It's hard to discover a bad movie these days. It used to be easy, just turn on a UHF channel late at night. Then came the books Fifty Worst Films of All Time and The Golden Turkey Awards, and suddenly everyone and his sister knew all about Teenage Caveman and Robot Monster. The field was expanded further with the television series Mystery Science Theater 3000, which exposed nearly 200 terrible features during its initial run from 1988 to 1999. Unfortunately half the fun of watching bad movies lay in the discovery process. It was a thrilling experience to watch, say, Francis of Assisi, and learn for yourself that it stinks. But now people who had always loved bad movies found themselves sort of in the same position of adult baseball card collectors: once a rarity but now ubiquitous. My chances of finding an awful film, previously unsuspected, is roughly the same as finding a set of 1968 Topps cards at a yard sale. If a movie is a stinker, someone has already told me about it. So you can imagine my delight when I just happened to stumble across The Arrogant in the free movie section of On Demand. I had an hour to kill, I put it on. What a treat! A confusing allegory that takes itself seriously, The Arrogant is the first "new" bad movie I've discovered all by myself in a very long time. According to the guides, The Arrogant is about Julie, a waitress (played by softcore star Sylvia Krystal), who hitches a ride from a serial killer. Right away there's a problem. While the movie implies Giovanni is a murderer, it never really establishes it. We do see him kill his father-in-law, but only after the old man came after him with an axe and beheaded his cat. It's a clear case of self-defense. Sometime afterwards, Giovanni stalks an innocent farm girl with malicious intent. We know he means her harm because the camera keeps showing -and I mean keeps showing- his eyes rimmed with red signifying, I suppose, bloodlust. Or maybe he just has conjunctivitis, I don't know. He eventually seduces the girl, promising to make her rich and famous, and you expect him to kill her, but if he does they kept it a secret. So far as I can see he sleeps with her and then sneaks off, reprehensible behavior, but hardly serial murder. Later on Giovanni seduces an ex-nun and beats up her boyfriend, and also (in the film's funniest scene) whales on a biker gang. But he doesn't murder anyone, at least not in the sense that Gacy or Dahmer were murderers. Let's go back to the biker scene. Giovanni's brothers-in-law have been trailing him through the desert, seeking revenge for the death of their father. They set up in a remote bar on the novel theory that Giovanni will probably stop in there someday for a beer. A gang of bikers come in and start hassling the older brother, signaling to the bartender, who is apparently used to such things, that they are going to rob him and cut his throat. Nobody gets worse press than biker gangs. I've known many bikers and, yes, some of them were criminals. Many were involved with drugs and/or drank too much. But many of them were also good people, living an unorthodox lifestyle but not looking to harm anyone else. Many had a profound sense of honor. But in movies they are always cowards, perverts, morons, and sadists. In the 1960s we had the Erich Von Zipper buffoons, tangling with Frankie and Annette; later the appearance of a gang always meant that the heroine was about to be molested. Can you think of a movie in which bikers shows up alongside a distressed motorist and it's a good thing? I can't. The Arrogant takes it farther. Not only are the film's bikers murderous scum, festooned with Nazi memorabilia and eager to kill a stranger for no apparent reason, they are not even good murderous scum. Giovanni beats the living daylights out of the gang without suffering a scratch. The sole survivor, a shirtless weakling wearing a German helmet, could have easily run away but Giovanni orders him to "come here" and he immediately obeys. Whereupon Giovanni knocks him out with one powerful blow of his mighty fist. Egad, you could go on and on about this picture. Giovanni is sitting on a stump and is bitten by a snake, which appears from nowhere just to attack him (not something rattlers typically do). Giovanni goes into shock. Julie rushes him to the nearest gas station where she is surrounded by several gibbering mechanics who proceed to wash her down with sponges (really, the mechanics and bikers ought to get together and form an anti-discrimination league). Meanwhile Giovanni is dying from rattler poison in the desert sun, but Julie seems to forget this. In fact, she often stumbles over her lines and laughs while he's croaking, leaving me to believe that by this point in the process Krystal had realized the movie was not worth taking seriously. A sheriff arrives just in time and rescues Julie, telling her "These boys are harmless, they just miss their little sister." Which makes no sense whatsoever, but hey. The sheriff dumps the unconscious Giovanni in the back of his cruiser and casually suggests they go find a hospital. The gibbering mechanics frolic among the stacks of auto tires and it seems like a pillow fight is dangerously close to breaking out. The worst/best part of the film is the constant religious posturing. If you are expecting intelligent discourse, you are going to be sadly disappointed. The theological arguments are of the type you've heard camping out the summer after high school, after a few hits of blotter acid and heavy pot smoking. Even the very last scene, which I won't reveal, is supposed to have deep significance. But like the rest of the movie it's just stupid.
Review of The Arrogant
