Seeds

A HEAVILY dysfunctional family gets together for the holidays. This leads to multiple murders (all badly done) and quite a few sex inserts that feature none of the original cast! This was originally shot as a straight-forward exploitation film with little skin. The producers saw it and decided to change it. They cut out key scenes that explained the plot, inserted some seriously terrible music that occasionally drowns out the actors dialogue, inserted some soft core sex scenes (seemingly at random) with two people who aren't even in the movie! They turned what MIGHT have been an OK movie into an incomprehensible mess. Still the script (or what's left of it) isn't bad, the acting is pretty good (even though some actors REALLY chew the scenery) and a lot of dramatic sequences really work. However the sex scenes the producers inserted pop up all over the place and go on for up to 5 minutes! The two actors (a guy and a girl) ARE attractive and have nice bodies so they're not a chore the watch...but their scenes totally destroy the flow of the story. So what's left is what might have been a pretty good film destroyed by editing and inserting pointless sex. A 3.

Andy Milligan co-wrote, directed, shot, and did the costumes for this grimly effective exploitation feature. It stars Maggie Rogers as Claris Manning, a vile and hateful bitch if ever there was one. Now her grown-up children are all putrid and hateful in their own ways, and she's convinced (probably not incorrectly) that they're waiting and waiting for her to drop dead so her fortune will become available to them. The old lady's daughter Carol (Candy Hammond, whom Milligan married during filming) invites the ugly brood over for a Christmas dinner, and things turn ugly in more ways than one. Some of the family members start dying off in various ways.

"Seeds" is one of those trash flicks that makes up for in spirit what it may lack in technical polish. It may indeed be "rough around the edges", but Milligan and his co-writer John Borske concocted a wonderfully sordid story and wonderfully sordid characters here. It's all compelling in a really twisted way, especially since incest is a theme that recurs throughout. And because so many of the characters are despicable (including house staff that have their own scheme in the works), we're only too happy to see these people bumped off.

There isn't that much in the way of graphic violence, but exploitation devotees will be delighted to note the abundant nudity and sex. The lack of a big budget helps to create a truly depraved and, well, seedy atmosphere. There are very few settings used, with most of the action confined to the house.

The dialogue is often very amusing, and better than one might expect, and the same goes for the performances. Rogers, in particular, is memorably hideous as one of the nastiest mothers in screen history.

As some people likely already know, this is also available in an alternate cut, "Seeds of Sin", which trims out a lot of Milligans' original material and adds new sex scenes with different actors, in an attempt to increase the pictures' possible revenue.

This could make for interesting alternative Christmas time viewing for more adventuresome movie lovers.

Eight out of 10.

Seeds (1968)

** 1/2 (out of 4)

A mother, an elderly and alcoholic mother, is outraged when her children are invited over to her house for dinner. This here sets loose a lot of old rage and before long everyone is being killed off one by one.

Andy Milligan's SEEDS got a brief theatrical run back in the day but it was a major flop so another company bought the film, took out forty-minutes worth of footage and then filmed around forty-minutes worth of sex scenes. This version was released as SEEDS OF SIN and this is what most people have seen. In 2016 a restoration was done to try and complete Milligan's original version of SEEDS and that's what is reviewed here.

I must say that I think Milligan was a horrible filmmaker but his films are quite interesting to watch and there's no doubt that the man himself was quite fascinating. SEEDS is a rather interesting film because it features some awful acting, lame dialogue, bad camera-work and I'd argue that on most levels you'd consider it a bad film. However, it's actually rather entertaining because of all of these things and I must admit that it help my attention because this family drama, a real train wreck of a family, pretty much explodes on the screen like a train wreck.

I called the performances awful and that's a bit too extreme. They certainly aren't Oscar-material but at the same time they are all interesting to watch. They are bad and some are over-the-top but at the same time it adds an interesting element to the characters. The characters here seem like from an alternate universe and that's basically what Milligan's film seems like. Strange characters in a strange world and it's got some very nasty and mean things going on. In a Milligan type of way, SEEDS works.

Seeds of Sin (1968)

* 1/2 (out of 4)

Somewhat of a producer's cut of Andy Milligan's lost film Seeds, which adds various sex scenes in so that the film could be sold to sex theaters. With all the added sex scenes it's really impossible to judge Milligan's original film but for this here it isn't too bad. The sex scenes will certainly keep you interested and they're actually better done than what you'd normally see in a film like this. I'm still new to Milligan's work and I've heard it can have its certain charm but I've yet to witness any of that.

Say what you want about Andy Milligan - but if his family was even 10% as deranged as the one in this film, well then I guess he could have turned out worse. Unfortunately, the video print of this film contains sex scene inserts originally shot by the distributor to boost the picture's box office appeal. Several times during the film Milligan's ugly camerawork and silent film music abruptly ends, and suddenly good-looking stand-ins for Milligan's homely actors take over and start doing it to psychedelic 60's guitar rock. It's pretty easy to fast-forward through if you're trying to pay attention to Milligan's original film, which, unfortunately, is missing quite a bit of action that was cut to make room for the added sex scenes. What remains, however, is still compelling stuff. I don't think I've ever seen a more hateful mother in any film before.

Dysfunctional family goes home for the holidays and murder and mayhem result. Violent sexy Milligan at his most home made. Little better than a home movie (as much of Milligans films are) this is a trip into depravity 1960's style. Notable for the copious nudity and sex this film is neither sexy nor gruesome, playing now more as quaint.(though decidedly r rated). The film suffers from its uneven cast and from the cheapness of the production.(No one was ever sure where the money went on his movies since he was always broke). Its a bad bad movie thats not worth seeing except as a Milligan completeist or because its got some good looking people fooling around.