Boston Underground Film Festival 2009

This film had our undivided attention from the first line of dialogue uttered: “I was born with seven clits.” Meet Jennifer, high-end fashion photographer, multi-media artist renowned for her sexually-charged themes and owner of the aforementioned freakshow genitalia. Suffice to say, Jennifer has a hard time finding love. Luckily enough for her insatiable libido, she has an easy enough time finding sex. Not so luckily, most encounters end up with Jennifer accidentally killing her partner, if he hasn’t already fled at the sight of her mutant mix-up. A successful encounter (regardless of whether or not her mate survives) will result in a deformed baby, delivered less than two hours after conception, which must be disposed of as quickly as possible.

Batz is a loner, who as a result of a childhood accident, has been experimenting with various drugs in order to restore working function to his penis. He went a little too far, however, and now Batz’s cock is dangerously addicted to the medley of chemicals he’s has been injecting into it over the years. The drugs, originally intended to stimulate, are now employed to calm the beast down. It must suck to have a drug-addicted, sentient penis. When Batz’s stately Victorian house is rented for one of Jennifer’s photo shoots, a meeting is inevitable.

In his first film since 1992’s Basket Case 3, director Frank Henenlotter ratchets up the camp, gore and nudity to absolutely absurd levels. Shot in glorious 35mm, and relying on prosthetics and stop-motion animation as opposed to CGI, Bad Biology seethes with old-school schlock sensibilities. Fueled by an energetic hip-hop soundtrack (many real-life underground hip-hop artists including Prince Paul, Reef the Lost Cause, and co-writer/producer R.A. "The Rugged Man" make cameos), Bad Biology reminds us of the perverse pleasures that made Henenlotter’s Basket Case, Brain Damage and Frankenhooker cult classics.

-Kevin Monahan