Purely Joyful Movie!

Absolutely amazing

if their story seems completely bonkers, almost like a feverish work of fiction, you ain't heard nothing yet.

Close shines in drama with strong language, adult themes.

Wow. This movie gives all new meaning to the word 'bad'. This is an absolutely stupid and nearly worthless film, yet I also know that when it debuted the 'with it' people loved it for its brilliance--the same types who fawned over everything Andy Worhol produced at the time as well. This group of devoted fans make up .01% of the population (give or take .01%) and the rest of us (the normals) look at this film with disbelief--disbelief that a film manages to be much worse than Ed Wood's famed PLAN 9 FROM OUTER SPACE. Just watch the insane birth scene at the end of the film or the Grecian sets and you'll know what I mean.Now this does not mean that the film is 100% bad. The basic story idea of robots becoming more human over time isn't bad (though you really see none of this on film--just in the narration) and some of the color home movie shots are a bit sexy, but otherwise what's the point?! This is like a home movie of total strangers and weirdos that you are forced to watch! The film has no dialog (other than cartoon bubbles that are scrawled sloppily onto the film) and the acting is, to put it charitably, amateurish.So why did I see this film? Well, recently John Waters talked about various films that influenced him--including SINS OF THE FLESHAPOIDS. Well, I can see how this film encouraged Waters to show his rough home movies about Baltimore and the cheapness of his early films (like MONDO TRASHO and THE DIANE LINKLETTER STORY) clearly was inspired by this Kuchar Brothers film. However, unlike the early rough Waters films, FLESHAPOIDS isn't the least bit funny or entertaining. Waters' early movies, though crudely made and cheap and garish, were oddly fun. SINS OF THE FLESHAPOIDS is fun--in pretty much the same way a root canal is fun! Overall, a complete waste of time. Instead, ask grandpa to show you his old super 8mm films from the 1960s--they can't be any worse than this.

The theme that recurs throughout "Fleshapoids" is Howard Hanson's Second Symphony ("Romantic"). And yes, it's the same music used in "Alien." This film is a brilliant amalgamation of cinema rhetoric, fairy tale, pop art and cartoon. The typical Hollywood "love" scene, for example, is distorted way beyond familiarity. I can't think of any film that has such wonderful art direction on such a modest budget (Kuchar used his own crayon drawings, plastic fruit from Woolworth's, murals made with interior paint, etc.). As with many films from the Kuchar brothers, it's the original blend of music, voice-over and image that stuns you, leaving you either in tears of laughter.

Basically there are only two movies you have to watch. One is Orson Welles' "Citizen Kane." The other is, of course, "Sins of the Fleshopoids." While Welles took around 2 1/2 hours and about a hundred scenes to define his genius, Kuchar did it in about 12 seconds in less than one. The shot in which mankind's ultimate utopia is described by an Adonis like man with wearing a futuristic Roman style abbreviated tunic (to show off his muscle-man physique) and 50's flat-top (think brown-haired counterpart to Kirk Douglas as Spartacus) lays on a divan surrounded by faux Greek columns contemplating the simple , understated beauty of a Clark Bar. "Sins of the Fleshopoids" in my mind, was better than "Citizen Kane," but hands down, everybody must agree that given the choice between watching it, and "Gone with the Wind," (an unwatchable movie - no joke here) you've got to go with the Clark Bar.The truth of the matter is that Kuchar knew exactly what he was making here, and did a pretty great job of winding some satire throughout his homage to the idiom.

If anyone knows what the melodramatic piece of music is that keeps being repeated throughout the movie, please let me know.It sounds like the closing theme to Alien, but this film is 15 years older than that.By the way, ignore the negative comments that others have recorded about this film. This is a campy underground movie, not some mass-market film. Judge it on what it is, not what you think it should be! I wouldn't criticize Scorpio Rising because it's not Easy Rider!And who keeps going on about Plan 9 From Outer Space in this day and age anyway?