MANTOPUS!

 

How long has Joshua Kennedy been working on MANTOPUS! ?? Let me put it to you this way--he started work on this film during the first Trump administration. After years of production, MANTOPUS! had a special premier screening recently at the historic Citrus Theater in Josh's hometown of Edinburg, Texas. The movie received a rapturous response, and I was lucky enough to be presented with my own personal copy from the director himself, which I viewed last night. My immediate summation is that this is the ULTIMATE Joshua Kennedy movie. 

MANTOPUS! is heavily influenced by the horror and sci-fi flicks produced by Herman Cohen, especially those which were made in the late 1950s-early 1960s and starred English character actor Michael Gough. The story takes place sometime in 1950s Hollywood, where filmmaker Charles Landor (Josh Kennedy) toils away making horror movies for Danziger Studios. Landor is known as "The Monster Man", but the studio chief believes the director should start making cowboy musicals. The peeved Landor goes off one night in search of inspiration, and he wanders into a mysterious antique shop--where he discovers an actual real-life monster, a creature with a human body and a octopus head, called Mantopus. Landor decides to use this creature in his next production--but he also decides to use the beast off-screen as well, as an instrument of revenge against those who have either belittled him or have gone against his wishes. 

There's so many things I wish to discuss about MANTOPUS! that I really can't, because I feel the movie's wonders are best enjoyed by an unsuspecting audience. It's bold, wacky, and colorful, in the best Joshua Kennedy Gooey Films tradition. The movie has a nice flow, and at times takes on a manic energy. It's packed with enough in-jokes to fill out an entire spiral notebook, and most important of all, it's fun. Josh Kennedy's entire life has been influenced by the classic cinema of the fantastic, and he revels in this material, instead of looking down on it. 

I must mention that Josh gives the best performance of his Gooey Films career as Charles Landor. Film geeks will immediately know that Josh is imitating Michael Gough, but it must be pointed out that he's interpreting a very particular type of Michael Gough performance--one that the actor gave in such films as HORRORS OF THE BLACK MUSEUM, KONGA, BLACK ZOO, and Hammer's THE PHANTOM OF THE OPERA. Josh's assimilation of Gough's various horror films tics in MANTOPUS! is astounding. The supercilious manner, the preening vanity, the sarcastic asides, the uncomfortable body language--Josh displays it all, so much so that he becomes a kind of Mini-Gough. For Old Monster Movie fans, it's worth watching MANTOPUS! just to see Josh's performance. 

Thankfully there's much more to this movie than just a Michael Gough tribute. Many of the Gooey Films stock company return here, and they all get a chance to shine. The head of the Mantopus, brilliantly made by Mitch Gonzales, looks like something that would have appeared in a actual Herman Cohen production, and it also has some surprising attributes of its own. MANTOPUS! was entirely filmed in 16mm, or "SuperGooey 16", and this gives the movie a very unique, quaint look--it doesn't have the overly-perfect coldness of today's digital age. Rosa Cano's striking lighting effects make the colors bold and imaginative, and Reber Clark's music score perfectly matches the tone of each scene. 

I absolutely adored MANTOPUS!. My one worry about it is that those viewers who are not monster movie geeks will not be able to appreciate it as much as those who are in the know--but this movie has such an entertaining vibe I don't think it will matter. MANTOPUS! should soon be available on Amazon Prime, and Josh is preparing an official home video release. For those who have been following the career of the South Texas wunderkind, MANTOPUS! will be a must-see. It's a film that encapsulates the fun and enchantment of classic fantastic cinema.