|
October is here, and some of you might be looking for some good flicks to add to your "Halloween Party Background Noise" collection. My Demon Lover, a spookified romance from 1987, probably isn't going to be anyone's top pick. It's the movie that took Nick from "Family Ties" to the big screen -- yes, an honest-to-goodness Scott Valentine vehicle, complete with enough associations to make you feel like you're watching Mallory's boyfriend with amnesia. What's the film about? Uhhh... Scott Valentine turns into a demon whenever he gets a hard-on. No, seriously. Ninety minutes of that. It didn't woo the Academy nor the sixteen people who actually paid money to see it, but hey, I'm easily entertained. Got two hours to spare? Head to your Blockbuster's bargain rental bin and see if they're particularly well-stocked. There's worse movies to waste time on, and as for the better ones, well...they don't star Nick from "Family Ties."
Suffice to say, "My Demon Lover" didn't help poor Scott expand his career much -- with a box office gross of under 4 million, the flop was somewhat surprising in that Valentine's star was shining pretty big at the time -- he'd become a hit on prime time television making garbage art and comparing philosophies Alex P. Keaton, and conventional wisdom suggested that he'd have an audience on the big screen. Nope, sorry -- he didn't. It could be argued that, if given a storyline broader than "guy who turns into Satan when horny," Scott would've made his mark. Unfortunately, as things stand now, he's still known best as the guy Michael Gross secretly wanted to bash in the face with many, many hammers. Oh well. For what it's worth, I didn't loathe "My Demon Lover." Let's meet the main characters...
Our precious hero plays "Kaz," a homeless NYC squatter who makes a living collecting tips for his off-key saxophone sessions on the subways. It's going to take a patient soul to make it through the first portion of the movie, which mostly features Kaz running around the streets pinching the asses of various women. I know it doesn't sound that bad, but trust me, it is. He's a more likable character when the romance stuff starts, but the first half of the movie lends a bit of credibility to anyone planning to start an underground cult of snipers with Scott Valentine being the 1,000 point super-target. The comedy side is way over the top, and the script just couldn't carry it. It's like watching someone do the worst impression of Nick Moore in history, a fact made doubly grating since it's the guy who actually played him. My advice? During the first twenty minutes of the movie, amuse yourself with one of those knitting projects you've been putting off. By the time you're done with the sweater, Kaz will be done being incredibly annoying.
Michelle Little plays "Denny," a cute little spunker down on her luck. Pining for the "perfect relationship," Denny constantly gets involved with hoodlums who treat her like dirt and steal the entire contents of her apartment, as seen in the film's opening sequence. As you could guess, she becomes Kaz's love interest. As you could guess, things get interesting when she gives him an erection and his dick turns into Satan's tail. This isn't a great movie, but I'll give it this -- you'll never have more fun explaining the plot to someone. Michelle managed to make the character pretty engaging, and without her, I'd definitely assume "My Demon Lover" would've been completely unwatchable. That's right -- either Michelle Little played "Denny," or they were gonna be screwed. No other actress, living, dead, or unborn could've done it. Amazingly skewed blanket statements are best served for movie reviews no one will read because they've gotta click on an image Scott Valentine's head to get inside 'em. So, while I'm at it: every Jew is cheap, and Chinese people don't know how to add.
Now here's Kaz's dilemma -- whenever he sees a women he finds attractive, something strange happens. He grows fangs, his eyes turn red, and before you know it, the poor guy's standing there looking like Walter Matthau with the mumps wearing Jacko's contact lenses from Thriller. Making matters worse, we THE AUDIENCE are shown scenes of women being mangled by vague monsters, being led to believe that not only is Kaz a sometimes-demon, but a sometimes-demon who sometimes-murders girls so inconsequential that they aren't even listed in the extended credits. Hey, you want us to care? Kill someone important! The point is, there are some horror elements to the movie -- at least, there's enough to where I don't have to feel like a complete sap for reviewing a mushy love story starring Scott Valentine. I've got enough to feel like a sap about -- dressing like Dracula to review He-Man toys comes to mind.
Those are the basic points. No wait, those are the only points. The rest just fill out 90 minutes, and help this poor soul write his weekly "lengthy" article. Thanx, Kazx!
Article continued below advertisement:
Visit our sponsors to support the site!
