Spartacus: Blood and Sand is not so much a television series as a state of mind. I immediately bring this caveat to the table because it is simply not enough to say Spartacus is “not for everyone.” Entering its world is a transcendent experience; Spartacus is so recklessly indulgent in its genre, so unashamed in its over-the-top, contraction-free dialog that you cannot help but grow fond of this ridiculous show in all its gaudy glory.

Comparisons to 300 and Gladiator are inevitable, both in the camerawork and dialog. But where these two films demanded us to take them seriously in their dull-witted adolescent gravity, Spartacus is a far more nuanced creature. For starters, the ideology behind Spartacus is decidedly angry and proletariat-driven, quickly dispensing with the rah-rah, quasi-fascist Dulce Et Decorum Est bullshit that ultimately sunk 300 and Gladiator.

Techno Viking makes a cameo appearance

Andy Whitfield plays the Thracian with No Name, to be eventually saddled with the moniker “Spartacus.” Spartacus is working as a mercenary for the Romans in hopes of defending his homeland against frequent raids from the Getae. Things go sour when the Romans refuse to engage a Getae contingent that razes Spartacus’s village. Justifiably pissed off, Spartacus leads a mutiny against his Roman employers. The Romans don’t appreciate Spartacus not handing in his two-week notice, so they sell his wife off to slavery and condemn Spartacus to death by gladiator in the arena of Capua. Capua is to Rome is what Cleveland is to New York City. It’s a backwater to be sure, but Capua is still infested with enough intrigue and power plays of people eager to hit the prime time of Imperial Roma.

Batiatus would put Dick Cheney to shame. If Dick had any shame.

Spartacus manages to keep himself alive in a series of slow-motion, blood-spurting duels that highlights the martial athleticism of Whitfield and his solid costars Peter Mensah, Manu Bennett, and Jai Courtney. But the heart and soul of Spartacus is the deliciously decadent performance of John Hannah, who plays the gladiators’ owner Batiatus. Hannah delivers that rare feral performance of a man so detestable and conscience-free that of course, he is far and away my favorite character. Hannah chews up and spits out his scenes with aplomb and grace, his ruthlessness more frightening than the muscle bound ferocity of his slaves. Another fabulous standout is Viva Bianca, who matches Hannah’s terrifying performance as the scheming general’s wife Ilithyia, who will stop at nothing at seeing Spartacus dead for humiliating her husband. Let’s just say Ilithyia has a bad temper. A very bad temper.

Why do all the hot ones have to be so psycho?

I’ll tell why I love Spartacus: Blood and Sand, despite the fact every episode is a full-on cheese factory with dialog lifted from some bad D&D role playing manual. Spartacus succeeds admirably in demonstrating just how patently absurd an inherently dysfunctional culture can become. Sociopathic behavior is consistently rewarded, and the most grievous crime in this society is not knowing your socioeconomic place. Karl Marx would approve of the class-driven struggle that is the constant undercurrent of this earnest series. You could accuse Spartacus of being big and stupid, but you can’t call it dishonest. In a world where evil is its own reward, Spartacus: Blood and Sand is a wonderfully campy clarion call for the relatively virtuous to rise up and kick ass.

Yes, Lucy Lawless gets nekkid

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Scum of the Earth is a delightful piece of early 70s hack work, as bizarrely endearing as it is oppressively sleazy; if it were sold as a comedy instead of a proto-slasher flick, perhaps it would have a faithful cult following as opposed to languishing in obscurity for the past 35 odd years. While the gross misrepresentation of the VHS artwork is jarring enough (the film does not take place in a bayou, nor does the heroine wear a tattered dress), the original release poster does a better job reflecting the scuzzy hixploitation quasi-romantic vibe, while completely avoiding the slasher subtext. Maybe it was a tough sell. This unique hybrid of God’s Little Acre by way of Johnny Got his Gun has plenty to offer the schlock aficionado, and an even greater appeal for those who grew up in the Bible Belt and managed to escape with their dignity intact.

