The Toxic Avenger
Directed by Macon Blair
Written by Macon Blair, based on the film by Lloyd Kaufman
Starring Peter Dinklage, Jacob Tremblay and Kevin Bacon
Classification 18A; 103 minutes
Opens in theatres Aug. 29
Any doubts that Macon Blair, the Southern filmmaker best known for his slow-burn genre outings with Jeremy Saulnier (Murder Party, Green Room), understands the unique punk-rock shock appeal of the z-grade trash-terpiece The Toxic Avenger are dispelled during the moment when a character uses a toilet bowl to bludgeon a bad guy. The excremental excess of Toxie and his gross-out pals is certainly not for everyone. But for those who appreciate a hefty dose of literal potty humour, Blair has you covered head to filthy toe.
Children of the 1980s might best recall The Toxic Avenger as a foggy memory of Saturday morning television, the animated show about a do-gooding mutant arriving complete with enough icky action figures to fill several Toys “R” Us aisles.
But that PG iteration was in fact based on the supremely sleazy 1984 flick by junk-movie impresario Lloyd Kaufman, whose Troma Entertainment canon consists of titles that mostly speak for themselves (Class of Nuke ‘Em High, Sgt. Kabukiman N.Y.P.D., Poultrygeist). And so here comes Blair, ready to rescue Toxie’s too-sweet legacy and restore his rightfully so-bad-it’s-good name.
Working with what appears to be a shockingly high budget – there are enough full-scale sets and disheveled extras to rival the epic urban hell-scape of Beau Is Afraid – Blair creates a living, breathing world of oozy freaks.
Peter Dinklage in a scene from The Toxic Avenger.VVS Productions/Supplied
Chief among them is Winston (Peter Dinklage), a sad-sack janitor who balances his time caring for his sullen teenage stepson (Jacob Tremblay) and working shifts at the local multinational chemical giant, run by a CEO (Kevin Bacon) so evil that he gives Big Pharma a bad name. After some local goons leave Winston for dead in a river of slime, the Toxic Avenger is born, ready to take on all the many evils – gangsters, misogynistic terrorists, an Insane Clown Posse-like rock band – that run rampant in town.
Blair is a pro at updating and elevating Kaufman’s best/worst instincts – you will lose track of how many heads are scalped, severed and crushed – as well as convincing presumably above-this actors to bring genuine emotion to stock characters and obligatory confrontations (Taylour Paige, what are you doing here playing a corporate whistleblower?).
But as much sick fun as it is to see Dinklage (or, more frequently, his stunt double Luisa Guerreiro) use a radioactive mop to eviscerate random henchmen, the storytelling is frequently, and perhaps appropriately, constipated. It takes a good half-hour for Winston to finally transform, while the action keeps getting interrupted by ho-hum monologues from Bacon and his various cronies (including Elijah Wood underneath some ghastly makeup).
And perhaps because Blair is so focused on the slaughter, the filmmaker seems to forget that Kaufman was (and remains) a skilled satirist. Here, the jokes are either all surface-level or inserted into throw-away lines of dialogue, as if they were post-production patches that Blair hurriedly invented in the editing suite.
Still, this is a remake built on equal parts care and admiration, a love letter to all the sickos out there. It’s nothing to simply wash your hands of. Or flush away.
