FETUS
Produced by Stacey Hamlin and Brian Paulin
Directed, Written, and Edited by Brian Paulin
Director of Photography - Brian PaulinKevin - Brian Paulin
Sarah - Nette Detroy
Record Store Clerk - Kevin Barbare
Nurse - Yael Sanchez
Head Surgeon - Ernest HutchersonOne could make a case that the vast majority of horror films fall into two camps -- morality tales and character studies. Between the two I'd speculate that upwards of 95% are morality tales where where characters are punished for violating established rules and societal customs. These tend to be more passive viewing experiences where the horror washes over the audience. While fewer in number, the character studies tend to lend more depth to genre conventions by placing context upon the transgressive and thriller elements by identifying with one point of view. These tend to be more active viewing experiences for the audience who are forced to share that singular point of view which just might conflict with their own moral compass. If audience members are truly lucky, their viewing experience just might be both, and a case could be made that Brian Paulin's FETUS meets the criteria for both.
Due to the subject matter, I won't venture a guess as to how personal a film this is for Paulin, but it is a film that appears to convey an awful lot of anger. From one of the director interviews on the disc, one gets the impression that the movie is some sort of cinematic declaration born from an "I Did It My Way" manifesto spawned by Paulin's years of getting screwed by distributors. He states pretty clearly that from here on out his films will be uncompromised in terms of vision and economics. He'll do what he loves, push the envelop of extreme horror, and also do the legwork to finally see dollar one. It wouldn't be hard to imagine Paulin channelling his frustrations through his film; it would explain the bleak tonal qualities and their abrupt shifts. Besides, what easier way is there for a filmmaker to exercise his frustrations than making a movie?
In making FETUS, Paulin is wearing multiple hats, which is standard for anyone working in the realm of microbudget cinema, but few seem to do it as well as Paulin. On a technical level, the film is ripe for hyperbole-laden accolades. The effects work is fantastic -- an orgy of bloody, guts, and foam latex. The framing and purposeful camera movement, often quite complicated, indicate an elevated intent far above graphic exploitation. The result is a nightmare equal parts Lucio Fulci in its piercing violence, and Jorg Buttgereit in its gooey, spurting, taboo-busting gore. Paulin doesn't just deliver the goods, he showers his audience in rivers of sanguine excess, and does so simply because as a fan himself that's exactly what he would want to see. It's a progressive do-unto-others conceit possessing an endearingness that's matched only by the surprising earnestness and naturalism of his acting. As a non-professional actor, very few of his scenes don't feel emotionally real, even when the reality of the film isn't.
Paulin opens his film with an interesting credit. Viewers don't get the basic "a film by," but rather "a gore film by," and it's the opening salvo in his battle to do it all his way. He immediately tells the viewers where his cinematic politics and intentions lie. And he isn't lying. He doesn't just go for the gross-out; Paulin isn't afraid to disturb through disgust. Think of the recent Japanese gore film collective Sushi Typhoon (MACHINE GIRL, ROBOGEISHA, HELLDIVER) and subtract their preteen sense of giddy fun. Paulin doesn't quite reach the heights of inspired lunacy of those effects masters, but that's probably because he doesn't have the money they do.
Fulci, Buttgereit, and Sushi Typhoon aren't the only inspirations for FETUS. Paulin wears his inspirations like war medals on a proud general's chest. The film opens with a direct homage to the likes of Larry Cohen and his B-masterpiece IT'S ALIVE as doctors go about a birth that turns horribly wrong. As his wife, Sarah, dies from a tsunami-like loss of bodily fluid on the delivery table, Paulin's Kevin loses his whole world. It's at this point where FETUS starts to explore established genre tropes, many of which Cohen himself dealt with, but Paulin does so through varying levels of cinematic reality where each one could have been its own straightforward narrative. While viewers could potentially perceive this as hodgepodge filmmaking of undeveloped (ungestated) ideas, this pastiche approach is actually reflective of Kevin's mental breakdown. As FETUS progresses, and Kevin becomes more unhinged, it becomes increasingly less clear to the audience what's real and what are his deranged fantasies. Seemingly fetal narrative ideas work together crafting a nightmare plain of unreality, and this isn't just in regards to genre conventions, but structural tropes as well. Unannounced flashback and dream sequences weave in and out of a straightforward narrative at increasing levels, also indicative of Kevin's downward spiralling sanity.
Readjusting to life without his wife, it isn't long before Kevin starts seeing apparitions in his home. Not in his physical realm, but through the lens of his camera. Long before PARANORMAL ACTIVITY made this a staple of modern U.S. horror, this was a strictly Asian horror trope, another heavy influence on Paulin. So much so that it was announced in the mid-2000's that Paulin would head up an Asian-inspired sub-label for Sub Rosa Studios. I know this because I planed on pitching ideas directly to him since I was also heavily into the Asian genre scene. This doesn't just mark a director referencing his influences, but also the diverging point for questionable levels of narrative realities. The film opens up into three distinct stories. We have the straightforward narrative where Kevin attempts communication with Sarah. Interrupting the narrative is a series of flashbacks detailing their love story during her pregnancy. As the narrative progresses, a third level of supernatural reality arises that's reflective of Kevin's increasingly unhinged mental state.
