THE FIRST SUPERHUMAN-HERO… FROM NEW JERSEY!

A gang of thugs devise a cruel hoax that goes horribly wrong as Melvin, a nerdy emaciated janitor at the local health club, is cast through a third story window into a vat of hazardous toxic waste.

IMDb.com || letterboxd.com

    • southsamurai@sh.itjust.works
      link
      fedilink
      English
      arrow-up
      21
      ·
      12 days ago

      Oh, holy fuck, it’s better than good.

      It’s genre defining masterpiece of absurdist escapism.

      No bullshit, no joking, it’s one movie everyone should see once, even if they end up not liking it because it exemplifies what a B movie can be, and why they’re so fun. And, it manages to be coherent despite the absurdity of the premise and the script. There’s a story there that makes sense, and resonates in the same way Spider-Man does. Again, I’m not joking.

      I have to keep saying I’m not joking because Toxie gets pigeon holed as comedy, and it is a comedy as much as anything else, but Ritter and Kaufman crafted a brilliant script in terms of cultural relevancy, plus Herz and Kaufman made it work on screen with a minimal budget. That is filmmaking at its purest. The cast, despite largely being mediocre or bad actors in an objective way, manage to work together to be greater than the sum of their skill.

      And yes, I know exactly what I’m saying and how it looks lol. But, again, I’m not joking. I really think the Toxic Avenger stands out as not only the best Troma film, and at least in the top ten of all B movies, and it deserves to be held to the same esteem and affection as more mainstream movies.