Violent Shit (1989)

Vicious and deranged disfigured killer Karl the Butcher (writer/director Andreas Schnaas letting it all hang out something loopy) embarks on a grisly killing spree. Yep, that's about it as far as the flimsy wafer-thin excuse for a plot is concerned, but boy does Schnaas give the audience their cruddy money's worth with genuinely jaw-dropping bluntness and equally staggering ineptitude: We've got a ramshackle narrative that unfolds at a plodding pace, an annoyingly redundant synthesizer score, oodles of cheesy over-the-top excessive gore (the watery-looking blood squirts, spurts, and spills all over the place), obnoxious cannon fodder characters, tacky solarized video graphics, ham-fisted overuse of strenuous slow motion, a surprise appearance by a crucified Jesus in the woods, crass profane dialogue, a hefty body count, rough'n'grainy cinematography, interminably drawn-out murder set pieces, and a completely absurd ending which comes out of left field. Totally senseless and technically a total mess, this tasty chunk of foul cheddar nonetheless still possesses a certain lovably low-rent home movie charm.

This review is composed of a thread I began on the film's board, and kept replying to like a journal entry. I added the spoiler alert, but there is really not that much to spoil. This movie is about a nameless guy who hates genitals, Jesus, and himself. That is the entire story...I'm only 3 minutes into this so far. . .so I can't really attest to the violence yet. However they are delivering nicely on the sh!t angle.Jesus Christ! I'm five minutes in, and all I have seen is blurry handycam footage of a European kid playing with a ball, while the opening credits make some pretty outrageous claims. . . ."What's that, movie? . . . Written and directed you say?" Also, apparently this movie had someone on board who's title is "Special Hi-Wi Technician". As someone who has attended film school, I find it odd that this is the first time I have ever heard of any such crew title. Oh well, at least the sh!t isn't phoned in. . .theyre piling it on thick.. They couldn't possibly keep up this momentum for the duration of the "film". 17 minutes in, and it feels more like six hours. It has become apparent that the violence promised in the title is nothing more than sh!t as well. Though I don't think anyone would check out this "Violent Sh!tters Production" had they titled it "Sh!tty Sh!t". Damn this is going to be a chore to finish. 23 minutes in. I guess this is turning into a real time review of sorts. I heard the camera man laugh a couple of minutes ago. I would be more forgiving if the cinematography were not the worst character in the film. The movie showed a dude slice of a man's penis and jack blood out of the headless wiener, though. Thank you Germany. 42 minutes in, and the film has thrown an amazing curve ball. The cinematography has become worse. Now that the film takes place at night, all I can make out is a blackened space like limbo. Occasionally vehicle head lights can be seen, inter cut with footage of floating heads that have way too much dialog. 45 minutes. The movie is on it's third close up fake crotch mutilation. This time it's lady parts. I'm starting to realize that this is not really a movie, but rather VHS footage of not so special effects. It is really not "about" anything, and has no discernible characters. The August Underground films seem Oscar worthy in comparison. 58 minutes. Christians beware! I just finished watching a pointless, seemingly 3 hour, sequence of the killer disemboweling a crucified Jesus. Before anyone goes and gets excited, this movie is so boring that I began twirling a very sharp knife to keep myself occupied. As luck would have it, the hilt bounced off of my fingertips, and the edge grazed my Macbook screen. Now I have a quarter inch, paper thin, permanent reminder of this movie's epic sh!ttiness. One hour. . . This movie is really starting to f#ck with me. Slow blurry video shot from a moving vehicle, in near darkness has been going on for about five minutes. To make matters worse, the sound track has traded in the amateurish synthesizer for an unknown heavy metal track, with a cock rock singer bellowing "The torture never stops". How fitting for a film that has a good footing in the race for worst movie of all time. Dammit. I still have part 2 and 3 to watch after this. I'm starting to wish that my knife had destroyed my monitor, or at least ended up severing an important vein in my neck or wrist. This movie is about as appealing as eating popcorn out of a homeless man's beard. 1 hour 8 minutes. Apparently human appendages are predominantly composed of clothes stuffed with pig intestines and fake blood. Bones would only be troublesome for the killer and his cardboard cleaver. Also, I couldn't help but notice that with each murder, the amount of liquid latex covered oatmeal on the killer's face increases. I guess that will have to count as character development. . . and story for that matter. The killer started picking at the sores on his face, and pulling out his own intestines (pulling karo covered pig tripe through a hole in his shirt). I can only hope that means the end of the film is coming very soon. 1 hour 13 minutes. It ended. . . .it actually ended. I would rather set my face on fire than recommend this film to my worst enemy. This so called "movie" is just a concoction of week effects strewn together with consumer grade video wipe transitions. "Violent"?. . . no, not really. I don't consider rubbing corn syrup and tripe on someone to be violence, and the film had no tone, seriously. "Sh!t"?. . . Absolutely. This is the first film I have seen where half of the title gives away the entire story. OK, bring on part 2. Can it really be much worse?

