everyday lives (one has a cheat- ing, thieving boyfriend; one has extreme issues with an overbear- ing mother of her own; and we’re even given a sequence in which one’s attempt to share the greet- ings of the day with a black doorman is met with a tirade concerning racial inequality) but they find strength and spirit in each other’s company and refuse to succumb to chauvinism. Most notable here is a shared flash- back in which the trio gives a sex- ist “stud” his comeuppance in a sequence mimicking the famous “football field” scene from DIRTY HARRY! But their greatest (per- haps insurmountable) challenge comes when they fall into the clutches of Mother’s boys. Ike and Addley (named after Eisenhower and Stevenson) live with Mother in a cluttered, run- down cabin which serves as a nightmarish collage of processed junk food and pop culture relics;
their lifelong physical and men- tal nourishment supplied by a non-stop flow of television. Their appreciation of music is limited to a well-remembered argument con- sisting solely of “Punk sucks!”/ “Disco’s stupid!” and their cap- tives are nothing more than toys for them to “break” for Mother’s amusement. And should sugary snacks and living playthings fail to keep them in check, Mother ensures their constant devotion by warning them that her de- formed (and even more de- ranged) sister Queenie still lurks in the woods outside the cabin and is waiting to “get” her the moment the boys turn their backs. The abuse Ike and Addley dish out to the girls may not be quite as graphic as that seen in I SPIT ON YOUR GRAVE, but it’s equally painful to watch (as is an excruciating sequence involving a rope cutting into one of the vic- tims’ hands during an escape
attempt). Only when the heroines fight back with everything they can seize is the viewer invited to cheer: a television set may be the most fitting weapon in their ar- senal, but it’s the can of Drano that tends to provoke the loud- est howls. MOTHER’S DAY is un- deniably an extremely violent film filled with displays of misogyny, but it’s defiantly about something; its characters are memorable and well-played, and it leaves no doubt with whom its sympathies lie. While it wasn’t an immediate theatrical success in 1980, it has lingered on for a reason. Anchor Bay’s new Blu-ray re- lease (looking as good as pos- sible in a fresh 1.78:1 transfer) ports over the Charles Kaufman audio commentary from Troma’s previous DVD edition [reviewed VW 73:69]. Depending on how you approach the main feature from the menu, uncredited mod- erator Rex Piano may pop up in
Jaime King gets a lesson in manners from Rebecca De Mornay in the MOTHER’S DAY remake.
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