Hectic Knife Review from Troma Entertainment!
I reckon the movie terms, ‘experimental’ and ‘underground’ have always gone hand in hand. When the majors and small labels won’t approach your idea, you D.I.Y. cheaply but put a lot of mad editing and bewildering concepts together so that whoever stumbles across your tasty little movie, will be hit by a maelstrom of unforgettable madness.
Such is the appeal of Hectic Knife. Its budget is so low it’s spending a fiver and keeping change for a pizza afterwards. However, creator, Greg DeListo has oodles of weirdness humming around in his cranium to more than make up for any financial shortcomings. Here’s the think — he’s no stranger to making the ol’ moving images. He’s directed and performed cinematography duties on so many underground things, I get the feeling this amateur sniff around the edges is on purpose. Mind you, he describes it as a “6 year in the making labour of love, blood, sweat, tears and bagels…”
Opening on a dirty grimy black and white street at night scene, a whore smokes then speaks into the camera, shouting at someone. There’s noises and a rolling trash can lid. Suddenly some grinning dickhead lurks from the shadows. How she doesn’t hear him behind her with his syringe and gun is anyone’s guess! “I’m gonna inject you with some drugs.” he leers, grabbing hold of her. “Get away from me, you fuckin’ creep! You’re a junky.” Shit, she sounds so bored at first, then you realise she is over-the-top in a very over-the-top movie!
From out of the darkness comes a stranger wielding two rather big knives. The fiend kid has no idea what to do. “Oh my God, thank you so much. You saved my life from that awful junky!” says the hooker after he’s been sliced up. The blonde fella glares down at her. “Fuck you!”
“My name is Hectic Knife. People say I’m a vigilante. But mostly I’m a piece of shit!” begins the narration as our antihero stares out at the city from a roof top. “I only eat hard-boiled eggs, and I live in a city ruled by scum!” We see all types of criminal blokes and we also see Hectic Knife dispatching some in a violent fashion. He used to care about the people he saved, but nowadays he thinks it sucks. “Next time I hear a call for help, I’m gonna blow my fuckin’ brains out.” Thus, he has to roll his eyes as he chances upon a woman in trouble down an alley — again. He simply stands defenceless as the big guy chokes him. “Hello? Could you just save me, you asshole?” The victim cannot believe what she is seeing. Hectic Knife digs a blade in, and his martial arts moves are absolutely hilarious. She still isn’t impressed though. “You’re meant to be saving me. I mean, this is pathetic.” she says, whilst the big man shanks our hero and breaks his fingers. Suddenly, Hectic Knife plunges his own knife in. “Ha ha, you’re dying and I don’t give a fuck!” sneers the victim over the fading away villain. “In fact, I’m happy about it. Criminal dickhead!” She loves our hero now. “Will I ever see you again?” The dying bad guy smiles with his guts hanging out. “I really think they’re gonna make a cute couple.” he says.
In his personal life, Hectic has nothing but debts. Letters and threatening phone calls. In his savings tin sits one lonely button. What can a depressed down on his luck superhero do? Put adverts up all over for a roommate. Enter, Link – a slacker with a wad of comics, and a bigger wad of bank notes. Hectic seeks advice from his old friend, Harry, who suggests taking time off. Suddenly, there’s a drug deal going on behind them. “Oh, I love drugs. You gotta love drugs.” grins one fella handing a bag out. “Orange pills. I ain’t never seen orange pills in a drugs bag. An’ I seen a lotta drugs, but never no orange pills. Orange pills. Yeah I said, orange pills…” says another.
“Yo! What the fuck is that?” they turn as Hectic begins his martial arts knives routine. As per usual, the bad dudes get the better of him for a while, but he makes a comeback and takes them down. He sticks his blades into his own skull and begins a flashback to India (which is the same streets the movie has so far been filmed — later on, in a second flashback, some fella walks by with his dog!), many years ago and how he became Hectic Knife with his guru who says many mystical things, then shrugs. “We’re in India, we’re training, I gotta say all this shit!” back to the present, and the last bad dude has some wicked moves like he does. Harry rescues him and they find information on the guy about the main bad man in this movie, Piggly Doctor.
