Twisted Sisters

From the moment it starts, Twisted Sisters has 'direct to video' written all over it. The performances are wretched; a feat which is matched by the phoney British accents and inane dialogue, the plot is ridiculous and the film puts a focus on gore to attempt to mask these unfortunate truths. The film actually reminded me of the minor hit Murder Set-Pieces in many ways as the plot is paper thin and serves only as an excuse for some mindless gore. However, despite the fact that Nick Palumbo's film had a bit more 'bite' with it's over the top set pieces and music score, the two films are about on par in terms of quality. The plot for this film takes obvious influence from Brian De Palma's hit Hitchcock tribute 'Sisters' and focuses on Jennifer - a young lass who 'has it all'. The cops begin to turn up a load of brutal murders in which the male victims have been castrated, and the blame is put on Jennifer. However, her parents later reveal that Jennifer wasn't an only child and, in fact, has a twin sister...

This film really isn't very good, but somehow director Wolfgang Büld manages to make it entertaining in spite of that. There has been a lot of direct to video exploitation garbage released recently, from the aforementioned Murder Set Pieces to the awful August Underground and Slaughtered Vomit Dolls, all the way back to crap but fun films such as Delta Delta Die. This one would be somewhere in the middle between the rubbish and the decent stuff, as the film does at least have its moments. The conclusion to the film provides a few highlights, and despite some choppy handling throughout; the director comes good by the end with some delightfully sick imagery that actually does fit the feel of the movie. The gore is obviously important in a film like this, and many will be glad to know that Twisted Sisters isn't short on it. Some of the set pieces in the movie are overly silly, however, and the one involving fireworks stands out both on that front, and for looking incredibly fake. Overall, this is hardly a good film; but it has some decent moments, and fans of direct to video trash might get some enjoyment out of it.

Following a series of savage deaths, the police's insistence on a young woman as the culprit gradually reveals the existence of her malicious twin sister out for revenge for her better life and tries to stop her.

This was a rather enjoyable effort if only slightly flawed. One of the biggest pluses here is the fact that there's a lot of time spent trying to determine if there's actually any sense of whether or not she's the one doing the killing. This manages to pull out two or three different tactics to ensure it's not all that easy to determine what's going on, as the twin angle is played off in the last act so the remaining sections up until then utilize both the split personality feature in that it really is her while in a stupor or the fact of manipulating the surroundings to ensure she won't get caught, and it's quite good at doing these two tactics throughout here. Likewise, the film also manages to feature some incredibly brutal and graphic scenes in here that are wholly enjoyable and quite exciting to really play up her deranged and mental state with a slew of over-the-top graphic set-pieces filled with blood and gore including scenes of castration, tons of dismemberments, slit throats and the craziest sequence where she cuts open his stomach and shoves in an assortment of fireworks before setting them off inside his body, so this one really tends to get overloaded with the blood and gore. Coupled with the rampant nudity as well, this one's certainly not all that bad but does have a few problems. The fact that the revenge makes no sense seeing as how the entire thing is based on pure circumstance is a little troubling, as there's very little about it that would make someone start such a campaign to destroy someone that insignificant. Her job is decent at best, her boyfriend is about to propose marriage but hasn't yet and there's no evidence of her social life so it's not like her life is really one that needs ruining to the extent this one does, much less even in the first place so the purpose of choosing that particular point to strike is highly confusing. Same as with the clichéd and overused method of turning her psycho, with the abusive foster-parents after their true parents died which is hardly original and not all that convincing. The other part here that does need mentioning is the fact that, because this one is set-up as a mystery for the most part, the film is pretty slow to get going in the first half with the large amount of time spent on uncovering the reasons for the attacks while also playing out her home-life which takes a while to get going. Otherwise, this one is pretty enjoyable.

Rated R: Extreme Graphic Language, Extreme Graphic Violence, Continuous Full Nudity and several sex scenes.

Twisted Sisters is about a set of twins (both played by Fiona Horsey), one a pregnant, happily engaged successful business-woman, the other a man-hating castrating she-bitch who would get Gloria Steinem's seal of approval. It's also about an hour and a half too long. Crammed with barely adequate acting, very derivative storyline, and not particularly grisly deaths, this is one that can be skipped and you won't anything at all. It's been done, and done much better in "Sisters" Only recommended for true dyed in the wool fans of Director Wolfgang Büld, all two of you.

My Grade: D