activities. Mason finds Alice melted into the tub, and gives her more elixir at her request.

Alexa is craving more elixir as well, and the others could use some as well, as they all devour more of the "yogurt". So the boys head out to bring back more from their stash. Guys, you shouldn't be getting high on your own supply, you won't be selling any!

While the boys get waylaid by some mutants, Alexa investigates the scene of the crime. And she runs into another familiar face from the first movie, Lori. She recognises what's going on, somehow, and offers to tell Alexa what's what, when she's ready to hear the truth.

Now see? THAT is how you make yourself look like you’re in the apocalypse!

Now that their slime supplies are replenished, they gorge themselves on food and drink some more, and then the sex and slimyness resume. You get the idea.

The sex sends the movie back into another flashback, featuring Nicole getting her Flesh Control handbook, and truly joining the coven.

ZachCory and Nicolexa head out to satiate their violent urges, and run into the Mayor of Slime City. He actually fights back pretty well, until he tries to stomp Alexa. She pulls the old mouth in her stomach trick, and bites off his foot.

So we get another flashback, and learn Zachary has cancer, so he is going to perform the ritual, turn himself into slime, and take his whole coven with him, causing no end of trouble for these movies.

Alexa goes and sees Lori, knowing she has to put a stop to this. Lori gives a bit of exposition about what happened to the building, and how she's kept an eye out for the Zack Pack ever since the first film. She then hands over a copy of Flesh Control, and the cleaver from the first movie, to Alexa. As well as the advice to kill the others, and herself.

She then goes to the new Mayor, to get some bullets, and explains the plot mechanics to the boys.

When you stayed up late the night before, and are having trouble staying awake in class.

Mason doesn't like that this plan involves killing themselves, so Alexa holds the boys at gunpoint, and forces them to tie themselves up. Man, imagine if more teachers were like this?

Unfortunately, all of Alexa's work to protect the people of Slime City is for naught, because Ronald Crump's ICE agents are coming to "relocate" the populace.

And that, is the real Slime City Massacre.

Doubly unfortunately, the core four can't contain their urges anymore, and give in fully to the ectoplasm. Also, one of the Black River goon squad busts in, and gets eaten by the reconstituted Alice and her chest vagina. Gosh, there’s a sentence I just wrote.

Pac Man’s ghosts in their dark gritty reboot era.

Good thing they all wore the same colours as their slime forms.

Most of the movie from here on out is just the Zack Pack cleaning up the mess of the mercenaries, and killing them in creative ways.

While Inky, Blinky, Pinky, and Clyde clean up house, the leader of the mercs eventually corners Nicolexa alone. And she bashes his head against the ground. She really only has the one move, huh?

That is not what is meant by Coke bottle glasses…

Later, ZachCory comes on to Nicolexa, and she buries the cleaver in his skull. Romason and Alice barge in, angry, but hey! Kill all you want, we'll just make more! And I want to thank Greg Lamberson for picking names that made it ridiculously easy to make portmanteaus of almost everyone.

But back to the plot, here's a new host right for Zachary n...

OH no wait, that's Lori, back to finish the job she started decades ago, again.

She quickly pulls out a gun and shoots the remaining three, but if you've been paying attention at all these two movies, you know that's not gonna work for long.

Everyone's skulls crack open, and a trio of brains attack Lori. She takes out two of them, but Nicole's lives on, and bites down on Lori, ending her threat once and for all.

The movie wraps up by Ronald Crump returning to Slime City to claim it, but he gets eaten by a pack of liberals. Whew. Thank gods for that. Could you imagine if THAT guy got elected president??

And finally, Nicolexa drives off into the sunset to spread the slime another time.

TRISK ASSESSMENT

Video: This looks really good. Sharp, bright, easy to see, the colours really pop. We’ve come a long way in 20 years.

Audio: Sounds really good.

Sound Bite: “So, our Himalayan yogurt...is actually ectoplasm" It was the straight faced delivery that did it for me with this line.

Body Count: HOO boy. After a few very light, quick movies, with not a lot of deaths, this movie comes packed with stuff.

1 - The world ends two and a half minutes in, and a woman is the first victim we see killed.
2 - Shortly followed by Lloyd Kaufman
3 - Alexa bashes one of the preppy's heads against the ground
4 - Cory kills another
5 - And then Mason offs the bum
6 - Cory crushes the Mayor's face.
7 - Alice the puddle eats away a random guy
8 - Lori takes out a random goon
9 - And then another
10 - Black River leader shoots the new mayor in the head.

And then there's the titular Slime City Massacre where about two dozen people get killed off camera

11 - Alice shoves a guy's head into her chest vagina
12 - Cory bites a guy in the head.
13 - Romason gouges a guy's eyes out with bottles.
14 - Some poor random is being eaten by the leather crew mutants
15 - And they then chase down one of the Black River mercs
16 - Alexa bashes the head of the security force on the ground.
17 - A random hooker is devoured by Alice
18 - Pinky cleavers ZachCory right in the noggin
19 - Laurie shoots Mason in the face
20 - And then Alice
21 - Nicole's brain bites Laurie to death
22 - Ronald Krump gets eaten

Best Corpse: Those bottles to the eyes are very memorable. A great gag.

Blood Type - A+: So much blood, so many effects, so much slime and goo. A great job.

Sex Appeal: Lots of sex, and a naked Alice, if you can get past the torso vagina.

Drink Up! Every time they drink some elixir.

Movie Review: This movie was a lot of fun. It’s a bit of a ballsy move to make a sequel to a gooey gross movie from the 80s decades later, and decide to start off with the end of the world. It sets a very different tone, but doesn’t lose the original’s humour and strangeness. And definitely not the slimeiness. The plot is a bit shaky for me, but it’s mostly there to serve as a vehicle to deliver the effects and gooey goodness, and it works on that level. The original movie benefited from being a bit more focused than this, but the scale of this one with four flesh controlled bodies wreaking havoc is a lot of fun. If I had a complaint, its that the flashbacks never really add anything, aside from just straight up showing us the mythology. But we got to see Robert Sabin again, so I’m not going to complain TOO loudly. Three out of five pastel coloured brains.

Entertainment Value: I don’t really have much to add here that I haven’t already said, but this movie is, once again, just a lot of fun. If you’re a fan of the original, it amps everything there up to another level, and brings back familiar faces while doing it. It is gooey, and icky, and just a wild ride of big ideas. I prefer the first movie’s more intimate, singular horror nature, but I cannot fault this movie’s ambition and expanding of the world. Four out of five skeleton keys.