Great title, right? Though maybe the first exclaimation mark should be after “bitch.” (I digress.) This is THE exploitation film of the 2000s. I dare you to find a crazier film between 2000-2010 of violence, rape, and and twisted sadism than RUN! BITCH RUN! from 2009, directed by Joeseph Guzman and produced by Freakshow Entertainment. You will, indeed, be entertained… and repulsed by this film. You may laugh and cry simultaneously.
WATCH THE TRAILER. CLICK HERE.
IMDB’s plot description:
“Catherine and Rebecca are two Catholic School girls going door-to-door selling Religious paraphernalia in order to pay for their books and education. Things go horribly wrong when they knock on the wrong door in the wrong neighborhood. “Run! Bitch Run!” is a throw back to the classic rape and revenge films like The Last House on the Left and Ms. 45.”
Four minutes into this movie, we have a full frontal nun, black girl breasts, white girl breast, a fat guy gyrating his fat, hairy ass while having sex, pot smoking, and a whore murdering her latest “lay.”
Holy Hell. This is gonna be good.
The aesthetic of the film grain is great. Nothing is totally in focus. Ever. If this is not shot on real film, whatever kind of filter the editor or director is using is incredible. Shot in 2009, it could easily be 1975. The lighting is great. The blacks are nice and dark. And the soundtrack was well thought out. All the songs are like beautiful south western accompaniments that Tarantino never used but should have. Where the musical selections could have been too over the top or “on-the-nose”, this film finds a good homage to its throwback without being a blatant rip-off. I applaud.
By around the seven minute mark there is again a wide shot. Full frontal. A beautiful girl that is clearly shameless. Funny thing is, she is having a normal conversation with her friend in a shady motel room. They are both also from a Catholic School. Hey, sign me up. I’ll take another crack at Christianity if girls who look like a cross between Rose McGowan and Anne Hathaway are thumping the good ol’ bible.
When the first ten pages of your script has more blood and nudity then plot—bing—you gotta exploitation flick on your hands.
So these two girls are “100 miles from St. Mary’s”—the buzz kill girl with her blonde hair in a bun is trying to do everything by the book, including having humility, shame, and a clean path straight to God’s work. The naked one, Rebecca, with her raven hair down around her shoulders is talking about having a little fun and essentially not being a good girl falling in line. The issue I have with this scene: I find it hard to believe that these two girls, presumably having been in a Catholic school all of their lives, could be so different. One would think a lifetime of indoctrination would leave no room for promiscuity in their pretty little heads. But, hey, conflict is what makes a movie go ‘round, so rationality and reality be damned! The script must be written, I guess. I also quickly found it implausible that two girls would be going around in Texas Chainsaw Massacre-land just to sell some religious junk completely on their own. They seem to be in the middle of nowhere and aimless as hell.
On another note—and yes, I suppose I am just a man—the young lady they cast as Rebecca was a lucky find. Her name is Christina Derosa and was in playboy magazines at the time. Her smile is infectious, and even when fully clothed, she is cute and can actually act. When she is crying and bleeding and being forced to suck toes though, prepare to be truly uncomfortable. I cannot imagine shooting this scene. It is truly terrible. You need to have a stomach for this movie the same way you have to for Wes Craven’s The Last House on the Left.
For no other reason than having another “tit shot”—in a montage of the girls driving around from door to door at about 12-minutes in, we have a cut inside of the house they are knocking on to a 40-year old woman rubbing her breasts in the shower. Hearing the knocking, she towels her hair, puts on a robe but doesn’t tie it, and opens the door with her D-Cups just hanging out. One of the girls begins to say what they are selling, and the woman in the robe just scoffs and closes the door. That’s the whole scene. A full minute dedicated to middle age fun bags. Go figure. But what did you expect?
Hopefully the movie will be actually starting soon.
Maybe it will start after the girl pleasures herself on the toilet with the right end of the plunger. No, I am not joking. Ew.
Right after that, my favorite part is the dead black girl who is still breathing. Good job, director. It’s called a re-take. Use it when basic biology makes no sense, like a girl still breathing after a bullet to the throat. Then again, they made this for $25,000 — and that’s for all the effects and renting locations and paying the crew. So, Kudos, I guess.
In their defense; I’m sure they knew what they were making. This is grindhouse. I’m actually not criticizing too hard. I know the title of the freakin’ movie is Run! Bitch Run! for god’s sake!
I do agree: Tarantino and Rob Zombie would be proud of this one. Here’s a sample or a sickly funny scene that quickly turns to rotten disease:
LOBO: “We’re gonna play a little game. Clint and I like to call it Find ‘Em and Fuck ‘Em. It’s kinda like Hide ‘n Seek, but not. It’s better. It’s a lot better. You’re gonna go run somewhere and pray I don’t find you. Cause when I find you, I’m gonna fuck you. I’m gonna spray my whipped cream all over that sundae.”
Here, the female takes off but doesn’t get too far. This quote has the audience laughing for about a minute until there is a long, single take, no-cut aways rape scene that was directly inspired by Wes Craven’s The Last House on the Left. The rape scenes in Run Bitch! and Last House are the only two rape scenes I have ever seen in films which are not tasteful and are hard-to-watch; successful in the sense that they are so disgustingly real. I can’t imagine taking multiple takes. It’s something you’ll only ever want to see once if you can fight turning away for a brief second of relief. I bet you can’t watch the screen the whole time. Like two girls one cup. The movie, at these parts anyway, stops being a funny, dark comedy and becomes a terrible exploitation film at a disturbing level. Maybe that was the intention; to show how disgusting rape really is and how most films soften it for their audiences. This film refuses to do that. You’re gonna watch like you were really there, so hold on tight… but, hey, you’ve been warned.
This rated R flick is almost NC-17, in my opinion. Probably why it was only released in theaters in Japan but came direct to DVD in the States!
There are tons of low-angle shots at about butt height. Wonder why. The cheesy shtick and sleazy residue will build up on your soul in this one. It is sex, revenge, and 2-dimensional characters you can’t help but love with. The good and the evil characters make you think “I wonder what lunch break was like on the set. Yikes.” It’s pure entertainment. If you like to laugh as much as be shocked, this one is for you. If you are easily offended or are made uncomfortable by rape scenes, even light ones, skip it. You can’t really put a rating system to this one with any “across-the-board” clarity, but I think most people would give this a 2-star out of 5: while that’s probably the proper rating giving the faults in pacing, editing, and some acting, the fun factor and ridiculousness feel like more than two-stars. It could have been an hour long film. It drags after 40-minutes.
Here’s a reason why you should watch this movie, but this is a huge SPOLIER ALERT: The man guy gets stabbed in the anus with a two foot machete. Repeatedly. That’s the ending. Blood is everywhere. I was laughing and clapping when I saw that because I have never seen anything like that. Good god!
I could go on and on telling you every scene and why it’s over-the-top, but if you just see this one for yourself with some friends, you’ll be finding you own favorite one-liners in no time flat.
“Lord, if I wasn’t such a righteous man, I’d pound them harder than the nails in the cross.”
RENT IT $2.99 — BUY IT for $9.99 — watch immediately on AMAZON’s INSTANT VIDEO service. Also on NETFLIX instant stream!
MH
matthew hughston 