The Taint

Not since what seems to be eons ago has such a voice of trash echoed throughout underground cinema as Drew Bolduc and co-director Dan Nelson's The Taint has. Written, directed, and starring Drew Bolduc, this vile testament in multitasking is as shocking and repulsive as modern cinema, even archaic exploitation, comes. The plot revolves around a dystopian backdrop in which the water supply of a town, possibly the world, becomes tainted with a mutated penis enlargement formula. Phil O'Ginney awakes from a nightmare in the woods only to have a psycho with goggles sprinting towards him. Armed with an enormous scythe and a severed phallus, this maniac chases Phil until he runs into Misandra (Clever), a desensitized park ranger who alerts him that most, if not all, males are stricken with "the taint" which turns them into sex-raving beasts victim to their own instincts. These instincts of course include misogyny, the male's great past-time. Who else to pass judgment on women than their favorite prey? As displayed prominently in all marketing materials, killing women is the only thing on these males minds. 

With an aggressive 80s pastiche about it, The Taint is one of the few films whose aesthetic (or anti-aesthetic) is digested even before the start of the film. The title font rings of an old-school skateboarding design, an image so fierce that I can practically taste the Powell boards underneath The Taint's wretched breath. Whatever you want to call this, new-age trash with punk glamor, this genre undiscovered is a formidable force. Finally I can enjoy shock for shock sake and The Taint stands as one of the few true comedies of the splatter market. Long have I scowled in the direction of Troma for producing unfunny situations of cocks, lesbians, and deplorable (and shoddy) effects work. The Taint not only effortlessly delivers what Troma promises but does it with such zeal you can forgive the somewhat sloppy and confusing narrative amidst flashbacks. What might be the biggest surprise of The Taint is how well done and audibly orgasmic the soundtrack is. Coursing through the chip-tune veins of The Taint's score is hints of punk and garage rock, junk to the ear. This marks the first soundtrack I can listen to without imagery to accompany since Mike Patton's take on Neveldine & Taylor's chaotic Crank 2.

Following the fetishistic norm of hardcore dystopia, The Taint reintroduces an apocalyptic sensibility involving a rape-centered society. It's strange encountering this again so soon after viewing The Afterman. The epoch of subtlety has dawned. This is proven with the delightfully comic dialogue exchanged between Phil and a surviving camaraderie of frat-esque closet homosexuals whose leader is obsessed with the male figure. When one of the goons catches sight of Misandra, he bellows loudly of gang rape. With something as bold and artless as this, one cannot shake mention of reminiscing Zedd/Kern. Bringing Gen-X'rs into a style past brings a delightful platter to the table, one that can be compared as the comic hipdom of Scott Pilgrim vs. the World blended violently with the anarchic libidinous nature of several of Richard Kern's Manhattan Love Suicides. Normally, I would be hesitant towards the ingredients that makes up the popularity of The Taint. From a non-Troma enthusiast, take it as this. Troma's exhibition of frequent nudity and grotesquely cheap special effects marked a new era in horror - a desexualized kind. Troma stands as the only film company that can successfully kill my sex drive and to their demographic, serves as a large redundancy and inhibitor of clash-trash quality. Not only does The Taint handle carefully the contents within, but surpasses near every film in the catalog of Troma.

The biggest selling point of The Taint is the endless seam of misogyny available. Many scenes encounter various infected men as they bolt down the street with large objects with the sole hunger to smash women's heads in. Misandra's previous love life is divulged with one of the most hilarious scenes to be found in The Taint. Her relationship with her boyfriend is explained in a cinematic exposition during a picnic. After lustfully swapping saliva, words of true infatuation are exchanged as quoted below.

Woman - "We're so in love."

Man -"Fuck anybody who's not in love like we are!"

Woman - "Must be fags!"

Man - "Total fucking queers."

This imitation of retro 50s chivalry is a charm in parallel to the cock-spewing anarchic graduating class of cum-loud that is The Taint. For a meal consisting of gratuitous gore and ejaculate, The Taint is as repulsive as sleaze comes and is the first crack at cockaganda documented. I've never seen a film as abrasive and immature as Drew Bolduc and Dan Nelson's The Taint and I hope for the best in their future endeavors - as long as the hatred for women withstands.

-mAQ