THE TOXIC AVENGER

THE TOXIC AVENGER

Unrated Director’s Cut

Troma is a brand amongst cult-cineastes, that is either worshipped or despised. Troma make low-budget films... Very, very low budget films. They’re independent. Extremely independent, in fact, where the cast, crew and staff tend to act, write, produce, direct and distribute the films themselves. And they’ve been up-and-running for over 30 years now, in New York, USA.

Troma’s most infamous, yet celebrated creation, and probably their most popular too, is THE TOXIC AVENGER: a superhero film with a difference. Melvin Junko is a mop-hand at the Tromaville Health Club, in Tromaville, New Jersey. A 98lb nerd, a momma’s boy: a nobody going nowhere who is constantly on the receiving end of every possible permutation of persecution, pranks and put-downs.

When Melvin is set-up by big bully Bozo’s (Gary Schneider) girlfriend Julie (Cindy Manion), the prank goes too far, and in his attempt to flee the Health Club, he dives out of the upstairs window, and lands face-down in a vat of toxic waste. As the industrial sludge burns his body, he runs home, takes a bath, and eventually finds his weakling physique pulsate into 200lb’s of muscle, as he mutates into our titular hero.

From here on in, the film follows Toxie’s crusade, to stamp out evil and wrong-doing, both from his own past and from the villainous low-lives that are raising Tromaville, and turning it into a haven for capitalist criminals.

If there’s only one thing you should know about Troma movies, it’s that you have to accept that they are unlike any other kind of movie you will ever watch. What director Lloyd Kaufman has for his film’s budget, wouldn’t even cover a third of the promotional advertising campaign for your average Hollywood blockbuster! When we say "low budget", we mean scraping the bottom of the barrel low. But this should not be taken as a negative. Far from it! What Kaufman lacks in finance, he makes up for with nifty scripts, loony ideas, and a great use of imagination.

THE TOXIC AVENGER has a long censorship history, and whilst this is an old film – 1986 to be exact – its chequered past on home viewing outside of the US deserves a mention. As far as is known, the full, uncensored version of this movie runs to a few seconds shy of 83 minutes. When submitted to the BBFC on 5th November 1986 by Blue Dolphin Film Distributors, the film was pre-cut of most of the more graphic moments, leaving the film with a short-and-sweet duration of just 79m 04s. Three weeks later, Palan Entertainment Corporation submitted it for home video release, and from what information can be gleaned, the same print was passed with an 18 certificate.

Ten years down the line, Troma, (trading as Allied Troma Ltd), had the exact same print released again, under their own brand. It wasn’t until 1st September 2003, that an extended version was passed with a running time of 87m 32s. However, this was not the uncut version, everyone in the UK had hoped for. In fact, this was the same pre-cut and sanitised edition, with some trailers tacked on to the beginning and end of the video, to pad it out! Stand-up Prism Corporation – a well-known company who put out a lot of low-budget video and (now) DVD titles, mixing any number of cut and uncut versions of films, without any knowledge or care as to their content.

The most recent UK release, on the 23rd August 2005, again by Prism, was the 75m 51s version originally released by Troma. Almost nothing of the original’s notoriety remained, and anyone owning this edition, would have been very confused as to what was so explicit that an 18 certificate was still warranted.

It was two particular scenes that caused problems on this side of the Atlantic, and in much of the rest of the world. Early-on in the film, a scene involving Bozo, Julie and another teen couple playing their self-created version of "Carmageddon", (the PC computer game from back in the 1990’s, where points were awarded to who you killed, and how), for real was trimmed. Not only because Bozo is seen consuming alcohol to de-stress himself, before the vehicular slaughter starts, but also because the death involves a ten-year-old boy, being run-over whilst he’s out on his bike. Worse still, the boy is subsequently knocked-down, and then Bozo reverses over him, when they realise the boy’s still alive, resulting in a brutally satirical and tasteless head-crushing!

The other scene to be snipped, was the restaurant invasion sequence. James Ferman, the then head of the BBFC, was very anti-martial arts equipment, during his reign, and it was common for any sight of such weaponry to be edited out, irrespective of context or usage. The restaurant robbery involves nunchukas, a butterfly knife, and a samurai sword, so these were immediately deleted. However, this wasn’t their only concern. The scene was distasteful to the BBFC not only because of how the robbers act, but with how Toxie rescues the rest of the customers.

Initially, the robbers threaten customers, including a baby with a shotgun at point-blank range, tease an overweight teenage girl, and when one of the male diners tries to appease the situation, he has a shotgun blasted at his torso in slow-motion. One of the other diners, is Sara (Andree Maranda), a young, blonde-haired woman who happens to be blind. Not only is her guide-dog shot and murdered, but the head robber proceeds to rape her afterwards! As the rape commences, Toxie arrives, and proceeds to dispatch the offenders, in equally uncomfortable manners: arm ripping, eyeball-gouging, a blender through the face, and deep-fat-frying another’s hands!

