Review: Dear God No! / Cert: 18 / Director: James Bickert / Screenplay: James Bickert / Starring: Jett Bryant, Madeline Brumby, Paul McComisky, Olivia LaCroix / Release Date: January 14th
Aspiring filmmakers with no appreciable skill or talent whatsoever have been able to handily hide their lack of ability behind the grindhouse tag over the last few years, churning out grubby, cheap little movies, adding a few crackly on-screen visual affectations for extra sleaze value and then, presumably, sitting back and waiting for critics and audiences to tell them how smart and knowing they’ve been. Not this time, buster. Dear God No! is a grindhouse-cum-biker pic, but whatever it is, there’s no getting away from the fact that it’s a truly vile, repellent, nasty-looking piece of work which only succeeds in making the viewer wish that cinema had never been invented.
James Bickert’s foul script, appallingly directed, concerns a gang of devil-worshipping bikers (all in their fifties, by the looks of them) who like nothing more than murdering nuns and raping people. After a shootout in a topless bar, they stumble across a remote cabin where a former Nazi scientist is experimenting on bringing the dead – and specifically his late wife – back to life. The scientist, for reasons which we can scarcely be bothered to remember, is dining with an expectant young couple when the bikers arrive and start killing and raping everyone. Then Sasquatch turns up and tears people’s heads off. Then there’s a bit more raping.
We’re made of stern stuff here at Starburst (we got through Battleship, after all) but Dear God No! just goes too far. This is essentially pornography of the lowest order; the violence would be brutally offensive if it weren’t so ineptly realised (but one sequence involving a pregnant woman is stomach-churningly grotesque and makes you fear for minds that are capable of creating such disturbing garbage) and the dire acting is no more than such effluence deserves. Bickert’s witless, clueless direction and the desperately low production values (it’s all shot on 16mm for that authentic 1970s grindhouse feel) are the rancid icing on a poisonous cake which should never have been baked.
If a mate of yours is a grindhouse connoisseur, and he or she invites you to see this raunchy new movie they’ve got their hands on, take our advice and (obvious review conclusion alert) tell ‘em, “Dear God, no!” This is right up there with the very worst things ever made in any medium.
Extras: Two cuts of the film, the theatrical cut and the all new exclusive Grindhouse cut / Full colour booklet / Audio commentaries / Gag reel / Slideshows / Promos
