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THE DEVIL'S
REJECTS
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But that's only if he plays his cards right, mind you. "Rejects" succeeds in every single step of the way from the Peckingpah opening shoot out, to the brutal torturing in the "Last House On the Left" sense, right down to the exciting and brilliant "Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid" climax. Zombie really does get it right this time and he fully explored his talents that were lacking in the first film. With true nihilistic nature and chaotic nuance, "Rejects" starts off with a bang and further explores the origins of the Firefly family with Zombie pitting his focus on the three most popular characters from the first film, which is a wise admirable move that further puts him in my good graces. He then begins a whole new story launching a movie that's both connected and disconnected to the original film and amps it up 100 percent. Zombie has improved immensely from his embarrassing over-hyped uber-horror flick. He knows how to build tension perfectly, and when the action began, I was pulled in and hooked, I hate to admit.
For many, it won't spark a hint of understanding, but for me Zombie successfully presented these characters in a different light and painted them as human. "House" had a fatal lack of characterization, but Zombie pulls it off here with a memorable anti-hero in the form of Sheriff Wydell. Played with immense ferocity and utter entertaining charisma by the ubiquitous William Forsythe, Zombie gives us--instead of a clean cut hero chasing psychopaths--a psychotic killer chasing other psychotic killers. Sheriff Wydell is often times much more dangerous than they are, and gets off on pursuing vengeance upon the people who killed his brother. He often teeters between sanity and lunacy that make him one of the most memorable anti-heroes in film in years, and really becomes a match for the Firefly's. Forsythe pursues the role with sheer force and goes at this as he does best, as a villain. Forsythe gives an utterly great dynamite performance that I couldn't get enough of, and was surprised that Zombie could give us an appealing character that wasn't apart of the Firefly family. "Rejects" reads yet again like an assortment of Zombie faves as he features elements of his favorite films along with its stars. There are cameos and walk-ons from genre veterans like EG Daly, Ken Foree (who seems to be having fun as Charlie Altamont), Danny Trejo and wrestler Diamond Dallas Paige as Firefly rivals "The Unholy Two", Matthew McGrory, Priscilla Barnes, PJ Soles, and Geoffrey Lewis, respectively. It's a mixed assortment of talent here and it's only the tip of the iceberg in terms of quality. My three favorite characters are back and this time they're more bad-ass than ever. The utterly gorgeous Sheri Moon returns as Baby Firefly and she underplays the comedic aspect of her character in exchange for a more realistic role as a sadistic murderer. She pulls in a very good performance, and she's a lot of fun; Sid Haig is better than ever as Captain Spaulding, the loud talking, maniacal, unofficial leader of the group who Wydell wants most, and the walking cliché that was once Otis is now deepened and fleshed out in to a brutally excellent character that Bill Moseley takes pleasure in playing. Otis is a devilishly clever homage to Manson from Zombie as he spouts one-liners, wax' poetic, bears an ego-maniacal sensibility, and even sports a bushy beard and long hair. Together the three look like they're having a lot of fun. Leslie Easterbrook is great replacing Karen Black as the character of Mama Firefly, and doesn't miss a beat in terms of personality and importance to our story. Along with a beautiful soundtrack featuring Skynyrd, The James Gang, The Allman Brothers, Three Dog Night et al, how can you possibly resist this? Zombie redeems himself 100 percent and learns from his mistakes. "Rejects" works as a balls to the wall action horror that never lets up, and I ate it up with a fucking spoon.
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