BS: Weirdest Movie

Subject: BS: Weirdest Movie
From: Peter T.
Date: 29 Sep 03 - 08:23 AM

Every once in awhile one runs across a movie that just makes you shake your head and go -- what possessed them? I am not talking about "Plan 9 From Outer Space" or "Glen or Glenda", but something that ought to have worked in some way, but is just, well, weird. Someone lent me a copy of a 1960's film starring a too old Jimmy Stewart (bad wig, stunt doubles earning a lot of money) called "The Rare Breed" about two British ladies bringing Herefords to Texas to breed them with Longhorns. The whole basis of the film is, well, cattle sex. If they made it now, there would be graphic mounting scenes, sperm discussions, who knows. This film avoids all this, and yet it is all about whether the Hereford bull will impregnate Texas longhorns. In the human plot, the women fall for the Texan men, one of whom stands for longhorns (Brian Keith looking ridiculous as an expatriate Scot), and the other who gets committed to Herefords. The woman (Maureen O'Hara) will marry (be mounted by, accept sperm from) one of them, depending on whether the Hereford bull does the deed in the teeth of a Texa blizzard. It is hard to portray how truly weird this film is.
Someone sold the studio (20th CENTURY FOX!! PANAVISION!!) on this weird story, and in the hands of somebody with a sense of humour it might have become brilliant, instead it is just weird (and bad, bad, bad).
Any other examples come to mind?
yours,
Peter T.

Subject: RE: BS: Weirdest Movie
From: mack/misophist
Date: 29 Sep 03 - 09:02 AM

1959, Susan Heyward and Jeff Chandler, Thunder In The Sun. A wagon train of Basques emigrate to California, taking their wine grape cuttings with them. It features an odd yodeling call they used to use to carry messages in the mountains, fighting off attackers with jai alai balls bounced off rock faces, and bouncing around like mountain goats in special Basque rock climbing shoes. I was 13 when it came out. I loved it.

Subject: RE: BS: Weirdest Movie
From: Joybell
Date: 29 Sep 03 - 09:10 AM

"Night of the Lepus" It's about giant rabbits that are about to take over the world. It was made as deadly serious. --yes really was. The best bit is a scene at a drive-in movie where the hero makes an announcment over the sound system along the lines of "there's a herd of giant rabbits coming this way! Everybody turn on your head-lights, we have a plan!" All the lights are turned on, no questions asked!

Subject: RE: BS: Weirdest Movie
From: Peter T.
Date: 29 Sep 03 - 09:23 AM

Thunder in the Sun and Night of the Lepus -- I am scribbling these down! They sound terrificly weird -- a wagon train of Basques! (Should it not be Basquing in the Sun?)

yours,

Peter T.

Subject: RE: BS: Weirdest Movie
From: Amos
Date: 29 Sep 03 - 10:36 AM

Peter:

I think you are basquing in unreflective glory!!

LOL!!


A

Subject: RE: BS: Weirdest Movie
From: McGrath of Harlow
Date: 29 Sep 03 - 10:46 AM

Doese weird imply only films that don't work? I wouldn't have thought so.

They don't come much weirder than "Withnail and I", and that worked brilliantly.

Subject: RE: BS: Weirdest Movie
From: Peg
Date: 29 Sep 03 - 10:51 AM

I love Withnail and I!!!! One of my favorites.

My own list of weird would have to include Attack of the Killer Tomatoes, Children Shouldn't Play with Dead Things, a weird l ittle French film c alled The Beast, and Ken Russell's Salome's Last Dance. Oh, and something about the 1920s porn industry starring Richard Dreyfuss called Inserts.

Subject: RE: BS: Weirdest Movie
From: TIA
Date: 29 Sep 03 - 10:58 AM

In the mid-80's, we wathced an Aussie gem called "Don's Party" on the Arts channel on cable. Sooooo bad it was rivetingly fascinating.

Subject: RE: BS: Weirdest Movie
From: Clinton Hammond
Date: 29 Sep 03 - 06:13 PM

Meet The Feebles...

The beginning of Peter Jacksons long list of crappy movies that just make you wonder why...

Fortunatly his version of Lord Of The Rings is an anomoly...

Subject: RE: BS: Weirdest Movie
From: Mr Red
Date: 29 Sep 03 - 06:27 PM

I saw "Happiness" a few years back and I think the verbal pun was intended. Quirky but very funny.

