PopSyndicate.com

Once in a while, a movie comes along that is so bad it’s good; this is not that movie.

Attitude for Destruction (the title an homage to the Guns n’Roses album Appetite for Destruction) tells the story of a small band who attracts the attention of a record company due to the lead singer’s black-magic-wielding girlfriend calling the label. After the lamest backstage party ever, the label reps decide they like the band but not the lead singer Drake (played by Colby Veil, lead singer of G’n’R tribute band Hollywood Roses). Drake doesn’t take it well, so his band mates kill him.

Fast-forward to one year later, and the band is making money and getting famous.  The guitarist Marc (Simon Burzynski who is mostly known for his polish voiceovers in SOCOM and Call of Duty video games) has taken over singing duties. He’s also dating Drake’s ex-black-magic-wielding girlfriend. So with everything going well, it’s time for Drake’s zombie corpse to come back from the dead and start killing the reps and his old band mates.  All this culminates in a spectacularly boring ending that I’m not going to spoil for you. Go ahead and beg. It will do you no good.

The production values on this dreck were comparable to the Dallas Dustbuster Massacre movies my friends and I shot with a crappy camcorder back in junior high. The stock footage at the concert was so out of place it was jarring. The wigs the musicians wear are awful (especially the guy dressed as Slash, top hat and all), as is the makeup. Lots of the scenes have no dialogue (mercifully) and are shot like terrible music videos for the Hollywood Roses (who provide the soundtrack). The props look like they came out of Wal-Mart’s Halloween aisle.

The script (?) is childish and contains two boring oral sex scenes (did I just write that?). They made sure the drummer carried a pair of drumsticks in every scene so we’d know he was the drummer. There are two flashbacks to the body dump of the lead singer that use the exact same footage. All the line reads and acting have no subtext whatsoever. The women in the background look (and act) as well as strippers on their day off. In the middle of a party scene, the editors decided to use every wipe and transitional effect their little editing booth could provide.  And all this for a purported budget of $500,000. Maybe most of it went to the wrap party “entertainment” and “hors d’oeuvres” (read as “hookers” and “blow”).

Doing research for this, I discovered two shocking things. First, Colby Veil is 31 (even though I was sure when I was watching this that he was in his 40s, somewhere near 50). Must be all that “clean living”. 

Secondly, I knew someone in the cast was going to have crossed over into a porn movie at one point in their career, I just had no idea it would be the Blood Covered Midget from the opening scene – and yes I know the proper term is “little person”, but Blood Covered Midget is his characters name. The actor’s name is Mighty Mike Murga and you can see said porno by going out and renting Janine Loves Jenna. According to his resume, he can not only act, but also juggle, ride a unicycle, eat fire, and impersonate Elvis. I so want to party with this guy!  I’m going out tomorrow and starting a Mighty Mike Murga Fan Club in my town. I encourage you to do the same. 

But back to the DVD.  The only bonus feature is - no bonus features.  During the credits, you will be treated to some extra scenes that make no sense.  No sense at all.  I guess the filmmakers had footage from an unused scene and couldn’t bear to part with it on the cutting room floor.  Shame on you filmmakers, if not for everything else then for this illogical addition that ruined my joy that the movie was finally over.

The most impressive thing about Attitude for Destruction is the DVD cover art.  Very reminiscent of 80’s/90’s heavy metal album art, a skeletal zombie (a blatant rip-off of Eddie from Iron Maiden albums) wields a gun and a knife next to a banner of roses.  This also is supposed to pay homage to G’n’R because of the gun and the roses (duh!).  All that being said, it does look kind of cool.

So if you like bad horror or kind of cool DVD art, Attitude for Destruction is for you.  If you also don’t have any taste or self-respect, that is.

1