Bingo Hell - Movie Review
What do you get when the house that Blum built takes a shot at making a Troma film? Let me up the ante, the cast is Richard Brake and a handful of elderly character actors. No? Not interested? What if I told you it’s the first of the Amazon Prime Exclusive, Welcome to Blumhouse films that I’ve actually enjoyed?
Let’s discuss.
I gotta be honest. At this point, I feel like the Welcome to BlumHouse moniker isn’t a benefit to a film. I think it’s the films Blumhouse couldn’t see paying for their own marketing for. We’re talking the straight to VHS material here. I’ve watched a few and I’ve got to say… These are the whitest horror films I know. I don’t mean the films don’t have diverse casts. I mean I can feel the milquetoast Harvard grad, trust fund baby who wrote these thinking they were scary. I think I can speak for the rest of us in the 99%, we’ve lived scarier experiences than anything seen in the Lie or Nocturne. Worst of all, these lame attempts at terror haven’t been much fun. The heavy handed messages being shoved down our throats don’t leave much time for popcorn.
Sidenote - Jason, Big “JB”—brother if you need someone who can write you some 90’s style action / horror. Slide into the DM’s.
…Where was I?
Oh yeah, Bingo Hell
B.H. is a horror / comedy / gore flick brought to us from writer/director Gigi Saul Guerrero. It’s set in a neighborhood being forcibly gentrified by hipsters and hooligans. Our heroine is the completely unlikable Lupita, played by prolific Mexican actress Adriana Barraza. She’s the neighborhood busybody who follows the same routine everyday of her life. She has a cigarillo for breakfast, gets her hair did at the salon, and then runs the local bingo hall till ??’s. It’s a sweet gig until the hipsters started moving in and all of Lupita’s neighbors started jumping ship. Worse yet, the bingo hall has a new owner—and that owner is played by Richard Brake… Needless to say, Lupita needs to find a way to stop this avatar of pure evil from dragging her barrio straight to hell. It’s Floyd Kaufman meets Something Wicked This Way Comes in BINGO HELL!
Blah, Blah, Spoilers Maybe, Moles and Trolls, Moles and Trolls, Workworkwork
I had 0 expectations for this film. I picked it for my movie night with my buddy Leslie just because I haven’t seen anyone talking about it. Probably because the Get Out shine is off of the Blumhouse logo. Well, everyone’s missing out. This film is a blast from start to finish.
Is it a good film?
Maybe?
Good is a relative term in horror. As a diehard fan of Italian Cinema from the 70-90s, I can attest that me and those of my ilk has no concept of good taste. Quality isn’t as heavily weighted as Fun on my scoring metrics. More often than not, we as horror fans are so desensitized by our nonstop consumption of the genre teamed with our traumatic upbringing that we just want to have a laugh with our friends. We want to throw popcorn at the screen when someone says “I’ll be right back!”
That’s why I like this film. The cast of violent geriatrics have a fiery chemistry that feels a little too real. There are some back and forths that feel a little too much like a shoot, making for an uncomfortable few minutes. The actors and actresses ooze charisma and depth. This is emphasized by the fact that the movie tells us almost nothing about each of them. What we know is taught to us through the barrio itself.
As Lupita walks down the sidewalks of the town, every single person greets her by name. If you’ve ever been in a real barrio, you know a person who has garnered that much respect. That person normally has a few bodies in their wake. It’s a simple thing, but if you pay attention it’s telling. More hints to Lupita’s violent past are implied by the clump of scarred over bullet wounds in the shoulder / scares on her face and hands.
Jump over to Lupita’s scene stealing sidekick Delores played by screen legend L. Scott Caldwell. Yeah, I said it. You may not know her name, but she’s been in just about every movie / T.V. show in the last two decades. Almost always, she’s relegated to a recurring role or a brief supporting actress position, but almost always she leaves her mark. She’s incredible in the role of the downtrodden Delores. A strong willed woman who has taken in her dead son’s wife and child, even though the wife is a Teen Mom reject with a heavy drug problem. Through listening to the conversations she has and taking in the set dressing of her home, you’re told that Delores was a single mother of an only child. Her son was a heroine user who got wrapped up in gangs and knocked up his high school girlfriend. By the time her son got sober, he died of aids.
It’s a good writing team and a thoughtful director that can pull off this type of subtle storytelling.
From here, we get into Troma territory.
Richard Brake shows up like a evil Nickelodeon host and starts sliming people. This nasty, noisy, green jelly causes people to spin around with a steady came strapped to their chest while colors symbolizing different sins flash around them signifying what vice lead them to their death. Speaking of death, holy shit is this film gory. There I was getting annoyed at the spinney-neon-steadycam shot going on too long and then she ripped her boobs off. My jaw hit the ground. When this movie gets real, it doesn’t stop. You’ve got old lady Shotgun warriors versus Richard Brake doing his best Reagonomics / Devil mashup.
For real though, Richard Brake is a treasure. I’ve got to hit him up and see if these gigs are as much fun as he makes them look. To me, it looks like he’s having a flipping blast being the world’s biggest asshole. God bless ‘em.
Watch this movie if you like giallo mood lighting and ultra-violence.