I saw Tadpole this Saturday. Sigourney Weaver played it pretty cool but just right and a couple of actors unkown to me who acted the socks of everyone else, but you know, it was one of those offbeat films that appeals to the cerebellum - well mine certainly. Needless to say this was in the Gloucester Guildhall - local government sponsored screening with about 20 people in the audience or did I count a few twice?

Subject: RE: BS: Weirdest Movie
From: Amos
Date: 29 Sep 03 - 06:41 PM

I think Jack Nicholson's current effort, Anger Management actually qualifies, Peter!

Regards,

A

Subject: RE: BS: Weirdest Movie
From: Joybell
Date: 29 Sep 03 - 07:10 PM

Yes we were very proud of "Don's Party" at the time I remember. Very fast and naughty it was. As for Aussie films "The Cars that Ate Paris" is my all time favourite. And that's really weird. And it works. A whole town lures cars from the road - Cornish-smuggler style, makes them crash over the hillside, and recycles all the bits, including the humans. John Mellion is great in the lead role as mayor of the place.

Subject: RE: BS: Weirdest Movie
From: Jim Dixon
Date: 29 Sep 03 - 07:15 PM

They come a lot weirder than "Withnail and I." (Coincidentally, I just saw that movie Friday night.) Here are some very weird ones:

Any of Federico Fellini's later movies, like Satyricon (1969).

Caligula (inexplicably listed at IMDb as Caligola), 1979, arguably the worst movie ever made. Certainly the worst movie ever made by such well-known, good actors (Malcolm McDowell, Helen Mirren, Peter O'Toole, John Gielgud).

Eating Raoul (1982). I can endorse this one. It's funny. Intentionally.

Anything by John Waters, especially his early movies like Pink Flamingos (1972) and Female Trouble (1974).

O Lucky Man! (1973) – another Malcolm McDowell movie.

Gummo (1997). Frankly, I loved this movie, but I'm reluctant to recommend it because I know a lot of people will hate it. My wife, for example, left after about 10 minutes, because of the graphic (simulated) cruelty to cats.

Subject: RE: BS: Weirdest Movie
From: Snuffy
Date: 29 Sep 03 - 07:17 PM

Don's Party was great. They used to show it quite a bit a few years ago.

Subject: RE: BS: Weirdest Movie
From: GUEST,Mickey191
Date: 29 Sep 03 - 07:42 PM

"Ed & His Dead Mother" with Steve Buscemi,Ned Beatty & John Waters. Steve gets John to bring back Mum from the dead, only trouble is she now eats bugs, etc. Funny as hell-but weird.

Twin Falls, Idaho with the the Polish Bros.written by the Polish Bros, and directed by a Polish Brother.They are Siamese twins Looking for one girl. Object--Romance. Awful!

Subject: RE: BS: Weirdest Movie
From: Joybell
Date: 29 Sep 03 - 10:17 PM

"The Wild Heart" (shown in England as - "Gone to Earth") campy and delirious rather than weird. Jennifer Jones plays a Shropshire lass, a Gypsy type , with a pet fox called (imaginatively)Foxy. She says things like
"It be black and 'airy and I be afeared on it"
She starts out in a hovel with her drunken harpist father, and an assortment of other wild beasts. She falls in love with a hunting, wenching, drinking, lusty squire - (David Farrar)leaving her good and boring vicar husband - "Edderd". There can be no good come of it but you'll have to watch it through to the bad end.
I'll be doing Shropshire very badly all day now.

Subject: RE: BS: Weirdest Movie
From: Peter T.
Date: 29 Sep 03 - 11:03 PM

These are truly weird. My videostore is about to be challenged.
"Tremors" is truly weird. (Thanks JenEllen).

yours, Peter T.

Subject: RE: BS: Weirdest Movie
From: Coyote Breath
Date: 30 Sep 03 - 02:12 AM

I thought "Last Summer at the Hotel Ozone" was pretty strange.

"Cecil B. Demented" was MEANT to be weird.

A terribly acted and badly dubbed Italian Movie called "Blue Eyes the Bandit" was almost incomprehensible, but maybe not weird.

I always felt "The Saragossa Manuscript" was very strange (but seductively entertaining too).

But I think the weirdest movie I've ever seen is "The Wizard of Oz". I didn't used to think so. I watched again, just the other day. I found it...disturbing...and I kept thinking that it was more like an acid trip than a movie. L. Frank Baum was a very strange man.

