| Article
by Joseph A. Ziemba
Touché,
The Abomination. This game
is over.
The journey has been a long and
winding one. Nearly a decade of
yearning, dashed hopes, and heightened
expectations have been filtered
into 95 minutes of total bewilderment.
Victory. It's so very sweet.
Indeed, the chase has ended. For
on this night, I stare at my VHS
shelf. A tattered copy of the original
Donna Michelle Productions tape
of The Abomination stares
back. The entire world has melted
into harmony. But where did it all
start? How did I become so enthralled
with a film I had never seen before?
And furthermore, can a backyard
Super 8 gorefest from 1986 ever
hope to justify a cross-country,
10 year search? My mind reels and
soon drifts...
2 AM. Caustic synths jolt me awake.
My vision is hazy. I hear coughing.
I see blood. I smell wood paneling.
A man keeps repeating, “The
Abomination, which makes all things
desolate...The Abomination, which
makes all things desolate...The
Abomination, which makes all things
desolate...”
“You don’t have
to emulate Truffaut Or Godard to
be considered credible. You can
emulate Herschell Gordon Lewis.”
-- Max Raven aka Bret McCormick,
Director-Writer, The Abomination
May 3, 1998. That quote. That’s
what did it.
It was my twentieth birthday. My
then-girlfriend, now-ex-wife, hit
me with a trash film revelation.
I received two gift books: Re/Search’s
Incredibly Strange Films
and John McCarty’s The
Sleaze Merchants. Sure, I had
seen Blood
Feast. Yes, I owned VHS
pre-records of every Ed Wood film.
Hey, I had dinner with John Waters
when I was ten. I thought I knew
all about weird films. I was wrong.
That month, The List began to take
shape.
Every horror VHS junkie knows about
The List. It begins as a tattered
scrap of paper which conveniently
fits into one's wallet, purse, or
breast pocket. With each page turned
of Michael Weldon’s Psychotronic
Video Guide or Steve Puchalski’s
Shock Cinema, The List
gained momentum. It grew into a
notebook. Years later, it matures
into a word processing file. Eventually,
The List transcends Earthly disposition
and happily morphs into an existential
assistant for the cunning trash
film obsessive. It has your back.
Now and forever.
And so, in May of 1998, thanks to
the brilliance of Incredibly
Strange Films and The Sleaze
Merchants, my List exploded.
Gore! LSD! Palm trees! Chesty Morgan!
A brave new world was uncovered.
The Thrill Killers.
The Awful Dr. Orloff. Brides
Of Blood. The
Ghastly Ones. A
Night To Dismember. And,
of course, The Abomination.
The Abomination! I loved
the title. I loved the ads. But
who was this Bret McCormick guy?
Was he really discussing Francois
Truffaut, a director I learned about
in college, in the same breath as
H.G. Lewis, the man responsible
for The Gore Gore Girls?!
And why did the poster for The
Abomination feature a smiling
guy with big sunglasses getting
his insides pulled out? It was strange.
Strange enough. The Abomination
shot to the top of my List.
“There’s a chainsaw
decapitation, slit throats, hands
bit off, an exorcism, a cat in a
toilet, and good ole fart humor.”
-- Michael Weldon, The Psychotronic
Video Guide
September, 2003. Over the previous
three years, I inundated myself
with the magical allure of trash-horror
films. I bought every important
book I could find. I ordered catalogs.
I took notes. Thanks to the newly
established DVD format, it was becoming
much easier to actually see
these films. Finally, there was
Shriek Of The Mutilated!
At last, I beheld Unhinged!
The forbidden wonders of trailer
compilations such as Screen
Scaries, which taunted
me as a child, were finally coming
to fruition. I was in heaven. But
reality soon hit. DVDs were only
skimming the surface. “The
more obscure, the better,”
became my adage; VHS tapes became
my muse.
My List expanded, subtracted, and
became more focused. “VHS
only” rarities were given
top billing. Now, I just had to
find them.
In September, my ex-wife and I quit
our jobs, sold our house, rented
an apartment, and bought a van.
Over the next three years, we'd
visit almost every state in North
America, surviving on naive belief
that, yes, we could do whatever
we wanted to do. We drove through
California’s Redwood Forests
at midnight and slept there until
dawn. We sat in traffic for seven
hours in New York City (twice).
