MONSTRO!

Baretta (Nelli Scarlet), Snowball (Kate Watts) and Blondie (Karli Madden) are three inked up bad girls on a mission. What the mission exactly is however, is not exactly clear. Whatever their objective, it all comes to a grinding halt when a bit of car trouble hampers their journey to the beach. As luck would have it, two horny guys come to their aid bringing with them some "sweet wheels’ in the form of a Cadillac. But the dude’s attempts to entice the girlies to a bit of skinny dipping at a covert cove are thwarted as blades are brandished and windpipes are severed.

Upon arriving at their sea front lodgings, the ladies sink a few cold ones have a little playful fun in the water. They ignore the implicit warnings about the sea from their wheelchair bound neighbour Joseph (Norman Yemm), who lives next door with his teenage granddaughter Hannah (Kyrie Capri). If their daytime watery antics were frowned upon by the old man, their booze swilling, coke snorting, music blasting debauchery in the evening positively pisses him off! He sends Hannah to have a quiet word. But before she can start reasoning with the trio she is enticed to ‘dip her bill’ (that’s chug on some booze by the way!) and join the party.

As their inhibitions are submerged in alcohol, Hannah reveals just why her Granddaddy is so against anyone entering the sea. Both her parents drowned in those very waters and out of respect (or fear…) the sea is never to be entered again. Naturally this is scoffed at by the girl gang who themselves, although shit faced, decide a bit of night swimming is in order!

But salt water entering inebriated lungs is the last of their worries as slimy tentacles and snapping reptilian teeth from an ocean dwelling leviathan are soon baying for their blood…

There have certainly been enough sea creatures in playful horror flicks to fill an Olympic size swimming pool as of late. But sharks mutated with octopuses, their double headed rivals and, of course, Piranhas in all their bra busting dimensions are not are fit to lace the bikini of Stuart Simpson’s adrenaline fuelled flick!

Ok it’s pretty basic stuff. There are no real explanations offered as to where the creature came from or what it actually is. Who knows, had Simpson chosen to expose these facts it could have given him the extra 15 minutes to stretch his picture to an hour and a half. But for me, the 75 minute movie worked just fine and gave the three Aussie psychobilly chicks plenty of screen time in which to pamper themselves with amber nectar and ultra-violence in equal copious measures!

The movie had a very striking aesthetic. The black and white opening was razor sharp and the flip into colour the instant blood started to gush from the first hapless victim was superbly executed, if you pardon the pun! Throughout some intriguing camera angles keep the picture interesting while showcasing our nubile trio. (And no they don’t get fully nude - but Judas Priest, the bikini scenes were good enough!)

CGI was notably absent and the gore effects struck a nice balance between looking convincing yet retaining that grindhouse excessiveness that goads the censors. The beast itself wasn’t the greatest but a blend of puppeteers and animatronics will always be preferred over completely unconvincing computer effects. The unruliness of the aforementioned trio was contrasted with Hannah’s character. Although more grounded, she still had a subtle neurosis to her persona which exploded as the story evolved.

The DVD is literally packed with EXTRAS. For starters there are two short movies from the vault of director Stuart Simpson. ACID SPIDERS (15 minutes) also stars Karli Madden from the main feature and is further prove if you needed it that Simpson has cornered the market when it comes to drug induced tales featuring absurd slimy beasts! Next up is a superb 7 minute short entitled SICKIE which is a gore laden chunk of surrealism which divulges just how beautifully twisted Simpson’s mind really is!

The DVD has 2 separate commentary tracks. The first features some of the crew including the director, costume designer and producer, but was a little farcical I am afraid. The reason being the audio was completely imbalanced. Usually commentary tracks feature a diluted soundtrack over which the commentators to lay their discourse. In the case of this track the original audio is at least equal volume to the pundit’s which, when the action or high tempo music kicks in positively, masks what is being said to the point of inaudibility. I did manage to glean the fact that they had to remove a used condom from the beach front shack before filming though! The second commentary track features the three leading bad girls from the movie in a raucous gigglefest from Down Under! It fares a lot better in the balance of the audio but the original soundtrack is still a little too prominent and shone through too loudly for my liking. The disappointment of learning their tattoo’s were only temporary, was offset by the girls comparing the look of slit throats to vaginas -Interesting!

A 4 minute BEHIND THE SCENES skit is included with the obligatory ‘outtake and blooper’ reel and the extras are completed by a 13 minute CAST INTERVIEWS chapter. It starts with a novel look at the cast’s reactions after they had been shown an edit of the first 10 minutes of the movie at the wrap party. It in turn produces some creative responses such as "I knew it would be good. But it was really REALLY good". Right on sister! Finally there is a 7 minute DELETED SCENES section and the original trailer.

So all in all if you like trashy fun with fine leading ladies, an energetic soundtrack and enough blood to surf on, MONSTROS is a cracking little movie and the DVD itself offers excellent value for money.

Review by Marc Lissenburg