"Society" (1989)

• Directed by: Brian Yuzna
• Written by: Woody Keith & Rick Fry
• Starring: Billy Warlock, Devin DeVasquez, Evan Richards

(Note: This review contains spoilers. I don't usually like putting spoilers in my reviews, but in this case, I need to in order to properly articulate my thoughts on the film. If you're not interested in having this movie spoiled, stay away.)     

     Criticizing films can be an arduous process. If a film has beautiful visuals but an incompetent story, does that make it bad? If a film has an amazing plot but looks like it was filmed in someone's backyard, does that make it good? Similarly, should a film be judged by the strength of its individual scenes or by the sum of its parts? "Good" and "bad" are very rarely clear cut, and making a decision to recommend something can be hard to do. It's with this thought in mind that I recommend Brian Yuzna's 1989 horror effort, "Society," but with some very important caveats.

     Bill Whitney (Billy Warlock) is an outcast. He lives with affluent family up in Beverly Hills, and he is all set to become the next student body president, yet he feels as if he doesn't belong. His family and friends are distant, he's filled with paranoia for something that he can't explain, and he is constantly plagued by nightmares. One day, his sister's ex-boyfriend, Blanchard (Tim Bartell), shows him a tape that he recorded of his family participating in what appears to be a strange, incestuous orgy. With the help of his friend Milo (Evan Richards) and a weird girl named Clarissa (Devin DeVasquez), Bill decides to investigate, and discovers that his "family" are actually strange creatures that literally feed off of the poor for energy.

     Objectively, "Society" is not a great movie. Brian Yuzna's direction is without much style or suspense, the score is full of cheesy, buzzing synths, the characters are cardboard cutouts, and it's all wrapped up in a ham-fisted metaphor about high society. What is possibly the worst aspect of the film, however, is the plot. It's riddled with holes. Why would Bill's sister leave her (bugged) earrings on during an orgy? Why was Bill taken into this society and groomed for 18 years just to be fed upon? Why does Clarissa's mother seem brain damaged, and why is she obsessed with eating hair? If this incredibly suspicious society of ancient creatures live in public, how have they not been caught? Were Milo and Blanchard meant to be groomed as well?

     The film doesn't answer any of these questions, and offers absolutely no explanation or reasoning behind the film's events or the character's actions. I suspect that the filmmakers thought they would be vague and leave the audience to decide for themselves, which is fine, but not when the mystery doesn't make any logical sense.

     With all that said, why in the hell am I recommending this film? Let me set the scene for you: We've spent almost the entirety of the movie being built up to what this society might be, only glimpsing strange behavior and hearing some whispered notion about "society". Finally, Billy bursts into his house, where his family reveals their dark secret, and in order to demonstrate what they are they bring in Blanchard, who was previously thought to be dead. What follows is one of the most shocking and imaginatively disgusting scenes I've ever seen in a film, in which all of the members of this twisted society participate in a sickening orgy of flesh.

     Every single person is formed together in an orgiastic, slimy ball of squirming meat, sucking the life out of Blanchard's body. Hands erupt from mouths and latch onto eye sockets. Limbs bend and contort around each other. A man's head transforms into a gigantic, grasping hand. It all culminates in a scene where Billy witnesses his own family formed together into one hellish being. Arms are where legs should be, his sister's head hangs from his mother's groin, and his father's face emerges from his mother's detached anus. It's horrid, sickening, and utterly unlike anything I've seen in a horror film.

     Screaming Mad George is the special effects artist who's demented imagination supplied the concept for the scene, as well as the effects for the film. His work is the real star of the movie, and this scene is the reason that I recommend "Society". It's an incredible finale, but the problem with it is that it's buried underneath 70 minutes of a mystery that's badly written and uninteresting. But, if you're a horror or special effects fan that's willing to put up with that, I doubt that you'll be disappointed.