We visited the Night Of The
Living Dead cemetery in Evans
City, PA. We spent wonderful evenings
with relatives in Boston. We appreciated
the barren-yet-lush beauty of Utah.
It was like John Steinbeck’s
Travels With Charley, except
there was no book to write; there
were only lives to live...and tapes
to find.
During this time, I embraced my
passion for obscure VHS collecting
with total savagery. I knew what
was out there. My List told me so.
Now I had an opportunity to find
them. I was unleashed upon America's
independent video stores. Naturally,
they suspected nothing.
The Abomination would be
mine.
"Monster-beast creature
possesses a youth in sunglasses
and makes him tear eyeballs out
of human sockets...an ugly business."
-- John Stanley, Creature Features
Movie Guide Strikes Again
October, 2003. Driving through Kent,
Washington on our way to Seattle,
we pulled into an unassuming strip
mall. Stardust Video cowered in
a corner. As everyone knows, video
store hauls are undeniably hit-or-miss.
I approached the dirt-caked door
with my usual mix of haste, excitement,
and childlike wonder.
The smell hit me immediately. Stardust
Video was a "popcorn machine"
video store. A good sign. You see,
old stores catering to the popcorn-and-a-movie
tradition sometimes went too far
by installing a real life popper
by the front counter. The resultant
odor suggested a humid mixture of
stale Cheetos and dirty feet; it
was repellent yet tantalizing. For
some reason, these stores always,
and I mean ALWAYS, come through
with unbelievable finds. Stardust
was no different.
I made a quick sweep. Films for
rent were ordered by genre, but
not alphabetized. Return Of
The Family Man, The
Devil's Gift, Psycho
From Texas...The Abomination!
With a gasp, the box was in my hand.
I poured over the explicit photos
and copy. “Naturally, this
film contains multiple depictions
of blood, guts, and slime!”
Naturally! Everything I had read
in The Sleaze Merchants
appeared to be true. Invigorated,
my nose followed the smell.
The elderly man working the counter,
clad in an old cardigan and flannel
shirt, seemed congenial enough.
I'll call him "Jerry".
"Well, hi! Would you like some
popcorn?"
"Uh, heh heh, no thanks. I
actually have a question for you.
Do you sell any of the older horror
VHS tapes you have for rent? Not
the ones on the "Sale"
racks, but the ones that are still
available to rent?"
"Ahhhh. No."
"Really? No exceptions?"
"Well, look. This is how I
make my living. If I start selling
tapes right off the shelf, this
place could be gone...LIKE THAT!"
(He snapped his fingers).
"Well, I just collect older
horror titles and I've been looking
for this one for a really long time.
Would you take $20 for it?"
"Let me see it."
I'm sweating. He pulls an index
card out from under the counter.
"Now, you see? This one's been
rented SEVEN TIMES since 1987. That's
how stores like mine make their
business. Understand? Do you know
what a pawn shop is?"
"Well, yeah, of course I --"
"Then you should go to one
of those. There's one about two
blocks over. They've got lots of
tapes. Now, we do have a number
of Adult titles for sale over on
the back wall. All sorts of stuff.
You know?"
Then, Jerry winked at me. Unsure
of what had just transpired, I added
a cordial "Thanks!", shot
a final glance at The Abomination,
paid for a handful of Sale rack
tapes, and exited Stardust Video.
Well played, Jerry. Well played,
indeed.
"Mother-fixated nerd boy is
possessed by a 3,000-year-old monstrosity
sending him on an eyeball-gouging,
chainsaw-wielding rampage."
-- James O'Neill, Terror On
Tape
August, 2005. With two years of
traveling behind us, things started
to settle down. As I'd hoped, my
collection had expanded by the hundreds.
Drive-In Massacre,
The Mummy And The Curse Of The
Jackal, Horror
House On Highway 5, Spine,
Halloween Night and
other obscure pieces of garbage
had found a loving home.
Yet, The Abomination remained
impossibly elusive.
I was beginning to think it was
a lost cause. Aside from the fact
that no other video store I visited
had even heard of the the film,
my closest fellow trash obsessives
all came up short. The occasional
(maybe once a year) eBay listing
shot up to ridiculous prices. Whatever
The Abomination ended up
being, it most certainly was not
worth $80. For a few months, I had
all but forgotten about the film.
Then, it happened.