Sure enough, Kaz stumbles out from the pile of garbage he was sleeping under, and takes an interest in Denny -- more specifically, Denny's hamburger. Only it's not a hamburger, it's a healthy fruitburger! See, it's funny because Kaz wasn't expecting a fruitburger, and spits it out as if he'd just taken a bite of seagull shit. I'm serious, you'll never see a more exaggerated example of someone spitting out food in any entertainment medium, anywhere, ever. It's the Danny Thomas spit-take magnified by ten thousand, and the real coup? You get to see Valentine make about fifty-five different "damn I gotta take a shit" faces in the span of seven seconds flat. Amazing, truly amazing. What's more? All of this incredibly obvious overacting just comes to a screeching halt in the middle of the movie, with the cast soothing into more tolerable performances that won't make you want to kill them. It's as if the director arrived six weeks after shooting began, exclaiming "damn, that mono sure was a killer!" Nobody told him what he missed, but considering the amount of drugs the cast and crew of "My Demon Lover" had to be on to see the continuing project as a good idea, they probably wouldn't have remembered much anyway.
Ultimately, Denny puts aside her better judgment and gives Kaz a chance, and whaddya know? Seems like they're made for each other! Of course, the relationship can only go so far -- whenever it turns to the physical side, Kaz feels the Devil rising up inside him, and in an effort to spare Denny the horrors of a Satan-Kaz, typically leaps out her window and hides until dawn. It's not the perfect relationship, but really, what is? All I know is this: they got the five-minute "let's eat hot dogs romantically!" montage, and if that ain't Lucy and Desi reborn, I don't know what is. Kaz institutes a "no touchy touchy" rule, which Denny takes to mean that he's just nervous about sex. Girl, he ain't nervous. He just doesn't want to kill you with Helldick. Get the boy a ring.
Kaz consults a street vendor who's selling a bunch of occult potions and whatnot, and since the credits list this jive soul bro only as "Fixer," that's what I'll call him. "Fixer." Fixer immediately recognizes Kaz as a cursed soul, leading to a discussion about just what kind of curse the poor guy's dealing with. Kaz explains the predicament, and how he fell in love with this sweet girl he can't have sex with. As far as urban street vendors go, Fixer's pretty gracious -- not only does he offer free advice, but he actually goes as far as unveiling his black magic altar so they can see just how he got the demon curse.
As we see within Fixer's makeshift crystal ball, Kaz was inflicted with the disease as a teenager by the grandmother of a little girl who caught the two making out. Fixer calls the curse a "Romanian case of blue balls," where Satan takes over Kaz's body whenever he's feeling sexual. That's a rough curse. Kaz is, of course, a little skeptical. He even calls the whole thing a "third rate fairy tale." It's the script that keeps on giving, folks. Fortunately, Fixer knows just where to look for proof of his claims. Wanna take a guess where that might be?
Yup, his f'n f'n F'N crotch. SCOTT VALENTINE'S CROTCH, ONSCREEN -- pubes included! It's not full-frontal, but it's close enough to make me feel all dirty inside. I couldn't believe my eyes, but eyes rarely lie. There it was, right there in front of me, for a good few seconds. Nick Moore's pubic hair. I couldn't escape it. Some would argue that I just could've looked away, but when you see something so unexpectedly frightening, the mind wonders if the next thing you see is going to top it. I envisioned looking away from the television only to see one of our cats whacking off to a picture of Mallory, which, in retrospect, wouldn't have been as bad. Look, no matter how I explain it, there's no denying the factual truth (is that a double-positive?) that I was caught looking at Scott Valentine's public hair. Sure, all that stuff about being afraid of what I'd see if I looked away was bullshit, but if you were in this position, you'd look for excuses, too. Don't deny it. And stop staring at that picture up there, you freak.
Anyways, Fixer's more interested in that scar on Kaz's lower belly than his pubes, and I'm not going to fault him for that. That's the scar that proves the curse, my friends. To shed himself of his demon side, Kaz has to do something "noble." Problem is, the curse will spread to whomever Kaz is closest to at the time. He takes that to mean Denny, but (SPOILER!!!!) as we'll find out later, Fixer meant it in the literal form. If you don't know what I'm talking about, rest assured, either do I. I'm still shaken by the spider legs popping up from Valentine's pants. And is it just me, or is he going around commando? Do any transient sax-playing demon lovers wear underwear? Show of hands?