CB

Subject: RE: BS: Weirdest Movie
From: Amergin
Date: 30 Sep 03 - 02:17 AM

yeah well...about the only things common with that movie and the book Coyote is that dorothy goes to kansas meets three characters on the way to oz...and kills the wicked witch....

book is much much better...


picnic at hanging rock is a bit of an odd movie...also the Evil Dead series....(especially the third one)....and of course the howling...

Subject: RE: BS: Weirdest Movie
From: GUEST,Jeaniekoala
Date: 30 Sep 03 - 03:20 AM

The Movie, Wizard Of Oz is one of my favourite movies .. I love it and thought it was very well done.

Subject: RE: BS: Weirdest Movie
From: Rt Revd Sir jOhn from Hull
Date: 30 Sep 03 - 03:24 AM

Soylent Green.john

Subject: RE: BS: Weirdest Movie
From: Kaleea
Date: 30 Sep 03 - 03:30 AM

When I was just a mere babe, I was coming back from the Far east, & had one night layover in LA. I went to the nearest no-tell motel to get some sleep. When I awoke at a couple o'clocks in the a.m. & could not get back to sleep, I turned on the TV. The previous motel guest had left the TV set on a cable movie channel which showed X rated flicks. There was one which had just come on, & having never seen such things on TV, I thought I'd watch for a few minutes to see why that man who was in trying to kill a fly in his no-tell motel room, couldn't kill it no matter how he tried.    He eventually ran barefooted out of his no-tell motel room, in his tee shirt & boxers, chasing the fly into the streets of whatever-major-city, running & screaming profanity, passing naked people getting it on, in & out of buildings, unable to kill the little bugger no matter what he tried.      
    That was the entire plot of the movie.

    The actual dialog (excluding non-word exclamations) would not have filled an entire paragraph, however you will be relieved to know that there were sub-titles for those who did not understand the term "aaaaaaaaaaahhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhgggggghhhhhhhh!!!!!!!!!" in French or Italian or whatever. (hey, I can't remember--it was about 1977, so how can I remember some tiny detail from the begining of the disco days?)
   So, 'catters, I ask you, was that wierd--or a work o'fart? Or, perhaps, both?
   & if you don't understand "The Rare Breed" you gotta just realize it was a 60's thing. You had to be there. And, westerns were popular.

Subject: RE: BS: Weirdest Movie
From: GUEST,Kim C no cookie
Date: 30 Sep 03 - 09:35 AM

Blue Velvet, Motel Hell, Blair Witch, Brotherhood of the Wolf, Death and the Maiden, The Ring...

I watched Run Lola Run recently (German with English subtitles) and while it was weird, I liked it very well.

Subject: RE: BS: Weirdest Movie
From: Watson
Date: 30 Sep 03 - 12:15 PM

Eraserhead

Subject: RE: BS: Weirdest Movie
From: GUEST,pdc
Date: 30 Sep 03 - 12:24 PM

This isn't about a weird movie, it's about a LOTR parody (about 4 minutes) that you must see.

Go to http://mischiefbox.com/movies/
and click on LOTRtruestory.wmv. You need Windows Media Viewer.

It's extremely funny and well-done - they used the original actors for this little spoof. If you are offended by vulgarity, don't go there.

Have fun.

Subject: RE: BS: Weirdest Movie
From: smallpiper
Date: 30 Sep 03 - 12:25 PM

Donnie Darko

Subject: RE: BS: Weirdest Movie
From: Chief Chaos
Date: 30 Sep 03 - 01:06 PM

There has been a war flick on recently, Don't know the title but it's about a small troop of Americans trying to save this castle in France. The only actor I can remember off the top of my head is Peter Falk playing an American who gave up fighting (WWI) and became a baker in the town to the south. I think it's supposed to be serious but the whole thing seemed fairly odd, almost surreal. For the life of me I still don't understand why they were trying to hold it against the Germans who knew they were there. It just led to the whole squad dying and the castle getting blown up.

Alot of the others mentioned are supposed to be weird, this one? I just don't know.

Subject: RE: BS: Weirdest Movie
From: curmudgeon
Date: 30 Sep 03 - 01:16 PM

While some of these films are wierd, a lot of them are just plain bad, with a few being bad enough to be good.