On a crisp summer Saturday, my ex-wife
and I decided to pay a visit to
her childhood hometown of Blue Island,
Illinois, just for kicks. Towards
the end of the day, she mentioned,
"You know, there was a cool
video store called Blue Island Video
that we used to go to. The entire
basement was filled with horror
movies. Lots of big boxes."
Ten minutes later, we stepped into
a veritable trash-horror wonderland.
There was a popcorn machine. There
was a basement. She was correct.
Two minutes after that, I held a
copy of The Abomination
in my hands for the second time.
We approached the counter. There
was a middle aged woman working.
She wore khaki pants, a Chicago
Bears t-shirt, and big tinted glasses.
I'll call her "Sandy".
"Hi, what can I do for ya?"
"Hello, ma'am. I was wondering
if you'd ever consider selling any
of your older horror VHS tapes?
This one, in particular?" (By
now, I had this bit down to a science.
Charm, smiles, and a polite countenance
are key traits in video store bartering.)
"Well, actually, I can't do
that. You'd have to talk to our
owner. He's not here."
"Great! Can we give him a call?"
"I don't think he'd sell that."
"Can we give him a call?"
"I'm pretty sure we'll be selling
some of our VHS tapes in the next
few months. If you want, you can
call back and check."
"So, you can't sell me just
this title? I can give you $20 for
it."
"No, I'm sorry. I just can't
do that. Here's our card. Would
you like some free popcorn?"
Although defeated again, I was grateful
to Sandy, based solely on association-to-The
Abomination alone. My wife
and I drove home that evening on
the wings of childhood nostalgia.
We listened to The Zombies' "Odessey
& Oracle", discussed the
photos we'd taken, and talked a
lot about where she used to spend
time as a kid. It was nice. All
the while, my brain was racing.
Certainty was upon me. It was only
a matter of time.
On Saturday, March 17, 2007, I purchased
The Abomination for $2.50
from Blue Island Video. Sandy wasn't
jiving me. In January, they had
liquidated the VHS tapes, setting
up a massive "Sale" rack
at the front of the store. Curiously,
customers virtually ignored the
horror films on that rack. Not so
curiously, I did not.
As I finished paying for my large
stack of tapes, Sandy and I shared
one last exchange.
"I'm glad you were able to
come back and get that movie. It's
an old one! Seems like you really
wanted it! Would you like some popcorn?"
"You know what, Sandy? Yeah.
I would."
The Abomination was mine.
Now, I just had to watch it.
"You are the whore of
Babylon, Mother! You're the mother
of this...ABOMINATION!!"
-- Cody, The Abomination
The kitchen cabinets have puked.
The washing machine has puked. A
woman, her son, his boss, and his
girlfriend have puked. I think maybe
even God has puked. Somebody get
me a Bible.
In 1985, Dallas, Texas-based filmmaker
Bret McCormick was ready for action.
Having lost some money on the home
video release of his inspired-yet-problematic
first film, Tabloid, by
Los Angeles-based Tapeworm Video,
McCormick embraced the experience
and learned from it. Tabloid
was an eccentric, John Waters-lite
spoof, which was unable to attract
an audience. In an interview with
John McCarty, McCormick explained
his need to switch gears.
"Most buyers didn't want [Tabloid]
because it wasn't classifiable as
a horror film, an action film, or
a comedy. It was a bit of all three."
McCormick continued, "So we
talked to people about what kind
of picture would move...they told
us horror."
Bret McCormick listened. In an effort
to save money, make a splash, and
satiate the home video market, the
writer-director grabbed a Super
8 camera, hit the backyard, and
went to town. The results were Ozone!
Attack Of The Redneck Mutants
and of course, The Abomination;
two trash-gore films which were
shot back-to-back, edited on video,
and "crammed full of as many
gross-out special effects as our
meager budgets would allow."
While Ozone! found semi-distribution
via the insanely obscure Muther
Video, The Abomination
fared better. Donna Michelle Productions,
the Hollywood-based company responsible
for unleashing Jon McBride's Cannibal
Campout and Woodchipper
Massacre, picked up the
movie. The resultant success or
failure of The Abomination
is inconsequential. It found limited
distribution. It was listed in famous
books. It sat on video store shelves.
It enticed people. Perhaps, even
at Blue Island Video.
The Abomination is manic,
ambitious, and completely insane.
Upon initial impressions, it's no
trash classic. But there's something
else there. Something special. Something
which finds an abrasive balance
between Biblical riffing, physical
sickness, skewed humor, and bloody
vagina monsters which hide in cubbards
(and washing machines). How does
that grab you?