Okay, now here's where things start heating up. Kaz finally confesses his "problem" to Denny, who handles the news in the same way one would if their significant other confessed to liking Jackie-centric reruns of Roseanne. The whole demon bit doesn't bother her one bit. In fact, she wants to see him do it. See, Kaz is convinced that he's the guy going around killing all of those fine city women. Denny claims that "her man" would "never" "do" something "like" that. To persuade Kaz otherwise, she insists that he turns into a demon. If Kaz doesn't eat her, she'll know she's right. If Kaz does eat her, she'll be too dead to know she's wrong.
So, they start making out. Then they land on the bed. Then Kaz's spine gets all bumpy and misshapen. I think I saw a nipple in there, too. Not sure who it belonged to, so I won't put it on my "pros" list just yet. With that, we're ready to see mildly aroused and totally creaturrific Kaz in his demon fatigues:
Well, he only changed halfway. Actually, every time Demon Lover appears on the screen, he always seems to look a bit different. Either Scott Valentine had a nasty habit of scratching at latex between takes, or it's the biggest flub since Greg called Jan "Eve" on "The Brady Bunch." You know, if you smacked Jan with a shovel a few times and put enough Kabuki makeup on her, she'd look a lot like Denny. I'm not saying Denny's ugly, but you'd need to smack Jan with a shovel as their heads are shaped rather differently. Eh, come to think of it, they look absolutely nothing alike and there's no way to take them to that point without massive surgery. I just felt like talking about Jan.
So yeah, in half-demon form, Kaz has a deeper voice, huge belly, no hair, and first prize in NY's annual "Tor Johnson Look-A-Like" competition. All right, that one made sense! Screw you Jan, I got Tor for my comparison musings now. We had our thing, but now it's over. You can go back to writing personal essays detailing why the Jan in the newer Brady movies wasn't as funny as you were. I got my Tor and I don't need you. We're getting off-track. We've gone from demon lore to Jan and Tor. Let's take a breather and meet the film's secondary characters -- these guys made less of an impact, but they're important nonetheless. The film was getting so lacking in the cast department, I began theorizing that I was watching a twisted version of Our Town
On the left, "Sonia." She's a friend of Denny's, she's in with the police department, and she's part-psychic. She's all of these things and more. After her sister was attacked by the mysterious and newly dubbed "Mangler," Sonia takes a vested interest in finding the creature of the night responsible. Convinced that he's not human, Sophia ultimately uses her psychic prowess to deduce Kaz as a likely candidate. Psychic prowess my ass -- the dumb idiot put on his red contacts while sitting right next to her. If I was Mallory, I think I'd be saying "just shut up and look pretty" an awful lot. Someone would probably be masturbating to me right now, too. And I could finally wear broaches!
On the right, "Charles." He's the neighborhood nerdy loser who can't score a date no matter how many times he calls Denny and Sonia with dinner and a movie on the brain. He'll come off as a bit parter, and in fact, only appears sporadically and decisively inconsequentially for most of the film. Then, out of nowhere, he's present for all of the big climax scenes. Remembering that we're still not sure if Kaz is the one murdering all them girly girls, Stranger Charles' random insertion as a major character seems to be leading to the obvious. Still, no matter what you're actually expecting to happen, trust me -- they top it.
After a short rendezvous with the aforementioned filler-outers, the lovebirds return to the nest to give that whole "turn into a demon and I WON'T BE SCARED" thing a try. This time around, Kaz goes all out with the transformation. He's in his full demon garb, horns and all. At first, things seem okay. He's ugly as sin, but he's still Kaz. Denny even kisses him a few more times, if only to emphasize that "My Demon Lover" wasn't really meant to be seen by anyone at any time. Suddenly, all of her furniture begins flying around the apartment, and before they know it, Kaz slips into "insane mode." Now possessed both in appearance and spirit, it looks like trouble's a'brewin. What happens next? That's kind of hard to explain.
