Tag: Halloween 2022

Thinner (1996) Halloween Advent 2022

Rating 18
Length 1h29
Release 12.4.2017
Director Tom Hollad
About When Billy runs over an old gypsy woman, he is cursed by her husband to lose weight rapidly and uncontrollably. Soon, the experience turns deadly for him and everyone around him.
Moon: no moon sighting
Where to Watch: Now TV
Trailer:

Trick

  • Body horror isn’t for everyone and some scenes were even tough for me to handle.
  • The tone isn’t quite figured out. There’s an element of satire there, but it is so hard to tell if it’s self aware. The fat suit does not help matters. It isn’t easy based on the subject content and there just isn’t the time in the industry for someone to do a Christian Bale 360 during production.
  • There’s no one to root for. Not a single likeable character. Yeah, sure, you want to like Joe Mantegna but he’s a fucking mob boss. Even telling yourself its just Fat Tony doesn’t quite do it.
    You have the Romanian Gypsy community. Okay, dude should have been watching the road and not having his dick sucked. However, I’m not sure cursing three people is justice when your entire family are into a second century of living.
  • Call me woke, too PC or a snowflake, I don’t give a fuck. The representation of the Gypsy community in this film is appalling and outdated. Yes, I enjoyed the movie but I still have the point it out given the problems the community faces both here in the UK and around the world. For every attempt to throw a positive light, there’s bullshit like this that boils them down to a horror archetype (See Drag Me to Hell for an other example)

Treat

  • Much in the same way the anthology film Cat’s Eye (1985) takes rather mundane concepts and unspools the thread into an outlandish nightmare, Thinner gets under your skin. Hell, I’m currently trying to loose weight and I’m a little more aware of my body right now.
    There’s also the idea that Billy keeps on eating. Fuck me, does he eat. I think that turned my stomach more than anything else.
  • Intentional of not, I found it incredibly funny. The very fact that the whole film is catapulted forward on the grounds that Billy’s wife decides to give him a blowie in the car is so nonsensical that you have to laugh.
  • Stephen King makes a cameo! Bloody brilliant!

Final Thoughts

Blow jobs in a car were ruled out of the bucket list when Gillian Taylforth was arrested on the A1 before I even knew what one was but I’m sure they’re every man’s fantasy. However this film is probably enough to put all men off requesting them again for life.
It’s a bat-shit crazy film, economic with its run time and will have you questioning the drugs King was on at the time of writing this story.