Look, I'm gonna throw out some film names here, and if you're into any of them, chances are you'll be into this too:Nothing But Trouble, Terrorvision, Greasy Strangler, Meet The Feebles, Meet The Hollowheads, Street Trash, Forbidden Zone, Frankenhooker...Yes, this can unequivocally be described by words like "stupid" or "crude". But that would be missing the point. You like your films extra-bizarre with a heaping of absurdity on the side? This is gen-x anti-corporate cynicism lumped together with a greasy carnie's hallucinatory visions, deep fried in bizarre, drenched in crude browns and greens. The stale, dated jokes don't matter - they're like a weird crust made out of old crushed-up potato chips. A few even manage to land here and there. Bobcat is maximally obnoxious, and some of the freak characters have literally zero dimension beyond a gag or two. But the SFX are almost as great as Randy Quaid's performance, so it all balances out. Frankly, this is a million miles above most mainstream frat humor both then and now, and a more entertaining piece of cinema than a third of the garbage that actually made it onto the theater screen in the 90s. (The Kilmer/Clooney Batman films immediately spring to mind.) In short: if you were looking for something like this, you will be very happy to have found it.

The not-so-excellent adventures of toxic chemical company spokesman Alex Winter (as Ricky Coogan) and his pal Michael Stoyanov (as Ernie) are told, in flashbacks, to talk-show host Brooke Shields (as Skye Daley). The beauty appears briefly. Joined by pretty protester Megan Ward (as Julie), the trio are turned into mutant freaks by hairy, hammy Randy Quaid (as Elijah C. Skuggs), in South America (allegedly). Then appears an army of beasts. "Freaked" absolutely shows make-up and special effects can be superior to lame comedy, which certainly wasn't the point being made here. Keanu Reeves sports a great tail. Beauty is only skin deep, but humor goes right to the funny bone.*** Freaked (9/11/93) Tom Stern, Alex Winter ~ Alex Winter, Randy Quaid, Michael Stoyanov, Megan Ward