The central plot, Kevin's attempts at communication and possibly raising his wife from the grave, isn't just the connective tissue for the two realms of unreality, but the morality tale that comprises nearly all horror works. Rather than move past his personal tragedy, Kevin's selfish desires dictate his choices. He turns to another classic horror genre trope, Black Magic, in itself a total rejection of righteousness, which push him down a path of revenge. Now blaming the doctors and nurses in the delivery room for Sarah's death, and with the more advanced spells requiring certain sacrifices, Kevin hunts and murders them all. Unlike the modern "Torture Porn" craze where the on-screen killing is glamorized to the point of fetish ritual for agony-craving viewers, the only ritual present in FETUS is strictly plot related. The deaths here are painfully violent, but quick. They're brutally unrelenting, a direct reflection is Kevin's rage, but Paulin's lens never lingers gratuitously. Doing so would have turned FETUS into mere entertainment, unwittingly asking viewers finding giddy pleasure in the film to sympathize with Kevin. Had this third of the film gestated into the entire plot, perhaps this judgmentalism would be allowed, but through the other two narrative devices Paulin is more concerned with what makes Kevin tick and how he perceives the world.
Often seen from a first-person point of view as if direct memories, the flashback are a glowing and brightly lit idealized world of love, happiness, and hope. Unfortunately, viewers can't rely on these memories as truth due to Kevin's slipping mental health. It's possible that his despair and loneliness filter these thoughts into something better than they were. The flashbacks themselves are familiar ones. Scenes of the couple lying in each other's arms discussing possible baby names have been done dozens of times, but their familiarity is their point. Viewers know them, and thus Kevin. He's an every-man, and thus us. Since we know we can't trust his point of view, we can't trust ours (i.e. what we're shown), and that's why I view the third narrative avenue as one of complete fantasy.
During the main plot of FETUS, as Kevin kills in sacrifice to some unknown dark lords, he's rewarded with increasing amounts of supernatural activity that grow more depraved and hurtful towards him. A case could possibly be made that these are in fact truths in the linear narrative, that dark magic has a cost, but I believe that to be a complete and utter misreading simply because when these scenes end the massive carnage they once contained is apparently limited to only what was committed by Kevin's hand. It's through this third narrative avenue that viewers realize it isn't love but guilt that propels Kevin's story. As Kevin commits murder and becomes increasingly unhinged, the supernatural activity that occurs aren't moments of truth, but rather subconscious delusions of a broken, schizophrenic person. They're morbid fantasies of a man who truly blames himself for the death of his wife and desperately wants her back. After all, it was his seed that led to Sarah's pregnancy. His penis was essentially the murder weapon, a point clearly stated in the film when Sarah's corpse asks him "how could YOU do this to me?" As his self-loathing grows, so does the depravity of these dark fantasies and the pain they inflict, clearly representative of what Kevin believes he deserves. As Kevin becomes more undone, so does his body -- his dick literally falls apart!
It's during these fantasies that an underlying theme of defilement becomes expressly clear. What is only hinted at through Fulci-like hammer killings and Joe D'Amato-like corpse fucking, is spelled out through Kevin's delusions. In his subconscious, he defiled his wife - one he remembers with ethereal grace not unlike The Virgin Mary - and so did their unborn child. Their fetus is symbolic of every regret Kevin suffers, and it's so internalized that at one point he dreams that it was his body the was defiled through childbirth as some sort of penance for Sarah's death. It's a waking nightmare expressing, perhaps exercising, his rage. As he butchers his own demonic fetus, Kevin's on one hand extracting revenge, equating one fetus for the other, on the other he's expressing regret for the one thing that might have saved Sarah -- aborting their child.
It should be made clear that at no point does FETUS ever address abortion directly, but the two words, fetus and abortion, are intertwined in today's society. Being a New England filmmaker, it's wouldn't be a stretch to assume that director Paulin was surrounded by conservative Catholic views on the topic, but FETUS could be viewed as veiled commentary on the topic with a decidedly progressive attitude, whether intentional or not is irrelevant. One's stance on abortion hinders on when one believes life begins, and the very act deals with the end of premature entities. If Kevin viewed Sarah as his life, then his life was effectively aborted during childbirth. The catch is that the one thing that could have saved Sarah was an actual abortion. Either way it's loose-loose resulting in death. It's as if Paulin is stating that there are no clear answers, a far cry from the black & white world of clear-cut morality.
There's nothing clear-cut at all about Brian Paulin's FETUS. It's a film of ambiguous moral complexity that is matched only by its narrative complexity. Sure, it's a kaleidoscope nightmare assaulting the audience with shock and awe as the gross-out gore gags grow in intensity, but it shouldn't be dismissed as such. Sometimes there's more to exploitation then meets the eye. FETUS is an adult film dealing with adult themes and content that does exactly what the director set out to do -- push the envelope of excess and bust societal taboos. It sounds almost like a John Waters movie had Waters ever played it straight. No, it's a Brian Paulin gore film, one he did completely his way.
You can order a copy of FETUS directly from the Morbid Vision Film website.