Cody (Scott Davis) lives with his
Mom (Jude Johnson) in a wood-paneled
shack. Talk about issues. Mom has
a tumor, but she also devotes her
life to shady evangelist Brother
Fogg (Rex Morton). Cody fills his
time with working as a mechanic,
driving around in a truck with his
girlfriend Kelly (McCormick's then-wife,
Blue Thompson), battling nightmares,
and killing people. Or does he?
Hack! Cough! Mom belches up the
tumor. It infects Cody. He coughs
one up, too. Soon, the growths multiply,
infect the entire house, and take
form as...The Abomination! The Abomination
-- a beet-red mass of teeth and
curious openings and tentacles!
The Abomination -- a force, originating
in the Bible's Prophecy Of Daniel,
which eats everyone! The Abomination
-- I have no idea what it is! Is
Cody really a killer, or is this
all part of The Abomination's grander
scheme? Perhaps Brother Fogg's interesting
toilet scenes will clue us in.
The gritty onslaught of blood-barfing,
coughing, strange religious references,
and later, extreme chince-gore,
is one thing. But the presentation
of The Abomination -- that's
something else entirely.
Douglas McKeown's The Deadly
Spawn. Nathan Schiff's They
Don't Cut The Grass Anymore.
George Barry's Death
Bed: The Bed That Eats.
Each of these films builds its own
set of rules within the confines
of lo-fi artistry, thereby crafting
surreal, self-contained worlds which
hold no ties to rational thought.
They disturb. They entertain. They
even further the boundaries of exploitive
D.I.Y. filmmaking, taking the next
(il)logical step after bizarre films
such as The Wizard Of Gore
and Blood
Freak. The Abomination,
with its mismatched post-dubbing,
odd approach to editing and organization,
and stray insertions of tape-manipulated
voices, synthesizers, and library
music, fits right in with this group.
Ideas are reiterated obsessively,
to the point of actually beginning
the film with a five minute highlight
reel of the gruesomeness that awaits.
Events are thrown together as if
by chance. The final 20 minutes
explode in a claustrophobic stench
of wet cow intestines and humorous
bloodshed. It's psychedelic anxiety,
1980s style.
For all this bizarre inventiveness,
The Abomination isn't perfect.
Driving scenes pad nearly 10 minutes
of the film. The unneeded repetition
of certain sequences slows things
down. Unlike The Deadly Spawn,
which shares a similarity in design
and theme, there's no real focal
point to the film as a whole. As
a result (and very much in keeping
with gore overload problem in They
Don't Cut The Grass Anymore),
the film nearly chokes on its own
crazed methods. Nearly, but not
quite.
The Abomination may not
achieve regal status amongst this
freak clique of films, but it's
far from forgettable. In fact, repeated
viewings only bolster the film's
endearing qualities and smooth out
incipient bumps. In the end, The
Abomination is a unique, grotesque
experience which reminds one not
only of the admirable (and literal)
guts of mid-80s D.I.Y. trash filmmakers
such as Bret McCormick, but also
the attractive, mysterious era of
VHS distribution in which they thrived.
Not such a bad thing to think about
from time to time.
"The Abomination, which makes
all things desolate...The Abomination,
which makes all things desolate...The
Abomination, which makes all things
desolate...”
Awakened with a jolt, I stare at
my VHS shelf. A tattered copy of
The Abomination stares
back. I smile. I think back to the
first time I opened The Sleaze
Merchants, the first time I
laid eyes on the film at Stardust
Video, and the irony of purchasing
my own copy from a store which rented
Flight Of The Navigator
to my ex-wife when she was ten years
old. My smile grows wider.
Was The Abomination worth
it? Well, I still don't own Mad
Ron's Prevues From Hell, Filmgore,
or The
Monster And The Stripper.
I place "Odessey & Oracle"
on the turntable. "Care Of
Cell 44" starts up.
See you on the road.
WORKS CITED
McCarty, John. The Sleaze Merchants:
Adventures In Exploitation Filmmaking.
New York: St. Martin’s Press,
1995
Stanley, John. Creature Features
Movie Guide Strikes Again. Pacifica:
Creatures At Large Press, 1994
Weldon, Michael J. The Psychotronic
Video Guide. New York: St. Martin's
Griffin, 1996
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