When I was young and hungry I started buying a movie related magazine. In one edition they interview the stars of B&T Alex Winter and Keanu "Woah" Reeves, can't remember a thing about it except that Winter said that his next project was a film called "Hideous Mutant Freaks".Now some 20 years passed and I had never heard of it since, in fact I just forgot about it. Until I saw a film called Freaked on the cult rack and absent-mindedly flipped the cover to read the back. And there it was in all its glory, slightly different name but most definitely Alex Winter's baby, released in 1993, which meant I had so far allowed it to slip under my personal radar for almost half of my life. I wondered with my almost obsessive appetite for almost all genres how this could have passed me by, then I watched it.A digression. (1) I really wanted to like this movie. (2) After 16 years of not knowing I wanted to say "don't make the same mistake I did, check out Freaked today". (3) I wanted to bring up Freaked in conversations with mates and tell people that they just have to check out this crazy film.Now with reference to the points above:(1) I didn't. (2) I won't. (3) I won't and you don't.Freaked is somewhat of a throwback, when a star made it big the studio thought "well if that worked let's throw some money at the star and let them make another hit". You might remember such classics as Hudson Hawk (which I actually like and will defend endlessly), Waterworld and Battlefield Earth? Well they all had far bigger budgets than Freaked, but Willis, Costner and Travolta all had far bigger profiles.So back to Freaked, the movie starts with opening credits that strongly resemble an early Red Hot Chilli Peppers video, and in fact one of the lead characters wears a RHCP T shirt in the early going.3 minutes in we get a Brooke Shields sighting. She is a TV presenter explaining the bizarre case of young acting superstar Ricky Coogan, who disappeared after going overseas to try to bring some credibility to a chemical manufacturer responsible for some suspect creations, notably "Vigrot 24″, which is apparently responsible for mutations in humans.The early scenes are all nudge-nudge wink-wink stuff where Alex Winter who plays Ricky Coogan is almost leaning to camera and saying "Isn't this wacky? Can you believe they are letting me get away with this?" The acting is terrible and hammier than Porky Pig, the dialogue is similarly awful and the sets look like they are from a cheap skit show like Mad TV.This is unfortunately a 3 years on Bill and Ted wannabe, only without any sort of meaningful concept that might justify any shennanigans, and without the common sense to cut most of the juvenile, cheesy and puerile stuff that they thought at the time was comedy gold I guess.15 minutes in enter Randy Quaid and I officially lose hope for this as entertainment. Similar to Lindsay Lohan and Paris Hilton, the man has become famous for being there, in the dopey sluts case this is nightclubs and police cells, in Quaid's case he has been in so many cheesy, crappy, overacting movies that for some reason he has become the King of Crap. I just hope his latest film "Balls Out: Gary the Tennis Coach" (seriously!), changes my opinion of him being a gross out lowest common denominator comedian.Back to Freaked, Ricky Coogan, some chick he is chasing after and his bonehead best mate are lured by the Dr Moreau style guy played by Randy Quaid and mutated into Hideous Mutant Freaks, never saw that coming did ya?The remainder shows how the three, and a cavalcade of allegedly hilarious fellow freaks manage to escape their situation.What I learned:Again make up and FX can be done well without CGI, I must say that Alex Winter's face in particular looks cool, even though his lips don't move when he talks and he still managed to enunciate beautifully.There is more of a debt to R Crumb and even Kenny Everett than any other monster movie here.When you are making a "small" film, having multiple cameos from a bunch of similarly small celebrities doesn't help people decades later who wonder "Who the hell is that?"Mr T didn't have much to do in the early 90s. Snickers should have snapped him up sooner, he couldn't have been cheaper than when this first came out.When you make a no-budget, quirky, self aware "comedy", where the jokes are more about "look who's in it" and "gee aren't we crazy". Anyone remember Monkeybone, Nothing But Trouble or Idiocracy? Didn't think so.A parting gift from the big bad company in the film EES (Everything Except Shoes) "Those who oppose us will stand knee deep in the blood of their children". Seemed weird to me when I watched it, seems weird typing it now, but they actually said it and I think it was supposed to be funny.I never lol'd even once during this film, and I made specific note of how many times I was amused: 5Watch an episode of Futurama and try not chuckle or smile a few times - that'll save you an hour to spend doing something more worthwhile.Final Rating – 4.5 / 10. Another less than pointless vanity project. Perhaps Keanu actually was the smart one! At least he knew his limitations.If you liked this review (or even if you didn't) check out oneguyrambling.com

A young entrepreneur and former child star (Alex Winter) travels to South America for his corporation and tries to get a nasty chemical sold there. Instead, he stumbles upon a freak show and ends up becoming one of them -- deformed due to exposure to (what else?) the very chemical he was trying to market.This film has everything going for it. I thought this was going to get a nine out of ten, and the folks from Netflix thought it would be the best film I ever saw. Randy Quaid, Alex Winter, that guy from "Blossom", Keanu Reeves, Bobcat Goldthwait, Larry Bud Melman, Brooke Shields and William Sadler. What a cast! And the jokes are pretty funny (the airplane joke is hilarious and the Ramada Inn joke was priceless). Even the company name EES (Everything Except Shoes) was amusing. What went wrong? Two things failed for me. First, the jokes from the first half didn't continue into the second half. Many of the more clever moments were used up right away. Actually, I can't recall a good joke from the second half to be honest. And second, the movie relied almost exclusively on the "freaks" to be the entertainment. I didn't find them very interesting. Sure, the makeup department did a fine job. But it's just overkill. They didn't even give Keanu Reeves credit for his role, which I think would have helped the marketing and reception a great deal (you know, it's like a "Bill and Ted 3" or something).Luckily the film is really short (like 73 minutes) so by the time it goes downhill, the movie is nearly over. But the film cannot rely on Brooke Shields to carry it and some of the jokes are just obscure (I liked the racist Frogman joke, but my friend Jason didn't get it). Rent this if your curiosity gets the best of you, but otherwise don't. Ten years from now, this will be even more forgotten than it is right now (if that's possible).