#horror – #horrormovies – #horrorreviews – #MadHeidi –
Directors: Johannes Hartmann, Sandro Klopfstein
Writers: Sandro Klopfstein, Johannes Hartmann, Gregory D. Widmer
Stars: Alice Lucy, Max Rüdlinger, Casper Van Dien
If ever the word “ridiculous” could be used as a descriptor in a positive light, it would have to be when referencing the movie Mad Heidi. It is certainly a wild ride. It felt like Quentin Tarantino and the Zucker brothers got together, smoked a joint or ten and began spitballing ideas.
The general plot of the movie isn’t tough to follow. Heidi lives in a fascist version of Switzerland where cheese production is the main industry and lactose intolerance is essentially a death sentence. Ruling the working cheese class is President Meili (Casper Van Dien), who uses methods such as cheese boarding (yes, this is exactly what you think it is) to keep his citizens in line. Heidi’s boyfriend is caught selling illegal cheese and subsequently executed along with her grandfather while she is captured and thrown in a secret prison. While in prison she is subjected to various punishments and humiliation before eventually escaping. From there she learns martial arts from a mysterious glowing green lady and her two nuns before finally taking her revenge on Meili and his henchmen.
That is the most basic, generalized summation of Mad Heidi I can give. If I were to attempt to describe the full absurdity of the movie, I would be writing all day. For an independent movie, it gives off the appearance of a major studio flick, while maintaining the feel of a grindhouse exploitation feature. You can almost feel a thin film of 1970s grime while watching. This is coupled with a clever modern satirical feel and it’s done really well. Rounded out with high action cinematography and gruesome special effects and this is a fun little romp.
While I wouldn’t really dub this a horror movie based on the context, the gore factor is still existent and highly prevalent. As a matter of fact, there appears to be a good combination of various genres represented. While the backbone is rooted mainly in heavily exploiting Swiss and Eastern European culture, there are elements of standard exploitation movies of the 1970s, spaghetti westerns, female prison, kung fu, conspiracy and the supernatural (think zombies created from chemically altered cheese – seriously). This may sound like a lot, but it’s such a nicely woven patchwork that is peppered consistently with head-shaking tongue-in-cheek humor.
If I had to provide one negative aspect of the movie, I’d say that there are moments where the “serious” overtones seem almost too serious, and I get it. The whole point of satire, in my humble opinion, is to mock something that already takes itself too seriously. For me, there were moments where I was waiting for the next chance to groan and roll my eyes and the wait seemed to take a bit too long.
Aside from those fleeting instances, I had fun watching Mad Heidi. Growing up watching movies like Airpplane! and The Naked Gun (when not watching horror movies of course!), this was right up my alley and I look forward to seeing more from these writers and directors.
Rating: 7.5/10