Watson is right; if you haven't seen Eraserhead, you don't really know what weird is -- Tom

Subject: RE: BS: Weirdest Movie
From: mike the knife
Date: 30 Sep 03 - 01:32 PM

Night of the Lepus was just plain stupid. I remember wathcing it at a sleepover at a friend's house when I was a kid- on weekends my friends & I used to sit up & watch the late-nite horror movies & eat junk food until the wee hours. I remember feeling ripped off by those stupid rabbits- where was my REAL horror movie?
As for Eraserhead, well... wow, don't know what to say- I've seen (or tried to watch) it "chemically enhanced" (as a much younger adult) and without chemical interference (as recently as a couple of years ago) & never made it to the end. Too weird for me and that's saying something.

Subject: RE: BS: Weirdest Movie
From: Clinton Hammond
Date: 30 Sep 03 - 01:46 PM

PDC, is that file that stupid MTV Video Awards, Jack Black, "The Ring As Prince Albert" short?

Cause if it is then, "they used the original actors for this little spoof" is very misleading...

They used the movie footage and just recut it... and spliced in scenes with Jack and SJP...

I also hope yer not paying for that server space, cause yer download speed sucks...

:-)

Subject: RE: BS: Weirdest Movie
From: Jim Dixon
Date: 30 Sep 03 - 06:27 PM

Ah, yes, I forgot about Eraserhead.

Anything directed by Terry Gilliam is pretty weird, for instance, Jabberwocky, Time Bandits, and The Adventures of Baron Munchausen. And that's leaving out all the Monty Python stuff. (Actually, his non-Python stuff is weirder, but less funny than his Python stuff.) The one I enjoyed most was Brazil, a rather free adaptation of Orwell's 1984.

A sci-fi film that I liked a lot was The Fifth Element. I don't know if that should count, because sci-fi films are supposed to be weird, but The Fifth Element was weird and funny.

Subject: RE: BS: Weirdest Movie
From: Little Hawk
Date: 30 Sep 03 - 06:45 PM

Yow! I remember watching "The Rare Breed" many, many years ago. It was dreadful, and it seemed to go on forever. I must say that a lot of Jimmy Stewart's movies have that effect on me, but most of them are way better than that one.

The one with the G.I.'s holding the castle was called "Castle Keep", wasn't it? Basically, it was just an excuse to blow up a castle with WWII hardware and kill a bunch of people.

"Night of the Lepus" sounds like a classic. I regret that I have not seen it.

"Frogs" was a truly dreadful and absolutely implausible movie about reptiles and amphibians going berserk and wiping out humanity somewhere in the Everglades. Witness people dying under the assault of hundreds and hundreds of hopping, normal-sized bullfrogs. Ha! Ha! What exactly causes the people to die remains a mystery. Even the frogs look utterly bored with the whole idea. They must've payed them a lotta flies!

"Fear and Loathing in Las Vegas" was weird enough to register 10 on my weirdness meter...but it was supposed to be weird.

I still think Peter's original entry is the king.

- LH

Subject: RE: BS: Weirdest Movie
From: Joybell
Date: 30 Sep 03 - 06:52 PM

Ah Mike, So it was you there at that sleep-over so many years ago when my daughter wanted a horror movie and I palmed her off with "Night of the Lepus" You were such little kids. I thought it would work. My daughter was afraid of cuddly bunnies for weeks after. Sorry! Grandma Joy

Subject: RE: BS: Weirdest Movie
From: GUEST,pdq
Date: 30 Sep 03 - 07:04 PM

Speaking of Jimmy Stewart movies back a post or two, he did one called "Cheyenne Social Club" where he inherits a social club that turns out to be a brothal. He and Henry Fonda essentially talk and talk while riding horses accross the West.

Subject: RE: BS: Weirdest Movie
From: mack/misophist
Date: 30 Sep 03 - 07:17 PM

Perhaps this collection of weirdophiles can tell me something. One morning at work the radio was on and some people were discussing exceptionally odd scenes in movies. Some one said that the most effective one they knew of was a scene in a horror movie where a man in a restaurant is served a pizza which grows a mouth and begins talking to him. I called the station but no one could remember what movie it was in. The image fascinates me, a little bit like Alice being attacked by the food at the tea party. What was the name of that movie?

Subject: RE: BS: Weirdest Movie
From: Amos
Date: 30 Sep 03 - 07:21 PM

"Dinner with Anchovy"?


