Strychnin Review from Beheading Films!
AKA: Strychnine
Directed by: Juval Marlon
Written by: Juval Marlon
Produced by: Juval Marlon
Cinematography by: Juval Marlon
Music by: Juval Marlon
Editing by: Juval Marlon
Special Effects: Juval Marlon
Cast: Unknown
Year: 2017
Country: Switzerland
Language: N/A
Color: Color
Runtime: 8min
Studio: Beheading Films
Distributor: Caps Collective Entertainment
Amongst the hills of cheese and the streets of watches with chocolate on top, lives a rather disturbed chap called Juval Marlon. This man is so deep underground that even the Demons of Hell have to point downwards if you ask the way to his house.
So underground in fact, that his short films are a step up from home video to a low level guerrilla style filming. This guy isn’t out to win awards or friends. His catalogue of shorts have that eerie feeling of some scrotum posting a dodgy video tape through your door (or to you new school heads, a dodgy email containing an MP4!!) and you sit with your face slowly draining of color.
Strychnin (translated, strychnine, which is a very unpleasant poison lethal to humans and animals) is the latest from the mind behind, Torture Fetish and Dead Baby Mutilation (reviewed by Severed Cinema prior, here) so you should know what to expect. That being said, this one crawls further into the realms of a sheer “Fuck you, I’m a nasty bastard and I’m shoving reality down your throat” category reserved for him only.
Beefed up by some skeletal background horror ambience, it’s a night in the life of a crazy who enjoys torching felines whilst filming from his perspective. Totally wordless and prowling, it’s almost a visual representation of the MC 900ft Jesus track, The City Sleeps, but he was burning buildings and not cats.
In case you think you’re going to see some random and unforgivable cruelty, the camera cuts with choppy edits and we’re left with a flaming cat shape, maybe a toy, maybe a dead one collected from a vets. Who knows?
Thus that’s about it for the first five minutes. He spies kitties, he gives them all a big fuss and some loves (they adore him — he’s a Pied Piper of cats), all to cut away to the burning cat shapes. The music darkens as we observe these torched moggies. Our mystery man finally scoops one chubby cat from the road and the short film takes another direction.
A few people will get uptight and freak out with their emails holding their cuppa in hand, but there are a lot of real sick in the head men and women who abuse animals for a giggle. Instead of aiming your malice at a well-crafted short film which is meant to shock you and make you think, “Oh my God!” then join an animal rescue league or confront the prick of a neighbour which you know batters his loyal animal daily (I have personally confronted so called friends in the past over this and once put a man in the animals place) do something constructive with your anger! Do something like I’ve stated prior. My cat, Crowley, meanwhile, hasn’t forgiven me or the filmmaker. Crowley has chilled out on my knees and watched some vile flicks in his years, but this time he shook his head and went to bed.
I can see Crowley’s point. It feels very real, and not very comfy towards the end because it makes you replay certain parts and look carefully. Juval Marlon is a one man army who deals with everything in his films. Many years ago when Creation Books and Headpress were riding high, this bloke would have had a few features and interviews, believe me.
Caps Collective Entertainment will be distributing this one like they did Juval’s previous revulsions. It’s the ideal union; their website shop sells some titles which would sit correctly in a seedy back alley store in the ‘80s which had a pile of “Real video nasties an’ snuff movies, mate” under the counter. Love it. Think along the lines of Tumbling Doll of Flesh, and Amerikan Holokaust, then scrap it all because this and Juval’s other oddities are on a shelf of their own, surrounded by mouse traps.
