Jesus Shows You the Way to the Highway

The world needs more films like this. Its like The Mighty Boosh wanted to produce a sci-fi as a side project, but for some reason they wanted to keep their names out of it. Every criticism that you may have about this being ridiculously cheap and making no sense is everything that makes this film wonderful. I can't be the only person thats sick of knowing everything about a film the second i see the poster or hear the byline. The bigger budget a film has then the more cliches they usually cram in. But this film looks like was made for the price of a lunchtime snack for the main cast. And a small snack at that.

Despite what some people may say about this film, this film itself is quite unique, and quite entertaining at that! With its exotic writing, acting, and overall film methods, it definitely in my opinion is worth a watch.

Whether you like it or not you are unlikely to ever see anything similar. If you liked space cop or kung fury this deserves a look. Its much wierder, at times it's Jodorowski level wierd. I dont even know if i liked it but im glad i watched it.

CIA Agents D. T. Gagano (Daniel Tadesse) and Palmer Eldritch (Agustin Mateo) are given the assignment of entering the agency's operating system to find and destroy a computer virus that is taking over. The task isn't as straightforward as it would seem, because in addition to the Soviet-Leader-Masked virus there's a Substance, which induces all sorts of hallucinations in its users. Bring in the leader of Beta-Ethiopia, Batfro (Solomon Tashe), and a man who might be Jesus and might be Roy (Guillermo Llanso), and things get complicated really, really fast....

There isn't really a way to describe this film, which could be equally considered science fiction, romance, comedy, thriller, Afro-Futurism and super-psychedelic trip, depending on one's perspective at the moment. Clocking in at a fast 83 minutes, it's exactly the kind of film to see with Montreal's Fantasia Festival audience, people who love genre and love gonzo and most of all, love movies. Director Miguel Llanso's earlier film, "Crumbs," also played at Fantasia, though I must say that I didn't really understand it; despite my description above, "Jesus Shows You...." is much more coherent - and hilarious. And a great stomping shaggy dog's tale to boot!

I was going to begin this title with "Surreal", but if you're going to talk about a film that's clearly inspired by Phillip K. Dick's fiction that's kind of redundant. The basic plot bears quite a few points of similarity to one of the author's lesser-known novels, "Ubik"; there's even a major character named "Palmer Eldritch" -- as in Dick's novel "The Three Stigmata of". Which also featured an alien hallucinogen.

So the film isn't shy about acknowledging its antecedents. Along with lots of other influences from all over the place. Whether you'll like it or not probably depends on whether you enjoy that type of story. But seriously: "Worst movie ever"? No way. I really wish reviewers would stop using this as shorthand for "This was confusing/I didn't understand it."

Which is a perfectly valid opinion. I can't claim to have completely understood it, either, after one viewing. But I enjoyed it enough to think this is worth a couple more looks. Yeah, it's got its rough edges, but it also has real heart and creativity.