Terror Firmer
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Movie Reviews of Terror Firmer
Movie Review: Terror Firmer
Summary: 5 Stars
A film writhing in dark humour, gore and a wonderful storyline, Terror Firmer is a must for anyone who loves Troma and anyone who doesn't. The film is one of the best black movies I have ever seen, and I recommend it to you, because it is fantastic and a classic.Movie Review: Boombastik
Summary: 5 Stars
The Troma gang haven't lost their edge.The whole cast kicks ... Lloyd has a real gem here, insider info about low-budget movie making and a very informative extra disc thats just as fun as the movie , AND it has the AMAZING DEBBIE ROCHON !!! Nuff said!Movie Review: TODDDSTERRRR!!!!
Summary: 5 Stars
HAHAHAH, if you seen the movie you know what i'm talking about. best film by troma since redneck zombies in my opinion. And the rap video with dj polo and his homeboy Ron Jeremy is worth the money alone. That was hilarious. Pick it up!!Movie Review: The Usual Troma Fare
Summary: 4 Stars
"Terror Firmer" is yet another seedy contribution to the world of cinema by the gang at Troma films. Lloyd Kaufman, the founder of Troma, continues to offer up films loaded with soft-core sex, sickening gore, and acting so bad that it makes a home movie look like a Shakespeare production. Kaufman's best known film is "The Toxic Avenger," a 1985 release that, despite the bizarre premise, succeeded beyond anyone's wildest expectations. Troma took the modest success of "Avenger" and promptly ran it into the ground with a series of stupid sequels and shameless self-promotion. To a great extent, "Terror Firmer" is itself a means of promoting Troma and its no budget films.
"Terror Firmer" is a film about making a film, namely a behind the scenes look at the making of "The Toxic Avenger Part 4." In the process of creating yet another sequel in the Toxic Avenger franchise, we learn that a serial killer is hunting down members of the cast and crew. Kaufman himself stars as the blind (yes, blind) director of the film, interacting with cast and crew members played by Debbie Rochon, Alyce LaTourelle, Will Keenan, Kaufman's real life daughter, adult film star Ron Jeremy, Lemmy from the thrash band Motorhead, and Troma co-founder Michael Herz. Many of these people appeared in other Troma films, so "Terror Firmer" seems to be a sort of reunion/chef-d'oeuvre for Kaufman and company.
The idea behind "Terror Firmer" is to show how difficult it is to make a low budget film. We constantly see the trials and tribulations that actors and crew face during a shooting schedule. Apparently, romances always blossom on a film set, as does professional jealousy. Throw in a pain-in-the-you-know-what prima donna leading lady and you have a typical day in the movie business. In the warped world of Troma, however, there must also be mutilations, interesting uses of a pickle, body parts that stretch like plastic, and a serial killer who looks like a poor man's Tim Curry from "The Rocky Horror Picture Show."
Kaufman relies on tons of sight gags, multiple storylines, gratuitous nudity, and disgusting gore to entertain and sicken his audience. Many of the scenes in "Terror Firmer" take place behind the cameras, where dozens of people mill around during the course of the film shoot. It pays to watch closely what people in the background are doing, or else you may miss many of the gags. Also present throughout the film are constant references to Troma: film posters, spoken panegyrics, and other assorted advertising gimcracks. The shameless promotion for all things Troma tends to grate very quickly.
The gore in "Terror Firmer" is well done for any movie, let alone a Troma film. Herz's unfortunate encounter with an escalator may be one of the sickest scenes ever witnessed by this viewer, rivaling anything done by grindhouse maestros Lucio Fulci or Ruggiero Deodato. Other attempts at gory violence do not work as well due to an insistence on pairing the grue with extraordinarily dumb slapstick humor. For the determined gorehound, however, "Terror Firmer" offers up a congeries of stomach churning scenes.
This is a two-disc set, with an unbelievable amount of extras included. There are deleted scenes, actor auditions, a "making of" documentary, interviews with actors, bloopers, trailers, and several music videos directed by Lloyd Kaufman (which are highly unlikely to appear on MTV or VH1 anytime in the future). There are so many extras on these discs that it takes hours to get through all of them. Did I mention that there are three different commentary tracks? As for sound and picture quality, both are more than adequate for enjoyment of the film and the extras. If you shell out the money for this movie, you will definitely get enough bang for your buck.
Ultimately, "Terror Firmer" is an entertaining film, although I still believe that "The Toxic Avenger" is the best movie Troma will ever produce.
Movie Review: Gleefully Stepping Over the Line
Summary: 4 Stars
This is the one: the Troma film that may make prior Troma films seem restrained and timid. This time lloyd held nothing back and if prior movies really pushed the envelope of raunch and depravity then here Lloyd rippes that envelope wide open here. Terror Firmer has everything that Troma has always promised: Gore, nudity, filth and pointed jabs. The pace is manic, and driven and the acting is in some of the stronger Troma tradition, and I admit there will always be a wet place in my heart for Debbie Rochon.Troma has gone from being a 2 bit exploitation house to being America's formost Subversive. Herein may lie the problem for me, after Tromeo and Juliet my expectations and hopes may have been too high. While all the elements of Tromeo are here (Minus that one scene with Jane Jensen and Debbie Rochon) it doesn't quite reach the levels that Tromeo did. I guess it serves me right for taking it too seriously but Lloyd himself has adopted the mantra "Lets make some art!!" and he has done so before. This time however he misses his high mark by just a smidge.
Lloyd is clearly relishing his role as an elder-statesman of the low budget indie scene here and this may be why Terror Firmer misses its mark. All of Troma's best work so far has targeted us, society and our hipocracy so the heroes were Toxie and Sgt. Kabukiman NYPD. This time the target is film and art and the hero is Lloyd himself. While he certainly pokes fun at himself he is a bit too self-congratulatory. Yes Lloyd IS a hero and he is one of the last standing voices for truly independent film, none of this is in question, but Lloyd's vision is too narrow. There are many heroes who are on the front lines: Lynch, Cronenberg, VonTrier, Fincher who are all fighting to push film, kicking and screaming usually, into the this millenium. All this would be fine and merely academic, if it were not for what it does to the film. Unlike Toxie, Tromeo, Killer Condom and others, Terror Firmer's preachy edge, isn't tempered by humanity or other concerns; we aren't talking about saving the earth or our own humanity in this one, but rather the validity of Troma's particular form of Art. It is an important message but it was ultimately not enough to push Terror Firmer into the hights Lloyd had given us before.