A

Subject: RE: BS: Weirdest Movie
From: Steve Latimer
Date: 30 Sep 03 - 09:29 PM

Kim C mentioned Blue Velvet, one of the strangest movies I have ever seen.

How about Magnolia?

I recently heard that if Tom Cruise has short hair it's a "movie", if he has long hair it's a "Film".

Subject: RE: BS: Weirdest Movie
From: Metchosin
Date: 01 Oct 03 - 12:31 AM

Masterpiece weird films:

The Man Who Wasn't There
Brazil
and Fassbinder's Kamikaze 89

Subject: RE: BS: Weirdest Movie
From: LadyJean
Date: 01 Oct 03 - 12:42 AM

On the Arthurian note, I once saw a French film, "Lancelot". The main characters, Lancelot, Arthur, and Guenevere are all medieval. While the peasants wear modern clothes. It does seem odd.
I don't remember the name of the film where Candace Bergen falls down a hole at Stonehenge and meets Merlin and Nimue. It tells the story of Gawain and the Loathely Lady, which is one of my favorites. But it doesn't tell it very well. Candace Bergen is out of place in the Arthurian world.

Subject: RE: BS: Weirdest Movie
From: Jim Dixon
Date: 01 Oct 03 - 12:47 AM

How about Naked Lunch -- David Cronenberg's adaptation of William S. Burroughs' novel. For weirdness, there's nothing like making a junkie's hallucinations come to life!

Subject: RE: BS: Weirdest Movie
From: Thomas the Rhymer
Date: 01 Oct 03 - 02:01 AM

How to get a head in advertizing, Eraserhead, Brazil, Open your eyes, Il Mostro, Intacto, The King is alive...

ttr

Subject: RE: BS: Weirdest Movie
From: Peter T.
Date: 01 Oct 03 - 08:16 AM

Almodovar's "Talk To Her" is a weird movie, but one of the greatest. So there is no accounting....But "The Rare Breed" is a rare breed.

yours, Peter T.

Subject: RE: BS: Weirdest Movie
From: Jeri
Date: 01 Oct 03 - 08:18 AM

Peter wrote: "Every once in awhile one runs across a movie that just makes you shake your head and go -- what possessed them? I am not talking about "Plan 9 From Outer Space" or "Glen or Glenda", but something that ought to have worked in some way, but is just, well, weird."

Most of 'em so far have been of the "Plan 9," or "Glen or Glenda" variety. A subject that was weird to begin with, and may never have worked in the sense that, if done differently, people would have said "Wow, what a great movie." There was never any hope for films like "Eraserhead" or "Naked Lunch."

David Lynch's "Dune," however, had potential. Well, maybe not Lynch's "Dune." Once it became known he was going to direct, it was a given that the "what the f...?!?" factor was going to be high.

Subject: RE: BS: Weirdest Movie
From: mike the knife
Date: 01 Oct 03 - 10:18 AM

Hi Joybell- I don't remember there being any actual girls there... at that age, I doubt it would have made any difference :) I have to confess that TJ & I snagged a beer apiece from the fridge & stayed up until the wee hours trying to come up with a good plan to ditch the cans.
On another note- I remember a deeply weird film from East Germany & I can't remember the name (arrgghhh!). It was to be a 1960's Socialist answer to West Side Story or something like that- a bunch of East German "youth" are all hitchhiking to a collective farm/vacation hotspot where the boys-vs-girls thing plays out amidst much singing, dancing and tractors. There is a wonderful scene where the action is playing out and there is a conveyor belt just sort-of dumping what looks to be random agricultural stuff off into nowhere. I'll find the title & post it- I doubt if it's widely released, & if so, I don't know if it's been subtitled. If you speak German, this one is a gem.

Subject: RE: BS: Weirdest Movie
From: mike the knife
Date: 01 Oct 03 - 11:06 AM

HA! Found it!

