Gothkill (Special Edition DVD)

DVD: Gothkill

Reviewer: Michelle Hussey

Date: 8/4/09

“Goth Kill”: Rocky Horror for the Goth Crowd

I had the mixed fortune of watching this move, “Goth Kill” this evening and am not really sure where to begin. Being Goth, I was not sure whether to be amused or insulted, possibly a little of both. There is certainly a lot of offensive things about this movie, primarily the really awful storyline and horrendous acting. But I think that is part of the charm to this movie. It is very campy and silly, much like Rocky Horror.

“Goth Kill” is about a man named Nick Dread who runs a Satanic Cult and comes back in another life to collect souls for his kingdom. The movie opens with him and a bunch of followers at a religious ceremony in a field in New York City. You see him say a whole lot of so-called “satanic” mumbo jumbo and then he talks about how his “followers” are to join his clan of 100,000 souls he must collect for his own kingdom. He then pulls out a shotgun and shoots everyone. The screams were hardly those of fear and pain, all the while Nick laughing this over the top maniacal laugh. Them movie then jumps to a prison cell that looked an awful lot like those at Al Catraz in San Francisco Bay. He states that he is in jail and is sentenced to death. His “priestess” from his church comes to read parts of the Satanic Bible with him in his cell before he is executed. They do this ridiculous “chant” and you learn from their conversation afterwards that this chant assures that he will come back in another person’s body to finish his collection of souls.  As his priestess leaves the prison, a Christian priest accidently runs her over and she dies. You then see what has to be the most pathetic looking crackhead on Earth steal the Satanic Bible. The movie jumps to an innocent 19 year old girl named Annie who is moving to New York City to live with her friend who over the past year has become oddly “goth”. Annie’s friend tells her that Goth’s party like no one else and that they will go to a goth party later that evening, but that Annie needs some hot new goth clothes. They go to this “goth clothing store” called Machine and Annie tries on all sorts of PVC and velvet and chainmail and corseted outfits. She finally settles on a PVC vest thing and PVC shorts and a seriously hardcore spiked collar and boots. As she is purchasing her items, the sales girl hands her friend an invitation to the Notorious “Scorpion Society”…..the VIP of all Goth events. Then somehow you see Nick Dread being executed via hanging……because you know that hangings still occur in New York City and all. He dies and ends up in a black dark room and is royally pissed off that he does not have his 100,000 souls that Satan promised him. He goes on for 5 minutes on this temper tantrum about how Satan betrayed him. What I want to know is why is he pissed if he was supposed to come back to life? Anyways, the movie goes back to the Scorpion Society. Annie and her friend are allowed in and it has to be one of the lamest Goth events I have ever seen. It has all the clichés of a goth Night:  scantily clad Go-Go dancers, pretentious and mediocre DJ’s spinning in some fenced in area, all sorts of elaborately dressed goth people in their hardcore goth best. They had a tarot reader and this really pathetic bodybuilder looking guy who was wearing a helmet and a costume suitable for a GWAR concert. The Scorpion Society is this pseudo vampire group and the guy who runs it is a complete tool who is just scamming all these wannabees for their money. He meets Annie and her friend and gives them some roofie laced wine and they are taken into the back, all drugged up and restrained down where they will be “intiated”, or rather gang raped. The Tool Vampire (I don’t even remember his name, I just remember that he looked and acted like a complete tool.) reads from a book that he found from some crackhead on the street that he thinks is smoke and mirrors. But in reality this book is really the Satanic Bible that the crackhead stole from the priestess in the beginning of the movie.  All of a sudden Nick Dread is inside Annie’s body and Annie is in the dark isolated hole that Nick was in. As this is happening, the lame security guy is unzippering his fly so he can rape the drugged up Annie, but the new and Improved Annie (with Nick inside of her soul) breaks out of the restraints and cuts off his penis. Nick starts yelling and carrying about how awesome his new body is and how he loves his new “cans”, but then suddenly realizes that his host body is a virgin, “an innocent” and he is infuriated and tells these people how they are scum for trying to defile a virgin and gets angry and kills a few people. Then he tells this really confusing story about how he got started, how he was a  catholic priest during the Inquisition and found that the women he was torturing were not witches but wealthy and that the poor people exploited them and that it was wrong to burn them alive. But the other priests are using this as a façade to steal their money. When Father Dread says that he will go to the Vatican with it, he and the witches are burned alive and he vows that he will denounce Christianity and heaven for it is evil and makes a pact with Satan. He tells how Satan tells him that he can have his own kingdom in hell with 100,000 corrupt souls to torture for all of eternity but that he has to kill them all himself no matter how many lives he has to come back and live to do it. So then Nick goes on a killing spree and kills everyone in the club because they are either corrupt or mindless followers who allowed themselves to be betrayed. The only exception is that he does not kill Annie’s friend who is suddenly awake and freaking out and she keeps begging Nick to give Annie back her body because she is young and innocent. So Nick, says that he will because he feels bad and does and when he returns to hell, he has his kingdom. The END!

What a tale, eh? Seriously. An antisocial serial killer who has a conscience? WTF???? The story is just bad. The acting is even worse. The special effects are…..BAD!!!!  This movie is totally a Mystery Science Theatre 3000 keeper. But as bad as this movie is, it has some serious cult potential. That is the biggest selling point to this movie. In the extras to the movie, they talk about how they screened it in the East Village in New York City and people started coming in dressed up like the characters at other screenings.  There is even a drinking game for this movie! Rocky Horror is great and all, but it is so over played now and a new cult following is long past due. I believe this could be it.  And because of this potential, I am giving it a 3 star rating. It doesn’t get 5 because the acting is horrendous, the storyline is contradictory at times, and the special effects are pathetic, but it gets 3 for mocking the so called “elite” Goths and their scene, fabulous goth and cyber attire, and being so campy, you had to laugh. So grab your socially repressed underground goth friends, drink some mead and Bordeaux, and enjoy this bloody yet hilarious flick!

Goth Kill, Released 2009, Wild Eye Productions.

https://www.gothkill.com/gothkill_dvd.html