Street Trash (1987)

T. Scott, or “Spike” as he was called, stabs at a guava spear and scowls at a rather suggestive piece of text. He and Frank are eating at a small PR place on the 1900 block of Lexington. Spike chews and shakes his head suspiciously, but Frank is unsure whether he disapproves of his new play or the mofongo. “No. No. No!” Spike mutters. (Frank looks up from the paper placemat where he has been taking notes about Spike on a cartoonish map of Puerto Rico somewhere, as far as he could tell, between Fajardo and the island of Vieques.) “I don’t talk like this, bitch!" Frank takes this down word-for-word, underlining “bitch!" It was all very unnecessary. The actors at Carlitos Café y Galeriá, a good four or five blocks away, already had the script and were set to give a semi-impromptu performance of it. It was not an earth-shattering ordeal, but a great chance to try workshop a piece before a small audience. Frank, now impatiently sipping sangria, had been to this sort of affair before and his greatest dread were the twenty-something girls, potential groupies seeking to cling to a dreamy rising star. They would, of course, twist their mouth disapprovingly at Frank’s world-worn face and accusingly clarify: “You're the author?” (Frank notes this too, underlining the first word for em-pha-sis) Frank’s mistake, however, was mentioning the affair to Andrea, who in turn mentioned it to Spike who got on a small prop plane at Quetzalcoatl International Airport, both outraged and curious that he appeared as a character in one of Frank’s scripts. Jumping on a plane in Nuevo Laredo wasn’t a heroic effort by any standard. Spike’s schedule was his own—having left a lucrative job as a lineman on a gulf coast rig to be the personal assistant to a meth cook. Spike considered this to be a lateral career move. Now, as Spike insists on script changes— (He had a particular seething hatred of fully justified Courier New text) — Frank just wishes he was back in the hotel room he had secured in the Indian section of Jersey City. Jim Muro had been a sought after stedicam operator for years, and was now a cinematographer in his own right, having DPed recent films like Open Range (Costner 2003) and Crash (Haggis 2004). However, these films, Frank guessed were the usual Hollywood tripe. Still, before taking the subway up to Harlem, Frank had noticed his hotel had a variety of DVDs available for rent in your room—and at a place available by the hour, to be sure, most were pornos. But Frank had also spied Muro’s directorial debut, Street Trash (1987), now available (30 August 2005) from Synapse Films. Hanging out in Spanish Harlem had given him the itch to watch it for the first time in 15 years. Not that the film is good. It’s particularly reprehensible and kind of icky for no particular reason. The plot revolves around a NYC liquor storeowner who finds an old case of booze called “Tenafly Viper” (after the lovely Jersey burg) while cleaning his cellar. He opts to sell the hammer juice for a dollar a bottle, making it a tempting treat for the local homeless crowd. Viper ingested causes the ingestee to melt in a series of non-realistic primary colors three seconds after drinking.

And that’s your basic plot—except for a crazed Vietnam vet named Bronson, who’s mobilized a gang of hobos in a large auto wrecking yard. He terrorizes the locals with a knife made from a VC femur strapped to his leg. A couple other subplots ensue to add additional gore and nudity, but Bronson’s terrorizing of the neighborhood seems to be the main plot mover. In fact, you’ll soon be asking yourself: “Wasn’t this movie supposed to be about bums melting?” It is. In a remote sort of way… Muro’s cinematographic expertise, however, is evident from the opening credit, containing ambitious stedicam shots, his specialty. From the get-go Muro tries desperately to get us root for his fun loving bums, Fred, a lovable scamp, and his brother Kevin (think Ralph Macchio meets John Tuturro) —and wait a second! Rewind! The car that crashes to avoid hitting Fred has no driver! Until the next shot, that is… But hey! When Bronson’s minions kill a dork wandering into the neighborhood, again revel in Muro’s talented camerawork, filmed in nerd-o-vision, through the victim’s POV. But please turn the flick off when Bronson cuts off one of his gang's penises for a game of gory keep-away. The film is not getting any better… The real redeeming thing about the new release is the “Tenafly Viper” stickers included with the DVD. This would be more “classic” if the movie had more of a cult following. Which it doesn’t. Frank glances at the clock on the wall above a Corona ad. It’s near seven o’clock. Perhaps he should forget both Street Trash and Spike. Ditch’em both. The problem was that both T. Scott and Andrea were appearing as characters in his next reading in Carlitos, so he’d better keep his mouth shut or he’d undoubtedly have twice the fun next time.