As most of the scene was contentious, played-out at length, most of it was deleted, leaving very little explanation as to how Sara and Toxie subsequently begin their romance. Its removal also left viewers with difficulty in understanding Toxie’s motivation later on, for killing various other criminals, resulting in a disjointed film minus anything of any merit.

If taken at face value, THE TOXIC AVENGER could be viewed as being highly offensive, which is presumably how Ferman reacted, in 1986. Yet, it should have been obvious to anyone, that this film is really a bad taste comedy. The offensiveness is in that you see the very things you don’t want to and don’t think the film will dare depict. It deliberately blind-sides you, and goes way over the top, pushing the notions of taste and decency, to the farthest limits, not unlike a John Waters work. The mixture of revulsion and horror, is also worked in with a lot of jet black humour, which I feel helps counteract any outright offensiveness. How else could you view a scene in which a criminal has both arms ripped-off, before the hero of the film who proceeds to beat him up with them? Even the shooting of the guide-dog – not exactly the most tasteful act in a film I’ve seen – is initially shocking, but the tone is relaxed when the dog is shown clearly and blatantly breathing, under the dark-red paint that’s been applied to its fur. Tasteless? Yes! Dangerous and cruel? No!

This is one of those films, that is great for people who don’t want to think too hard. It’s post-pub, party entertainment! If you start to try and rationalise what you’re watching, it is easy to pick holes in every sequence. Taking it at face-value, would also be a disservice, as many will be screaming for the director’s blood at the on-screen carnage. For those of you, however, who want something purely entertaining, then THE TOXIC AVENGER certainly delivers that in spades!

The picture and audio are respectable. Depending on what information you hear, the film was available both in 4:3 and widescreen for cinemas. With that said, Troma almost always film in 4:3, with copious space at the top and bottom of the image, that can be matted-off for theatrical projection. As such, the original and correct way to view this film is in 4:3 full-screen. Whilst the image can be zoomed-in on 16:9 modern TV’s, it doesn’t seem quite as accurate a manner to watch the film. The composition becomes too tight, too intimate. Sound is in the original English in Mono, delivered to both left and right speakers. Anyone expecting anything over and above this, should avoid this disc! There is a tiny bit of print damage, at the very, very start of the film, but other than that, it’s a nice, clean and stable image, and there’s no noticeable artifacts or unwanted grain, with just occasional white specks of dust on the negative, that don’t really detract from your viewing.

Surprisingly, this Netherlands release, has a fair amount of extras. Sadly, they’re not really of any substantial value, but at least an attempt has been made to fill the disc with something of additional value. There’s a short introduction from Lloyd Kaufman about the film; interviews with fans at a Troma Convention; trailers for all 4 Toxic Avenger movies; a fictional documentary about Toxie; an audio commentary; several interviews with cast members (which are pretty enlightening), plus a few other bits-and-bobs. Alas, most are of a frivolous nature, and don’t add much to the experience of owning the film. The commentary is best, as Kaufman talks about the movie’s beginnings, how Troma started, and there’s some information on what it takes to get a Troma movie completed. The rest, though, are mostly filler and fluff.

Ultimately, you will want this disc, for the fact it’s cheap to import (around £10), has the film uncut, uncensored and in its original 4:3 ratio, and happens to come with lots of extras. There is a 2-disc US release from Troma themselves, which I would recommend, as it has a feature-length documentary about the film’s creation. However, the major caveat is that the film itself is in anamorphic 1.85:1, which as I mentioned earlier on, makes the film seem cramped when viewing it. Plus, it’s still quite pricey to obtain!

Fans should also be warned that the single-disc release, and several of the various boxed-sets from Troma, (which include various permutations of the four films in the series) are labelled as being "uncut", but in fact often contain a censored theatrical print, with the head-crushing sequence heavily edited! (Ditto, with "THE TOXIC AVENGER: PART II!) Unfortunately, until you watch the actual disc, you cannot tell what edition of the movie you will get. (The exception to that, is the 2-disc release talked-about above.)

There are numerous other releases of the film, around the world. All of them have good and bad points, but for me, price, screen ratio and the full version of the film is what makes this one worth buying. The animated menu screens being in English also make this release one of the best.

And if you enjoyed this, you simply must buy the jaw-droppingly tasteless DVD release of "Citizen Toxie: The Toxic Avenger – Part IV", which makes the first one look positively juvenile in tone! I promise you, it’s worth every penny!

Review by Pooch


 
Released by Donut Films
Region 2 - PAL
Rated 16
Extras :
see main review
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