Despite the reissue title, Scum of the Earth has absolutely nothing to do with the 1957 Peter Graves cornpone drama Bayou, which was re-edited for the drive-in circuit, had its title changed to Poor White Trash, and was a massive success, especially in certain regions of the Deep South. While one could make the assumption that Bayou was some kind of Douglas Sirk styled celebration of backwater hick “culture”, it would be nigh impossible to make the same mistake when judging the merits of its unofficial sequel: Scum of the Earth is unequivocally and uncompromisingly disgusted with its subject matter, depicting every moment of low-class excess with an ugly, overlit Velveeta sheen rendering its hideous supporting cast even more freakish than usual. And then there are the axe murders.

Or rather, the single axing that acts as a dubious curtain-raiser: newlyweds Helen and Paul Fraser are inexplicably picnicking in some off-the-beaten-path sinkhole in rural Texas, enjoying roughly two minutes of vanilla wedded bliss before the business end of an axe finds its way into Paul’s chest.

Helen quickly comes to terms with becoming a widow, but she is unable to find the keys to their station wagon and is cast off into the wilderness. Instead of finding help, she encounters Odis, the odious patriarch of the Pickett clan, and foolishly follows him home to his ramshackle log cabin. Meanwhile, the unseen axe murderer hovers around, contributing an occasional POV shot, but he’s maddeningly inactive for the bulk of the running time. It would seem that his plan is to allow Helen to enjoy her Southern hospitality until it breaks her very psyche, and the Pickett clan is more than up to the task. Every member of the household embodies one or more crass Southern stereotypes to go along with their other fatal character flaws.

It’s a motley crew indeed.

Odis (pictured at Right), our heroine’s “savior”, is a misogynistic moonshine-chugging Good Ole Boy, who doesn’t have the slightest intention of helping Helen; the house doesn’t have a phone, nor does he have a vehicle, but what he DOES have is a raging libido and more than enough homemade booze chillin’ in the well to keep it raging. Meek Emmy (in chair, to Left of Odis) is pregnant with the newest member of the Picketts, and her pleasant yet vacant demeanor belies the fact that she’s essentially trapped in a loveless marriage, as her first husband essentially used her as collateral in order to pay off a loan to Odis. She’s hardly of an upper-crust background, but her down-to-earth humility stands in stark contrast to perennial tart Sarah Pickett (at Left of frame). Pronounced “Say-Ruh”, she’s been living at home since she done got run straight outta Beaumont, and Odis probably fathered her first aborted child. Good times!

Later we meet Bo Pickett, Sarah’s dimbulb younger brother, who is often tasked to “fetch a jar” of moonshine for his alcoholic dad, and is more than handy when it comes to bringin’ home chow for supper.

So while Helen may not exactly relish the thought of freshly killed possum in her stew, dinner time with the Picketts is by far the least horrific ordeal in what turns out to be a very, very, very long night out in the boondocks. But the frequently hilarious dialogue, and whimsical musical score, turn the proceedings into high camp rather than the penetrating social commentary that Z-list auteur S.F. Brownrigg was likely aiming for. Sure, there are still rural areas in the undeveloped Southern countryside where people still live like it was the late 19th century, inbreeding is common, and progressive politics are demonized, but the depiction of the lifestyle in Scum of the Earth is part affectionate parody, part hysterical exaggeration; there is no ring of truth to its gallery of low-rent horrors. The script plays on cliches and stereotypes, depicting this regressive culture as nothing short of Hell on Earth.

It’s a tonally appropriate companion piece and spiritual sequel to Brownrigg’s inexplicably titled Don’t Look in the Basement, which examined the treatment of the mentally ill and the inherent dangers in experimental treatments vis-a-vis group therapy. It works well for its micro-budget but does not transcend the trappings of its genre. Ultimately Basement devolves into mindless slasher fare in its third act, and the blatantly telegraphed Big Twist is less mindblowing and more shrug-inducing. The film has lapsed into the public domain, and is worth checking out if only to plumb the cinematic genealogy of Scum of the Earth. The price is right.

