The Toxic Avenger (1985)

Perfect cast and a good story

best movie i've ever seen.

Funny, strange, confrontational and subversive, this is one of the most interesting experiences you'll have at the cinema this year.

This is a coming of age storyline that you've seen in one form or another for decades. It takes a truly unique voice to make yet another one worth watching.

Just 13 minutes into the movie I had to tell myself, "this one of the funniest movies I've ever seen." They make the best out of Melvin in just those few minutes, who is a nerdy janitor for a gym in the town. There are several very gruesome scenes in the movie (there is a warning message before the film), which usually I would really like but not all the scenes are in the context I'd like to see. The gore is very high quality for its time, but some scenes I just couldn't appreciate. For example, there is a scene where two young men begin to help an old woman out of her car, asking if they can help with her groceries, and she replies in such a convincing voice "oh, you sure can... it's nice to have boys like you in the neighborhood". They proceed to punch her in the stomach and then beat her and take her car. But most of the gore scenes fall into the Toxic Avenger killing the criminals of the town, and some of the scenes were actually quite funny.Don't let this turn you off, because seriously, it is a very enjoyable movie. You'll be laughing hard out loud, but there'll be some scenes that stop you and you won't know how you should react.

Well, this has got to be one of the strangest films I've ever seen in my whole life. Considering that I've probably seen THOUSANDS, that's really saying something. This movie is pretty basic, telling the story of a kid named Melvin who falls into toxic waste and becomes a creature with superpowers. The acting is among the weirdest I've ever seen. It seems like these actors are just pointing their eyes around. They seem to all be shaking all the time. The strangest bit might be where the Toxic Avenger constantly grunts, but then speaks intelligibly for a long time. We finally get to see the creature's face and how it moves.Did I find myself rooting for the Avenger in this? Yeah, I guess. I mean, he does come off as sympathetic. This is just a movie where everything is so ridiculously over the top and outrageous you can't help but at least be somewhat entertained by it. It did amuse me with how preposterous it was. It's better than something like "Attack Of The Killer Tomatoes". Having done some research on Troma, I was interested in seeing a movie made by them. The effects are as goofy as you'd imagine. These characters are just dumb. This one criminal repeatedly attacks the avenger even though he had a shotgun. Nothing in this film made any sense, but it was certainly like a bizarre theme park ride seeing it. If you want to see something that defines "over the top", check this out! **1/2

Joe Ritter's script felt like the lines from Commando extras infused with a tinge of glamour and a Dante/Raimi darkness. The lead protagonist is a C.H.U.Dian built superhero version of Day of the Dead's "Bud". (So, in essence, it's Bud the C.H.U.D...) Andree Miranda plays the attractive but flat testosterone absorbing female better than Roxanne Kernohan. The gore is cartoonish but satisfying for those who expect the entire movie to be like Emil's toxic demise in Robocop. Lloyd Kaufman's direction was perfectly lackluster, being sure to get plenty of gore and cheese without any substance to throw off the taste. While Mark Torgl's lead feels eerily similar to Simple Jack, in a good way. If anything, this movie shows that, in order to go full vengeance, sometimes you have to go full retard.

The Toxic Avenger is a classic B movie about a nerdy mop boy who is turned into a meathead by way of nuclear waste. It sounds over the top, which is a fair assumption. The violence is gory, brutal, and at times, despite its sometimes cartoonish nature, unsettling. That being said, I can't help but call this a grindhouse film because of that. It's a wacky, unorthodox premise that is carried out in an equally wacky way.One particular scene that was great, albeit disturbing, was the infamous "head-crushing" scene, which was cut from the original release. Just the couple of minutes before the crush is enough to make you squirm (and some may notice the throwback to Death Race 2000, another fine B movie), but the actual crush is nothing short of brutal, even by today's standards.This outlandish film is a hidden gem, a true grindhouse classic. If you can stomach the violence, it's definitely worth seeing. It has great humor, decent acting, and some of the most memorable violent scenes in cinema.