Heisser Sommer (Hot Summer)

1968, color, 97 min. Feature, Musical
Dir.: Joachim Hasler
Script: Maurycy Janowski, Joachim Hasler
Camera: Joachim Hasler, Roland Dressel
Music: Gerd Natschinski, Thomas Natschinski
Cast: Frank Schöbel, Chris Doerk, Hanns-Michael Schmidt, Georg-Peter Welzel
VHS-NTSC, English subtitles - available for sale: [e-mail]
DVD, English subtitles - available for sale: [e-mail]

Synopsis:

While hitchhiking to the Baltic, a group of twelve girls from Leipzig meets a group of eleven boys from Karl-Marx-Stadt. The two groups bet on who will get to the Baltic first. Naturally, the girls have an advantage over the boys when it comes to hitchhiking, so the boys have to make up for this blow to their egos. When the two groups meet up on a Baltic beach, various encounters and provocations come up, the latter, however, remain harmless. But there is not much group cohesion: couples form and withdraw from the group. Everyone is intrigued by the love triangle between Brit, Wolf and Kai. Actually, Brit prefers Kai but she is flattered by Wolf's interest in her - after all, he is a whiz at mathematics and has the reputation of being a Casanova. Provoked by her girlfriends, Brit spends half the night with Wolf in the barn... The next morning, all the girls are against Brit and Wolf is looked at askance. But nobody knows what exactly went on in the barn. Brit, however, says nothing and Wolf's behavior is so overbearing that Kai fears that something dreadful might happen. A physical fight ensues between Kai and Wolf and Brit almost loses both admirers. Yet, there is a happy ending for Brit and Kai. An original DEFA musical, since its 1993 comeback in Germany, Hot Summer has risen to the ranks of quirky and "alternative" cult films. East Germany's own unique version of Grease.

Subject: RE: BS: Weirdest Movie
From: Peg
Date: 01 Oct 03 - 11:42 AM

Thomas the Rhymer, good list! I love The King is Alive...and   most of the Dogme films I have seen.

Gilliam is a master; wonder what he's doing next?

Is that French Lancelot movie Lancelot du Lac by Bresson, by any chance? Funnily enough, John Waters loves that movie. I iunterviewed him once and somehow it came up and he said "Oh, it's wonderful! All those shoes!"


Gummo is on my top ten list...I do recommend seeing it on the big screen if you get a chance. I saw it that way half a dozen times, when the Harvard Film Archive decided to give it a "run" because no distributor in the USA would touch it...

Eraserhead, another good one...of course just about everything Lynch has done is extremely weird on some level.

Cannibal Holocaust is weird and upsetting, and has been credited with inspiring The Blair Witch Project (one of the greatest pieces of independent American cinema of the last decade and surely one of the best horror films ever made).

A good arty vampire flick that was supposed to be a blaxploitation flick: Ganga and Hess newly released on DVD after being unavailable in its intended form for many years...

Subject: RE: BS: Weirdest Movie
From: GUEST
Date: 01 Oct 03 - 11:44 AM

shadow of the vampire...

Subject: RE: BS: Weirdest Movie
From: Peter T.
Date: 01 Oct 03 - 11:54 AM

Speaking of spontaneous dancing, what was the name of that truly weird film that Bjork was in, from Lars von whatever?

yours,

Peter T.

Subject: RE: BS: Weirdest Movie
From: mike the knife
Date: 01 Oct 03 - 01:20 PM

Yeah, the lumberjacks dancing on the flatcar was a bit odd as was the whole scene w/ the gun. While we're on the topic of spontaneous dancing- pretty much all of the Bollywood stuff is chockablock w/ singing/dancing breaking out all over at the slightest provocation.

Subject: RE: BS: Weirdest Movie
From: Willie-O
Date: 01 Oct 03 - 02:39 PM

I saw this weird movie last night called "The Weight of Water". It's not terrible but rather double-takish. It flashes back between a double murder of two women off the NH coast in 1875 (apparently a real event) and a current-day story about a photojournalist travelling to the island with her hub and another couple to research the murder story. In both storylines, there is a bunch of sordid behaviour which is kind of confusing.

What puts this one right into the ranks of true weirdness though, is that the 1875 storyline reveals the true killer to be...Sarah Polley. Seeing her dressed pretty much like her Sarah Stanley/Road to Avonlea persona, quietly drinking a mug of tea, with her face spattered with the blood of her sister and sister-in-law whom she has just taken an axe to (politely telling her sister-in-law "I'm so sorry" right before splitting her skull open) is, um, unsettling.

As for her incestuous obsession with her brother, well that's more in keeping with the kind of roles she gets these days.

(For those unfamiliar, Road to Avonlea was a hugely popular Cdn TV series in the late 80s about a little girl growing up in wholesome rural Prince Edward Island...think Anne of Green Gables country. And even before Avonlea, she was the very young girl in "Baron Munchausen")

W-O