This is the movie that started it all, Andreas Schnaas shot the whole feature on video, with a low budget and lots of gore.The plot is just an excuse to show some gore: Karl Butcher is a deformed and cannibalistic killer, who killed his mom when he was a child. Now Karl is going to prison, but somehow, he manages to escape, by killing all the police officers with him. Now a bloody trip to the woods is going to start !Besides of gore, we have some "humour" (if you understand German) and blasphemy. There is a small "plot twist" but i am not going to spoil it.I don't recommend it for who wants to start watch the German ultra-gore "genre", watch Violent Sh!t III: Infantry of Doom (AKA: "Zombi Doom" in USA).

Violent Sh*t was the first "film" (video) by Andreas Schnass. While it's a terrible movie, it does have some merit, and arguably, some scenes that are almost artistic ( the Jesus scene, which shows Karls inability to become one with Christ, or become good, because all he knows is violence). Or something like that. Or just no......Whatever it is, it's not "anti- religious" like some people have stated. Although, I can see how it could be offensive, but then again, if you are easily offended, what are you doing watching "Violent Sh*t"?It starts out with Karl as a boy killing his abusive mother, but not until after smiling directly into the camera and laughing. We then cut to 20 years later, with Karl escaping from the police and killing various people for the next 57 minutes with a gigantic cleaver he just happens to have had all this time. He mutates with every murder and passes out, having visions and nightmares of his past were he saw the devil as a child. Finally he melts into a pile of goo, and a baby pops out. Right.For a movie with that title, and it being all about the gory effects, one shouldn't really complain. Anyone who picked up a movie called "Violent Sh*t" and was expecting "Casablanca" is at fault. But don't get me wrong, it is a bad movie. There's just nothing holding it together, except for the gore, and nothing is ever explained.As for direction, I guess it's fine. I know that sounds insane, but in a movie that's all about gore, it's perfectly fine. Schnaas is sure to show all the gore in lingering closeups. Because that's what it's all about, the gore. It's not about Karl's emotional states, or any sort of character development. "There's somebody. Now go kill him". That's it. The same goes for acting, the victims scream fine. And Karl is a mongoloid, or something.Now to clear up some myths and misconceptions surrounding the movie. First off, Andreas Schnaas is not Karl the Butcher. Karl was played by an "actor" named Karl Inger, Schnaas played the loudmouth tree cutter who gets cut in half with a tree trimmer.Another is that all "real gore" was used. Real animal blood and organs. This is obviously fake, because animal blood is not Pepto-Bismal, nor is an animals intestines sausage links, which were obviously used during the gutting scene.Violent Sh*t was the first German direct-to-video horror film.Some people state Violent Sh*t was a successful midnight movie and was pulled by the censors. This cant be true, because I doubt a film print of Violent Sh*t was ever made, and video projectors did not exist in 1987. But on this I could be wrong.In the end Violent Sh*t is a bad movie. No doubt about that. However, there is something interesting about it. Perhaps it's the fact that despite being made tongue in cheek, it's still played brutally straight. And that makes it interesting for a few reasons. What were they thinking? Why was this made? Who was this made for? There some of the same questions that surround a movie like "Blood Freak", or "Legend of Blood Mountain" (both wonderfully bad movies). And at least Schnaas wasn't insulting our intelligence, just his.