American Guinea Pig: The Song of Solomon

The Song of Solomon is a bit of a departure for the American Guinea Pig series: instead of virtually plot-free systematic torture, the film depicts the exorcism of a young woman, Mary (Jessica Cameron), by a series of Catholic priests, which, in true Unearthed Films style, results in lots of gory mayhem. In fact, director Stephen Biro piles on so much splatter that his film becomes comedic in its excess, which I don't believe was the intention.

For me, the gore that broke the camel's back was a scene clearly inspired by Fulci's Gates of Hell (AKA City of the Living Dead), wherein Mary yarfs up her insides. After a lot of reaching, up come her small intestines-but wait, there's more: a couple of organs are thrown up onto her bed in a bloody heap, followed by a large intestine. But Biro doesn't stop there... he has Mary pick up each glistening organ and stuff them back into her mouth one-by-one. This goes on for so long that it's hard to take seriously. Also giving me the giggles is the moment when the final priest gives up reading stuff from his Little Book of Exorcism and climbs on top of Mary to hump the demon out of her - it's supposed to be shocking (I think), but I couldn't keep a straight face.

The best moment comes towards the end of the film (just before the humping), when Mary's contorted limbs snap and split open (sterling work by make-up effects guys Jerami Cruise and Marcus Koch) - that part was as close to revolting as it gets - but the rest of the film is just a poor man's The Exorcist with much more blood and a silly 'twist' ending.

Very disappointed it's to far fetched &so far away from a proper exorcism it's unreal!! To much holly wood & not enough realism. very dissapointed with this movie

I think my biggest issue with this movie is that it tries way too hard to be serious, but none of the acting is good enough to be taken even remotely seriously. If it had even taken a couple brief moments to make a light joke here and there, so we know not to take it so serious, it could've helped it a tad. The bad actors overacting resulted in a lot of unintentional comedy.

The fact we did not see the possessed girl before the possession, in an innocent state, also lessened the effect in my opinion. Not like I wanted this film to be any longer than it already was, but I felt like I kept getting introduced to more and more new characters that I just didn't care about or know enough about to care, when I didn't even know anything about the lead girl in the first place. That makes for a pretty big chore to sit through this one.

But I don't believe they were concerned much with character development anyway, they were much more concerned with the splatter. Which is totally fine! I love gore flicks. There are a few fine displays of effect work in this film. The finale was rather impressive in that aspect. But when there's nothing else going for it, and the film just isn't good enough to believable, I feel the impact of the gore is also lessened.

With some better actors, maybe this movie would have succeeded for me. But as is, it should've known to keep it's tongue firmly in cheek so the viewer could've had a more enjoyable time with it.

I made it 50 minutes and turned it of. Everything ab out this was so, so bad. They would have done much better if they had just taken the easy path and tried to make this a comedy. I think the person who played Mary was the best actor, and she was not that great. Everything about this was equally awful. The items the priests were wearing as well as their cleric jewelry and other items they adorned or used look like halloween costumes. I guess they weren't the worst costumes I'd seen, but, still awful. And the scenes that required anyone to speak anything other than English.. again, awful. It looked like they probably did their best to nail those lines during filming, but sound was quite obviously dubbed for the non-English lines, and you could tell by the way it sounded that it was dubbed and voiced over.

This is probably a 1 or 1.5 but honestly out of the kindness of my heart I gave it 2 stars for the simple fact that at least there was consistency! Consistently awful.

The Guinea Pig films were a series of pictures that spanned across the mid 80s into the early 90s that gained infamous attention and notoriety for being some of the most graphic and extreme films to come out of the Japanese underground at the time. The series quickly gained a cult following, and with it came controversy, criminal investigation, and ultimately legal banishment. It is now illegal to produce films in Japan under the Guinea Pig title. This is where the American Guinea Pig series comes in.

Stephan Biro, the man responsible for giving the Guinea Pig films there first and only official home video release in the United States also gained the rights to the Guinea Pig name, and in 2014 started the American Guinea Pig series with his release of Bouquet of Guts and Gore. A pseudo snuff film that connects the original Guinea Pig series with its now American counterpart. The most infamous film from the original Guinea Pig series, Flower of Flesh and Blood, was said to be inspired by a genuine snuff film that director Hideshi Hino had received in the mail years before. Biro's Bouquet is supposed to be that very film that Hino received in the mail, making the American series a kind of prequel to the original Japanese films.

This connection and homage to the original series has been a running theme with nearly every American Guinea Pig release. As just mentioned, American Guinea Pig: Bouquet of Guts and Gore shares connections with Flower of Flesh and Blood. American Guinea Pig: Bloodshock nods its head to the original Guinea Pig classic, The Devil's Experiment. American Guinea Pig: Sacrifice shares uncanny similarities to the original Guinea Pig film, He Never Dies. The Song of Solomon on the other is the first film in the series to deviate from this attachment to the films of yesteryear. This is the first time in the American Guinea Pig series that a release came out that did not hold some kind of correlation with the original series. Nonetheless, this is one of the best films to come out of the series thus far.

As with much of the original Guinea Pig films, narrative comes secondary to the exhibition of graphic violence and gore. The first two films to come out of the original Japanese series held virtually no plot at all. The American series followed this model with the releases of Bouquet and Sacrifice. All of these pictures centered their focus on graphic presentations of violence, only holding enough plot to bring us to scenes of grotesque displays of the macabre. That does not mean that every film out of the Guinea Pig series were all void of plot. The original Guinea Pig film, Mermaid in a Manhole, is a prime example of superb story telling. The American Guinea Pig series' first attempt at a traditional narrative structure, with its release of Bloodshock, was a good endeavor, but ultimately a weak execution. Poor acting and debatable directorial choices resulted in a film that was often funny when it was trying to be serious, and ultimately did not pack the punch it was so desperately winding up for.

Fortunately, the same cannot be said for The Song of Solomon. Whatever was in the way during their first attempt is behind them now, and The Song of Solomon packs a strong enough punch to leave you eating the rest of your meals through a straw. The acting in this picture is significantly better. An though at times the dialog feels a little forced, the lead actors are clearly professionals and know how to make it work. There are some weaker performances in this film, most notably by the actress who plays the mother, along with whoever plays the doctor, but that is to be expected with any low budget indie project. Additionally, Solomon sets a tone and atmosphere that Bloodshock was so desperately trying to pull off, but couldn't. With these to factors, Solomon is able to dilute the few occasions bad acting or weak points in the film, making these flaws easily dismissible, and allowing the film's narrative to roll forward with little distraction. Resulting in an over all powerful and interesting picture.

In regards to the violence, and lets face it, that is why you are watching an American Guinea Pig film, Solomon delivers. This is likely to be the most gruesome and graphic exorcist film that you will ever see. That is to be expected considering Oddtopsy FX (Bouquet of Guts and Gore) and Toe Tag Pictures (August Underground trilogy) were behind the special effects for this picture.

All in all, you may feel like the exorcist genre is a tired and played out theme, and that very well may be true, but if you are ready to put that genre to rest I recommend going out with a bang with this one. If you are a fan of underground horror and extreme gore, this is one to set your eyes on.