All jacked up and laid out full of worms

I hope you have a strong stomach. You will need it for All jacked up and full of worms.

Motel maintenance worker Roscoe comes across a cigarette case full of hallucinogenic worms left behind by a prostitute after her session with a man named Benny. From there, the movie goes places that, if you can predict, mean you’re psychic or somehow also came across a cigarette case full of hallucinogenic worms.

There are other characters, of course, but they don’t have much to do with the plot and are just there. That is until act three kicks in, which we’ll get to later. So just to be clear, we’ll keep this focused on Roscoe and Benny’s misadventures.

Have you ever seen a movie that made you feel like you were going crazy? Not in a David Lynch-esque way, either. There is a method to his very specific kind of madness. I mean more like in a Tim and Eric style, where at just about any moment you feel the need to ask yourself if what you’re seeing is real or some kind of fever dream designed specifically to push you to the brink of death . mental health.

I spent much of the movie’s 71 minutes running with my mouth wide open, audibly asking no one but myself, “wtf?” Trying to decipher what I saw was like trying to play drunken Sudoku after spinning around on one of those teacup rides at an amusement park. A task I’m usually more than up for, but the excess of repulsive visuals made it all the more challenging.

This is a disgusting movie, and I’m not even saying that because of the whole food and sniffing of worms at one point. That’s honestly relatively tame compared to other parts of the movie. It would be distasteful to describe in any detail some of the things you will see. Suffice to say, you don’t want to eat before or after watching it. I literally stopped to shower half way through.

I won’t lie though; the movie is quite funny. There’s one scene in particular where, after Roscoe and Benny have their first worming experience together, an actual sentence I just wrote, they return to the motel and ask a complete stranger, Dennis, if he wants to join in. Instead of reacting as any normal human would, he enthusiastically joins in. The trio then embark on a night of debauchery in which Dennis is just dressed straight up like Guy Ferrari. It’s a minor thing, but it’s a perfect example of the movie’s unique brand of comedy.

Despite being equal parts confusing and sickening, the film is strangely sweet, or at least tries to be. The relationship between Roscoe and Benny is one between two broken people seeking solace in a broken world. They don’t find it or just before it slips through their fingers, but their shared desire for a common goal is still there.

However, against this are some acts that Benny commits, mainly related to a baby doll. These things don’t happen often, but they happen enough to certainly tarnish Benny’s image and sour the sweetness. Roscoe is an all-round fine chap, at least until about the last twenty minutes before he totally goes off the rails, but as for Benny, there are just some lines you don’t cross. Even to inanimate objects.

Speaking of the past twenty minutes, if what has been described so far makes me sound like an inmate in Arkham Asylum, then trying to explain how deep Worms goes towards the end would make me sound like someone who has a handful of hallucinogenic worms taken. It doesn’t just jump over the shark here, it jumps over the entire aquarium. I’m not going to spoil anything, but I will say that the practical effects are amazing. If you’re a fan of gore, goo and all that good stuff, you’re in for a treat.

All jacked up and full of worms is a good example of why rating ratings are not a sufficient way to explain a film’s quality. Is it a three out of ten? A seven out of ten? Is it good? Poor? Man, it’s just a ride that largely succeeds in what it sets out to do. Depending on your tastes and what you can do, it’s a ride you’ll either be happy with or resent yourself for not getting off when you had the chance.

While I’m not entirely sure what the real point of the film is, I can tell you that it is unabashedly original. It never loses sight of its identity, always stays true to itself, and that is worthy of congratulations.

Remember kids, if someone asks you to put worms on them, always say no.

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