Textual content © Richard
Gary / Indie Horror Movies, 2022
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Disorienting
Dick
Directed by Richard Griffin
Affordable Shifting
Image Firm; Scorpio Movie Releasing
88 minutes, 2022
https://www.fb.com/ScorpioFilmReleasing
Traditionally, director Richard Griffin likes to reuse solid members in phases.
For some time it was actors like Sarah Nicklin, Michael Thurber, and Michael
Reed, for instance. Then, overlappingly, it was these resembling Elyssa Baldassarri
, Jamie Dufault, Johnny Sederquist (aka Ninny Nothin), and Anna Rizzo, and
these days it’s been Samantha Acampora, Sarah Reed, and particularly Graham Stokes.
The final two additionally seem in his newest opus, the strongly LGBQT(and many others.) themed Disorienting
Dick. Stokes full frontal nudity within the first shot offers the viewer a – er
– style of issues to return.
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| Graham Stokes |
That is additionally a really sharp political commentary as we
meet Dick’s mother, the appropriately named Maureen Whiteman (Leslie Racine Vazquez),
a Qanon, conspiracy-focused, cash and power-hungry politician working for
Mayor in a metropolis in Rhode Island (the place that is filmed), who’s paying homage to Sarah
Palin, Lauren Boebert or Marjorie Greene (although Maureen is clever, in contrast to
these others). The mock political advert at her introduction is each ridiculously
excessive, and but fairly scary as additionally it is reflective of a sure degree
of Republican “values” as they stand right now; additionally it is a theme that permeates the
entire movie. The refined Ayn Rand reference by Dick can be telling.
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| Leslie Racine Vazquez |
Dick, in the intervening time, has a fiancée, Pat (Sarah
Reed), who wears a Jesus sweatshirt, but it surely’s fairly apparent that it isn’t
going to final as Dick turns into, within the phrases of the movie, “oriented” (relatively
than transformed). You simply comprehend it’s going to battle along with his mother. I’m
having fun with the political elements of the story to this point, relatively than it being extra
of a homosexual romp like Griffin’s earlier (quick), Homosexual because the Solar (2020;
reviewed HERE), which additionally starred Stokes.
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| Sarah Reed |
Whereas Dick is within the closet and having wild, softcore
fantasies about males, his mom finds out his wishes, and has him taken to the
“Clinic for the Terminally Dandy,” an evil proper wing conversion remedy
group (conversion remedy, by the way in which, is now banned by our neighbors to
the north, in Canada; in america, solely Washington DC has barred the
follow on adults). It’s run by the evil physician Hyde Hippocampus (Terry Shea),
wearing black with a black eye patch on his proper eye and his Nurse Rached-type
nurse assistant, DeFarge (Amy Thompson). Superior therapy contains the “Lindsey
Graham Initiative.” Sorry to present a number of the jokes away, but it surely’s only a smidge
of them, and I’m attempting to make clear that it is a good movie in addition to smutty
(meant in a great way).
However that’s not the entire story, as Dick retains getting
kidnapped forwards and backwards between the conversion remedy and a competing “Clinic
for the Fabulously Dandy” run by the dual of the opposite physician, Jekyll
Hippocampus (additionally Terry Shea) however with vivid pink garments and a pink eye patch
on the different eye, and a non-binary nasty additionally Nurse Rached sort, Atari 2600
(Albert Lin). Remedy contains things like “Jungian Interpretive Dance.” On the latter institute, they attempt to get Dick out of the closet. Between the
two, no marvel he’s so disoriented.
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| Amy Thompson, Vazquez, Terry Shea, Stokes |
The set designs and clothes within the second, optimistic
clinic, by Margaret Wolf and Angela Shulman, are vivid pastel colours, which
jogged my memory of the unique “Star Trek” sequence. Within the conversion one, the
shade theme is muted and white, with no pizazz. The director as soon as advised me that
the comparability of the homosexual intercourse in his movie The Sins of Dracula (2014; reviewed
HERE) was hanging of the chandelier sort, whereas the straight couple intercourse was
missionary and boring. This can be a comparable thought right here.
Maybe I’m studying an excessive amount of into the story, but it surely nearly
looks like the odds are flipped, the place 90 % of the characters are
some shade or diploma of homosexual or bi, and 10 % are straight. It’s an
fascinating idea. In all, it is a morality play on what is true and
improper, with the philosophically metaphorical satan on one shoulder and an angel
on the opposite, with one leaning towards straight and one in the direction of being homosexual, however
on this case, which is on which facet? In actual fact, Jesus and the Satan seem in
the movie momentarily as that inside battle is in play (having these two in a
Griffin launch(ing) is nothing new (in actual fact Michael Reed has performed each in
totally different movies of his, however I digress…).
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| Albert Lin, Shea |
Whereas a number of the performing is appropriately over-emoted,
there are a variety of actually courageous performances, by the likes of Victoria Paradis,
Vazquez, and particularly Stokes. The writing is particularly sharp with each
political and social commentary that doesn’t drag the story down in any approach, and
at occasions fairly biting (no pun supposed); and the intercourse and nudity is all male on
male and generally fairly express, although not as a lot as, say, Shortbus (2006).
The one lesbian scene is, not surprisingly, unseen. DD has a definitive
path through which it’s going, and it follows true to its path, and I respect
that, quite a bit.
There are a variety of components going into this fundamental
story, together with sock puppets (you learn that appropriately), however deep down, it has
a single theme. The final line of the movie sums up the philosophy of Disorienting
Dick in a single sentence fairly properly (I cannot give it away). You need to positively
discover out for your self. Perhaps the viewer may even study one thing about
themselves.
IMBD Itemizing HERE: TBD
Trailer HERE