Where do I start? Okay, as things turn out, being a demon in this flick constitutes the right to bust out with all sorts of wacky crap not explained or even passingly described in any previous scenes. In this case, KazDemon is able to turn into pretty much whatever he wants, first emerging from the bathroom as a redneck hick who heckles Denny about her stupid, stupid, stupid pants. Then he turns into Denny's mother, chastising her for being an unmarried spinster. This raises Denny's ire, causing her to charge at KazDemonMom fists-first. Upon impact, the thing's hollow head explodes, causing pumpkin ooze to slime its way down to the floor. Next, the head just entirely blows up, leaving a decapitated corpse on the floor shooting up blood and random pieces of string. Just when you can't take anymore, Kaz returns to normal and has no idea about what just happened. Don't feel so bad, Kaz. I saw the whole damn thing, and even I'm not totally sure I could tell you what happened, either. Let's just pretend this was an out-take, and leave it for the producers to explain when "My Demon Lover" nails a special edition DVD release and someone mistakenly hits the "commentary ON" button. I'd say we're about four decades worth of retro revivals away. Keep the faith.
To everyone's utter shock, Charles turns out to be the Mangler. Subduing Denny with an ether-soaked rag and kidnapping her, Kaz and Sophia head off to find their buddy before she's...well, mangled. Problem is, Charles the Mangler lives upstairs in a huge castle in Central Park -- odd that nobody noticed this castle before, but New York's a busy place. The cops are on the scene, and despite the very clear open doors and stairwells leading up to the point of abduction, everyone agrees that "there's no way up there." Sophia has an idea. In a previous scene where she tried to kill KazDemon, she noticed a pair of ominous wings sprout from his back. Now that they've made up and have this massive understanding, Sophia suggests that Kaz "use the wings." But he can't! He's not horny! So, what does Sophia do?
Yup, she fucks him. It's about the laziest and most PG-rated sex scene you'll ever see in a movie, but to its credit, one of the select few where one of the participants is a seven-foot demon. When finished copulating, Kaz has a celebratory cigarette, and indeed, he sprouts those necessary wings. They're about five inches long a piece, but they still work wonders in letting him fly. I'm having a really hard time deciding if this is the worst or most brilliant film I've encountered. On one hand, there's that scene where Scott Valentine spits out a fruitburger for twenty minutes. On the other side, we did get to see some chick screw Satan just so he'd grow cupid wings. It's a delicate balance, no doubt, but maybe things'll become clearer in the climax, which, THANK GOD, we're just about up to...
Kaz ain't the only demon in town -- Charles has the power too, but he's perfected it. Not only does he look more impressive with those curly goat horns, but he's got the ability to shoot lightning out of his paws a la Emperor Palpatine. There's a lot of little things that lead up to this next part, some of which involving the Fixer, others involving Charles inflating his face to sizes three times larger than usual, but folks -- it's getting late. Mind if I skip over that? You already know what the ending's gonna be....do you really need to know that Kaz kills Charles with some ancient occult demon sword tossed to him by a street vendor from approximately thirty yards away? No? Cool -- yeah, that's what happens.
Kaz wins, long live the Alliance. After stabbing Charles in the chest, the demon explodes into a bunch of lightning bolts; dies. News at 11. The Fixer, who arguably was the closest to Kaz at the time of this noble pursuit, catches his demon sickness and is more than happy to run off chasing lady cops down with newly acquired devil horns. The ending gets even happier, if you can believe it. As the curse is lifted from Kaz, his shirt transforms, into one of those then-stylish numbers with the sheet of satin ribbon candy running over the buttons. If you try to picture it hard enough, you'll know which kind I mean. The Demon Lover is saved, the Mangler is vanquished, and the Fixer likes being Satan. Everyone's pleased as punch, but Kaz and Denny have something to be especially thankful for...
Now they can have sex! The world will never be able to count the number of budding directors, rookie actors, and wishful dreamers who have found inspiration in "My Demon Lover." This is the movie that set the standard for years to come, and to this day, no box office record can muck the fact that its artistic genius has gone unchallenged. It's the flick that forces the world to try harder, in everything it does, everyday of its life. It's "My Demon Lover" -- the movie where Scott Valentine turns into Lucifer whenever he gets a chubby.
Overall: I dunno, how does "6 out of 10" sound? Too noncommittal? I'll give it a "7," then. I'm not very committed to that "7," but at least it sounds that way. As for Scott, I think he was most recently seen as recurring character "Steve Rafferty" on a television series called "The Black Scorpion." Poor guy. He's playing a character named after the way Scooby Doo mispronounces "give that to me!" That's one thing about the mighty -- eventually, they've gotta fall.
DISCUSS THIS ARTICLE WITH OTHERS!
RETURN TO X-E!
|
|
|
|