Much like its successor, Scum devolves into a very slow-paced stalk-and-kill murder mystery deal, only without any tension or emotional stakes or, indeed, any sense of mystery at all.

During one especially inept sequence, Bo is summoned with the words “fetch me a jar” and sent to the chillin’ well to retrieve more moonshine for his deposed Paw; the interior shots of the cabin show that it’s pitch black outside, but once Bo steps out it’s clearly just past High Noon. The Day-For-Night might match up with the similarly mishandled POV shots, but when there’s bright sunlight, stark shadows and birdsong in the middle of your tense murder sequence, well, say goodbye to any and all tension. To top it off, once Bo has his fatal meeting with a sharpened fence post, the discharge oozing from his open maw looks less like stage blood and more like raspberry preserves.

Once Odis is done slapping around his daughter and trading lewd remarks (it’s a remarkable bout of one-upsmanship that culminates in Odis declaring “They run you outta Beaumont ’cause you gave the Clap to half the town!”), his discovery of Bo’s corpse fills him with sorrow; less because he’s out one son than the fact that he’s going to have to fetch his moonshine by himself. Act 3 sends the atrocities flying at breakneck speed: an offscreen rape, more spousal abuse, a sloppy seduction turned barbed wire strangulation, drunken fury followed by a shotgun blast to the face. Then, of course, the Brownrigg signature: a ludicrous twist that adds absolutely nothing to the story.

As much as the lurid marketing campaign would like you to believe otherwise, there’s nary a single moment of terror to be found in Scum of the Earth, and indeed, were it not for the incest subplot and the occasional freshet of stage blood, it could have been reissued as a tongue-in-cheek parody fit for family consumption. With the somewhat optimistic yet totally bleak conclusion, combined with the weird upbeat theme song “Love is a Final Affair”, there’s tangible Family Values subtext to be found here. It’s just nearly impossible to decipher amidst the layers of grime and sleaze and Z-grade exploitation.

At the very least, co-writer and star Gene Ross deserves credit for creating one of the most loathsome yet inexplicably appealing quasi-villains in Odis Pickett. Making a drinking game out of his shenanigans is easy enough; dying from alcohol poisoning is a simple proposition if one were to drink with every utterance of  “Fetch me a jar”. And when’s the last time you saw a slasher flick that ended with cute little credit buttons?

Recommended with all the usual caveats.

The Wonderful, Horrible Life of Leni Riefenstahl epitomizes the old chestnut “To be great is to be misunderstood.” This meticulously balanced documentary, clocking in at an epic three hours, traces the life of the notorious creator of the Nazi magnum opus, Triumph of the Will. Director Ray Muller creates a fairly sympathetic portrait of the Riefenstahl, but his documentary is hardly an apology for cinema’s most infamous auteur. Muller asks plenty of pointed, tough questions, and he never backs down from the objections of this feisty, defensive woman. The Wonderful, Horrible Life of Leni Riefenstahl is a portrait of a woman immersing herself in total cognitive dissonance as she completely revolutionized the art of film editing and cinematography. And say what you will about Triumph of the Will, at least it had an ethos, and it DID win the film competition of the 1937 World Exhibition in Paris. Apparently French moviegoers were just as taken by Riefenstahl’s art as German moviegoers.

