{"id":39986,"date":"2023-06-06T01:07:06","date_gmt":"2023-06-06T05:07:06","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.cinema-crazed.com\/blog\/?p=39986"},"modified":"2023-06-06T02:39:51","modified_gmt":"2023-06-06T06:39:51","slug":"mad-heidi-2023","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.cinema-crazed.com\/blog\/2023\/06\/06\/mad-heidi-2023\/","title":{"rendered":"Mad Heidi (2023)"},"content":{"rendered":"

\"\"<\/a>Tickets are now on sale at\u00a0Fathom Events<\/a>; coming to theaters nationwide for a special one-night engagement on Wednesday, June 21st<\/sup> at 7pm, local time.<\/strong><\/p>\n

A lot of the media likes to use the words \u201cIndie film\u201d whenever referring to a movie that isn\u2019t entirely mainstream. The word has been homogenized over the years, as films like \u201cMad Heidi\u201d are lost in the shuffle. \u201cMad Heidi\u201d is a real indie film that worked hard to get a distribution deal, and it is here for us to gorge on. According to the press release, \u201cMad Heidi\u201d<\/em>\u00a0initially made waves for its innovative crowdfunded approach, bypassing traditional financing tactics to ensure that the film\u2019s original vision was preserved while placing profits back in the hands of the creators and backers. Even if neo-grindhouse isn\u2019t your cup of tea, \u201cMad Heidi\u201d deserves a lot of love for its willingness to embrace its indie roots, while also being literally as cheesy as it can possibly be.<\/p>\n

<\/p>\n

In a dystopian Switzerland that has fallen under the fascist rule of an evil cheese tyrant, Heidi lives a pure and simple life in the Swiss Alps. Grandfather Alp\u00f6hi does his best to protect Heidi, but her desire for freedom soon lands her in trouble with the dictator\u2019s henchmen. When pushed too far the innocent Heidi transforms into a kick-ass warrior who sets out to liberate her country from the heinous cheese fascists.<\/p>\n

Johannes Hartmann and Sandro Klopfstein\u2019s \u201cMad Heidi\u201d is the kind of movie you\u2019d expect to see in theaters back in 1980 with a double bill of a kung fu movie. It\u2019s a weird, wonky, surreal, and silly action revenge epic that marks itself as Swissploitation. You cans sense that that the directors have a clear love for the grindhouse aesthetic, all the while unabashedly trying to deliver something we haven\u2019t seen before. The writers have such a good time building this universe centered on a fascist dictatorship that lives and breathes on cheese. You could even make a drinking game based around the number of times they mention cheese or dole out a cheese pun.<\/p>\n

That\u2019s not meant as a criticism, as it\u2019s wholly intentional. The pair of directors has as much fun with their project as possible all the while building on some creative ideas. The journey of Alice Lucy\u2019s character Heidi is an interesting one, as she goes from normal farm girl to axe wielding warrior over the course of the film. This involves a green glowing sentient guardian angel, and a pair of warrior nuns, by the way. Everything feels so random but nothing ever feels haphazardly thrown together. There\u2019s so much to enjoy here from the fight scenes, the insanely over the top gore, right down to the great villains.<\/p>\n

I loved the henchmen that worked President Meili, and I was always interested in seeing who or what was going to show up next to take on Heidi. I\u2019d be remiss if I didn\u2019t mention Casper Van Dien who is just so much fun as the film\u2019s fascist villain President Meili. He chews the scenery at every turn and really feels like he was lifted out of an \u201cIndiana Jones\u201d film. Van Dien knows what kind of movie he\u2019s making, and he keeps his performance at a ten scale at all times. The directors do a damn fine job putting together \u201cMad Heidi\u201d as despite its small budget, it is very well realized and exciting.<\/p>\n

There are so many interesting set pieces, and they make good use of the Grindhouse aged film tint. I don\u2019t know what they would do with a sequel (maybe a \u2018charcuterie trilogy\u2019?), should there actually be one, but with \u201cMad Heidi\u201d my confidence in them is raised. \u201cMad Heidi\u201d is a surefire blood gushing revenge saga, one you can easily pair with 2023\u2019s equally insane \u201cSisu<\/a>.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Tickets are now on sale at\u00a0Fathom Events; coming to theaters nationwide for a special one-night engagement on Wednesday, June 21st at 7pm, local time. A lot of the media likes to use the words \u201cIndie film\u201d whenever referring to a movie that isn\u2019t entirely mainstream. The word has been homogenized over the years, as films […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[2,12],"tags":[58,64,71,219,433,477,501,631,733,840,1087],"class_list":["post-39986","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-a-indie","category-movie-reviews","tag-action","tag-adaptation","tag-adventure","tag-comedy","tag-grindhouse","tag-horror","tag-indie-film","tag-martial-arts","tag-ninjas","tag-revenge","tag-thriller"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.cinema-crazed.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/39986","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.cinema-crazed.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.cinema-crazed.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.cinema-crazed.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.cinema-crazed.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=39986"}],"version-history":[{"count":2,"href":"https:\/\/www.cinema-crazed.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/39986\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":39989,"href":"https:\/\/www.cinema-crazed.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/39986\/revisions\/39989"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.cinema-crazed.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=39986"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.cinema-crazed.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=39986"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.cinema-crazed.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=39986"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}