Verotika (2020) by Glenn Danzig


Director: Glenn Danzig
Year: 2020
Country: USA
Alternate Titles: N/A
Genre: Anthology

Plot:
Hosted by the demon Morella, a trio of stories coming from the pages of the Verotika comic-book series.

Review:

The Albino Spider of Dajette-Living with her boyfriend, a woman grows frustrated when a night of passionate lovemaking turns off another man when he sees her naked. When it grows so bad it manifests in the form of a murderous spider-person who begins killing her friends, she tries to understand how to stop it in order to keep them alive. This one wasn't too bad but it serves the film wrong as the lead-in entry. This one generates a fascinatingly bizarre overview with the physical ailment she suffers from and the utterly freaky emergence of the spider-creature through highly unconventional means is a fine way of getting this going. As well, there's a fine semblance of a relationship brewing between the two where his obsession with her and staying devoted to her manages to work well enough as a setup but the overall lack of explanation for what caused the creature to appear, the general inability to be disgusted by the illogical nature of it's being there and a wholly unsatisfying conclusion are big obstacles to overcome. Add a sluggish pacing onto it and this one is a tough one to open on.

Change of Face-Roaming the streets at night, a stripper begins a reign of terror slicing the faces off of women she deems attractive in order to replace her own scarred face. When a detective realizes what's going on, he sets out to stop her rampage. This one wasn't that bad and was somewhat decent. Despite working with a premise seen dozens of times over with a figure looking to physically scar others because of her own deformity, the changeover here to the idea of a stripper doing it to maintain her looks and keep her career is serviceable enough for an anthology entry like this. Given enough encounters and cheap gore to satisfy with the removal scenes as well as a series of bizarre surrealism surrounding the growing collection of faces attached to her dressing-room wall or the faceless victims appearing during her stripping performance, it has some enjoyable aspects. The detective investigating everything, however, is completely laughable and the lack of realization over what's happening to them makes the encounters underwhelming for the most part though.

Drukija Countessa of Blood-In charge of a remote peasant village, a vile contessa takes away scores of young women and keeps them in her castle to feed on them and bathe in their blood in an effort to remain young forever. As she carries on her rampage on the citizens, her hubris eventually gets the better of her. Overall, this segment was quite enjoyable. The old-school Gothic atmosphere of the castle and the living conditions of those inside which serves to highlight her own extravagant persona is all well-handled and gives this some of its enjoyable atmosphere. Given a sleazy make-over with the copious nudity and gruesome bloodletting that emerges, including the bathing in blood sequences or nearly orgasmic glee with the blood on her body, they manage to hold up the general familiarity with the storyline directly and overtly copying other legends in the genre wholesale which renders much of the shocking acts rather pointless. Likewise, the comically awful effects here with atrocious gore-gags and make-up do knock this one down immensely.


Overview: **/5
While on the surface filled with every imaginable facet of bad-filmmaking with a cheap look and plenty of flaws, the fact that this one still is better-than-expected isn't saying much with the detriments do shining through more than the positives. Give it a watch if you're curious about it due to the rumors, have an affinity for the creative side or looking to appreciate trashy genre fare while those who are not interested in those aspects won't find much to enjoy here.

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