The Wonderful, Horrible Life of Leni Riefenstahl is a beguiling chronology of a true Renaissance Woman. Before she made Hitler look so good, Riefenstahl was an accomplished dancer much in demand in Berlin. Riefenstahl explains how she fell into her fate while waiting for a train. She was on her way to the doctor for an injured knee when she found herself transfixed by a movie poster. She skipped the doctor’s appointment and went to go see Berg des Schicksals, directed by Arnold Fanck. This mountain climbing drama (a popular genre at the time, which Sylvester Stallone failed to resurrect with Cliffhanger) so impressed Riefenstahl that she got one of Fanck’s actors, Luis Trenker, to write a letter to Fanck on her behalf. She soon became a star in many of Fanck’s film, becoming an accomplished mountaineer and inadvertent stunt woman. She was often put in harm’s way by Fanck, who probably inspired Werner Herzog in his habit of almost killing his actors. She was asked to climb mountains without any gear, and Fanck even placed her in the middle of an actual avalanche.

The Wonderful, Horrible Life of Leni Riefenstahl is more than just a biography; it’s also a fascinating look at the old school method of film making, and how techniques we take for granted were born from Riefenstahl’s craft. As the documentary tracks her progression of becoming a filmmaker in her own right, Riefenstahl gives us a tour of the editing room and the subtle techniques of stringing scenes together. Here, we get an engrossing and sobering reminder that the film editor is far and away the most important person in any film. Before the days of digital editing, film had to be cut and spliced by hand, a tedious, herculean task that you Final Cut Pro Scorseses could hardly imagine. Riefenstahl speaks at length about the art of lighting, film filters, night filming, and capturing dramatic angles. She even tries to direct Muller as he tries direct her, resulting in some heated director-to-director arguments, but Muller admirably retains a firm grip on his film.

The apex of her craft came when she was working for the Nazi regime. Before Triumph of the Will, Riefenstahl filmed another Nazi get-together, the clumsy Victory of Faith, a documentary of the Fifth Party Rally in Nuremberg. This film presages the technical brilliance of Triumph of the Will, as well as the limitations that Riefenstahl learned to overcome in her eventual dark masterpiece. When describing Victory of Faith, the narrator quips, “The Nazis had not yet learned to march like Nazis,” drawing a sharp contrast between the confused milling about of Hitler and his lackeys to the machine-like precision of Triumph of the Will.

Muller is not hesitant to explore the murky topic of just how much of a Nazi sympathizer Riefenstahl was. He pulls no punches, and confronts Riefenstahl with the bubbly, over-the-top telegram of praise she sent to Hitler in the wake of his victory over France. Riefenstahl gives the all-too common defense that a) she knew nothing of the Holocaust and b) Hitler had utterly mesmerized her through his charisma, not his racial policies. Riefenstahl also vehemently denies ever being buddies with Joseph Goebbels, as he had claimed in his diaries. Muller leaves the viewer to come to their own conclusions, but Riefenstahl does seem convincing and eloquent enough in her presumed innocence. For what it’s worth, she does point out that Triumph of the Will never actually puts forth any racial theories of German superiority. That presents any film historian with a rather complex, dubious quandary; perhaps Triumph of the Will did not depict Hitler actually slandering the Jews, but was it not the film editor who took these passages out? According to Wikipedia, Triumph of the Will does contain one racist reference, where Julius Streicher comments, “”A people that does not protect its racial purity will perish.”

Equally fascinating, though not nearly as lurid, is Riefenstahl’s life after World War II. Her punishment for her political blindness (or pretending to be so) was that she could never make a film again. But being who she was, she kept herself busy, eventually living with several African tribes and publishing a photography essay of her sojourn with the Nuba people of Sudan. This project would seem to contradict any notion that Riefenstahl is a Nazi racist, or perhaps one could grudgingly admit she was at least “rehabilitated.”

No matter your opinion of her, you can’t help but admire her consistent boldness; at the age of ninety, she became a certified scuba dive master, and there are some mind blowing scenes of her petting a huge stingray that could have killed her in an instant. But as I marveled at her daredevil antics, I could not help but think that even if that stingray did kill her, Riefenstahl would die knowing she led a full, amazing, perhaps reprehensible, but never mundane life. And on that account, I am envious.