Remember that cartoon staple of the angel on one shoulder and a devil on the other? James Felix McKenney’s new film, Satan Hates You, is a darkly comic, and ironically unfunny twist on that idea with not much else going on, and it’s a shame.
He has managed to waste genre favorites Michael Berryman (as an overly moralistic hotel clerk) Debbie Rochon (a bad girl gone good), Reggie Bannister (a seamy bar owner), and Angus Scrimm (a telev”angel”ist) in a series of throwaway roles that would be better suited to sketches or short films instead of a feature length film that doesn’t really have enough story to tell.
This is meant to be a satiric take on Christian propaganda films, but don’t they really make fun of themselves? The movie tells the dual stories of Marc and Wendy, two “sinners” who are pushed to excess by a pair of demons, dressed like Party City employees at Halloween time, played with appropriately madcap relish by Larry Fessenden (who also is a producer) and Bradford Scobie.
Marc is a deeply closeted gay man who is so repulsed by his homosexual leanings that he murders his tricks, and Wendy is a drug fueled young woman who lives fast and well, that’s all she does. Therein lies the biggest crime of this movie. It gives us two central characters that are so dull, and as one note as the rest of the people around them, that by the time they reach their eventual epiphanies and “redemption” I didn’t care and was glad when it was over. I felt like I had been watching this thing forever…
I wanted this to be good, I like a lot of the cast, and I was rooting for it. “God” knows I’m always pulling for the little guy. I have tremendous respect for Fessenden and Glass Eye Pix, and really enjoy what he does with his company, but this project would have been better off as a series of sketches pulled together Kentucky Fried Movie style. In fact, the various religious television programs that populate this world the characters live in were the most interesting thing about it. What we get instead is an hour and a half of a gay man who hates himself and murders people and a girl who does nothing but have sex with strangers, talk to her boring friends, and does a lot of drugs. It tries to be witty, and shocking, and stylish, but falls flat for me.
To wrap things up in a little black bow, Satan Hates You is a film for a very patient viewer. There are some small rewards to be had, but I realize I am not the target audience for this film and that it there are probably laughs to be had if you are a fan of this Troma type of comedy. I found it neither scary nor funny, but it looks appealing. I say go for it!
DISC DETAILS
It looks like a low budget feature; knowing the limitations of the production team, the picture quality is fine, even if the audio is a bit hollow and tinny in spots. Extras wise, we have a behind the scenes featurette that is far more entertaining than the movie, a theatrical trailer, a short film called Creepy Christmas, 13 TV segments from the film (seriously, just watch these, they’re better than the feature itself)
Film Score: 1/5 Disc Score: 2/5
Daily Dead's Official Podcast! Daily Dead's Official Podcast!
