31 (2016)

July 16, 2018

Directed by: Rob Zombie

Written by: Rob Zombie

Starring: Malcolm McDowell, Richard Brake, Sheri Moon Zombie

Budget: $1,500,000 (Estimated)

Quotes: Smoke in times of rest is a great companion to the solitary soldier. You know who said that? Do you know who said that?... It was everyone's favorite revolutionary Marxist, Che Guevara. Except I think he smoked a pipe. I always thought I'd appear rather pretentious with a pipe.

Trivia: This movie had to be cut three times in order to obtain an R rating from the MPAA.


Rob Zombie is an auteur when it comes to horror movies. All of his movies have a very Rob Zombie feel: freeze frames, intense gore and over the top characters, experiments with color saturation and film editing, and a 1970s fueled Southern Rock soundtrack. 31 therefore fits in nicely with his growing repertoire of movies. Also, he is known for using the same actors and finding B-movie legends.  From the first moments to the last, 31 is a very fun and gory survival splatter movie where if you like House of 1000 Corpses and Devil's Rejects, you will like this one as well.

The movie is about a van full of carnies who get taken over by masked men who kill some of the carnies and then bring the remaining five living ones to a lavish castle. At the castle, Father Murder(Malcolm McDowell) announces that they are going to play a game called 31 where they need to survive for 12 hours in a horrific maze while murderous psychos attempt to kill them. While the five carnies attempt to survive rich people wearing 18th century French aristocracy costumes bet on the survival of the group.

The story itself is not super creative, The Most Dangerous Game, the Running Man and a dozen other movies have already done very similar plots. What makes this movie interesting are the characters and Rob Zombie's film style. The opening scene introduces us to Doom Head (Richard Brake). In a black and white scene, Doom Head talks directly into the camera for a significant time about murder until finally the camera pans to his victim. We get the initial impression, the character is speaking directly to us. The scene ends with Doom Head alluding to his victim that his wife is being kept as a sex slave before Doom Head slits the man's throat.

There are half a dozen other characters who are used in the maze to hunt and murder the carnies. First there is Sick Head, a Mexican dwarf obsessed by Nazism and Hitler whos weapons of choice are two daggers. Then there's Schizo Head and Psycho head, two chainsaw wielding brothers whose love for murder is only matched by their love of rape (during one scene they go into a routine where they exclaim, "Count yourself lucky, you've been fucked by the best!" Next is Death Head (the guy who plays the really tall nihilist in the Big Lebowski) and his girlfriend Sex Head (played by the adorable Elizabeth Daily, who does mainly voice work, but was also a whore in the Devil's Rejects and played Dottie in Pee Wee's Big Adventure). Death Head is an enormous German who bashes people's skulls in with a giant club with nails sticking out of it. Sex Head has a large knife. These characters are great, up there with the bad guys from the Running Man (remember Sub Zero, Dynamo, and Buzzsaw?).

Sick Head

Psycho or Schizo Head... I forget

Sex Head

While these killers are terrifying, they are not very good at murder... which essentially is the job that they are being paid for. The untrained carnival people are able to kill the first five killers while only losing two of their own. Another two are killed by Doom Head at the end of the film. One would expect the hired killers to be a little better at their job.

After the other killers failed their job, Malcolm McDowell's character (how cool is it to have Alex from A Clockwork Orange and Caligula himself in your movie?!?!) contacts Doom Head, the killer we were introduced to at the beginning of the film. This time he is in some sleazy room furiously banging some girl while watching Nosferatu (there is never anything sexy about sex in Rob Zombie's films... the other sex scene is when one of the carnies interrupts two other carnies in the middle of sex while the guy is telling some gross joke about jizz). There is a great scene when Doom Head puts on his makeup. The care to which he goes about his task makes his character terrifying. Followed by him bloodying his own mouth with his fist and he screaming into the mirror "you're not crazy, you're in control" cements this character at truly terrifying.

Doom Head

There are some great deaths. Chainsaws through the stomach. People being bludgeoned. Stabbings. All with tons of blood spraying everywhere. There is even one scene where the characters begin to consume a feast left out for them, only to discover their friend's remains are in a glass box underneath and they had been eating him. This scene has to be an homage to the Eddie death scene in The Rocky Horror Picture Show.

The soundtrack is also great with Lynyrd Skynyrd, the James Gang, and even the Mamas and the Papas' California Dreaming makes it into the movie.

The Running Man explored the consumerism of the 1980s with the survival of its contestants being watched on a televised game show, complete with prizes and commercials. This movie takes a different look at the theme. Zombie is not known for deep themes, but perhaps there is a class theme that carries the film. The 18th century French aristocracy costumes, symbols of ultimate decadence and the gambling with the lives of the "contestants" certainly seem to be saying something of classism. Also, Doom Head quotes Che Guevara, whom he calls "Everyone's favorite Marxist Revolutionary." Maybe the movie is saying something about the growing disparities between rich and poor and the exploitation of the lower class? Probably, Zombie just thought it would look cool to have Malcolm McDowell in a 1700s French costume affecting a foppish accent while a bunch of southern hicks fight for their lives against psychos. But who knows?

The conclusion of the movie is fairly predictable (who survives I mean) but how they survive was kind of a cool moment. I don't want to spoil it, but it builds the anxiety until the release. My only beef with the film is the very last moments of the film. I understand it was meant to reinforce the survival theme of the movie but it came off a little goofy to me.