Piggly Doctor is pure evil in 3D glasses. He happily blows up random children. He is the villain! Meanwhile, the hardboiled girl, Frannie, whom Hectic saved earlier, finds him and wants to be his girlfriend. In a jaw-dropping pointless, but incredibly addictive scene, Frannie introduces herself over twenty times to Link in all differing voices and accents. After she’s settled in, Hectic decides to pursue clues as to who Piggly Doctor is. He figures it is going to be something big.
Finding his hippy police buddy, Rockin’ Ray dead with a blood written sign – STAY THE FUCK AWAY, this might be one dangerous road. We do see that both hero and villain have women troubles, Frannie is stealing from her man, and Piggly has an eye-patched assistant in his face about having an evil baby together. Hectic traces Piggly to his clinic but fails terribly to stop his nemesis. He then basically gives in. Newspapers announce Piggly Doctor’s evil threats, and ask where Hectic Knife is. Then, after twenty five years of not seeing his Pops, he chances upon his slacker Dad and through this encounter, returns to his family. This leads to a classic awkward but visually entertaining family meal. They all have his hair, his social skills – and a toy balloon cat as a pet!
“So Hectic.” says his Mom, “I’ve been having lunch with a lot of villains lately.” Next thing you know, Hectic is writhing in agony as Piggly snips up a cardboard voodoo doll of his foe. Of course, they didn’t bank on his incredible healing powers.
All this is nothing compared to Hectic’s home life problems. Because Frannie has stolen everything, he and Link have to eat cardboard and other things. That sucks. Suddenly, Hectic notices something weird about his flatmate’s arm and commences to slice his skin and tendons until he discovers a circuit board buried deep in the flesh. A tracker. This leads Hectic on his final path to Piggly, and along the way, betrayals – plus bagels. As Piggly Doctor says on a DVD: “I’m on a beach, and I’m ready for the final battle. Come and get me, Hectic Knife!” Thus a quick musical number from Link puts us into the gory conflict.
This is the sort of movie Jim Van Bebber would make if he dropped acid and smoked a ton of weed whilst overdosing on comics and the Sin City flicks. There’s a certain gritty style to the filming like the Jack trilogy out of the UK. Of course, Hectic Knife is pure uncut beautiful gloriously over-the-top bullshit! And it is wonderful bullshit! In the first five minutes alone there’s a glory hole of blood, killings and craziness.
If I am to be honest, I laughed aloud at least every few minutes. The timing, the thought, and the ideas are all so perfectly gelled. On the negative flip side, some of the jokes are absolutely obvious and forced to be so unfunny. For instance: Hectic Knife; “How did you know that?” Barry; “It was in the script!” Painful, just painful. This is counterbalanced by excellent but ridiculous writing, like when Link finds Frannie stealing. Long minutes go by as she seduces him to which after every suggestion he looks shocked and blurts, “Really?” Frannie; “I want to sit on your face!” Link; “Really?” Frannie; “I want you to give me a golden shower!” Link; “Really?” Believe me, I couldn’t stop giggling at the endless absurdity. It’s awesome.
I particularly like his flashback sequences which reveal his training and healing powers – along with a massive chocolate layer of cheesecake scripting. The finale is excellent as well. Keep watching for the after credits party with the cast members still in character which is quite original. Speaking of cast members, everybody does their thing well and adds a certain personal funny ingredient to the cake. It looked like fun, and there’s certainly a few glints in people’s eyes to show they are just having a wonderful time.
All in all, Hectic Knife has been made for people with a certain sense of humour. You will either get it after the first five minutes, or you will simply hate everybody behind this movie and wish them to damnation eternal. If you get it and crack an early smile, great things wait for you on this journey. Greg, Pete! Bring on Chapter 2.
Directed by: Greg DeLiso
Written by: Peter Litvin, Greg DeLiso
Produced by: Greg DeLiso, Michael Anthony, Peter Litvin
Cinematography by: Greg DeLiso
Special Effects by: Al Krakosky, Clay Williams
Music by: Peter Litvin
Editing by: Greg DeLiso
Cast: Peter Litvin, Traci Ann Wolfe, Georgia Kate Haege, John Munnelly, Luis Anthony Maldonado, James A. Sands
Year: 2017
Country: USA
Language: English
Colour: Black and White
Runtime: 1h 22min
Studio: Munrovia Pictures
Distributor: Troma Entertainment
