Disconnected

MOVIE #1,547 • 🍿🍿🍿🍿🍿🍿🍿🍿 • 04.16.24 Sometimes, a movie that is, by almost every calculation, ‘bad’ hits you in the right way at the right time. In other words, I am pleased to say that I CONNECTED with DISCONNECTED! This wonderfully grainy shot-on-16mm for under 50K horror, the debut from Gorman Bechard (and you know that name is going on the list), barely makes a lick of sense and unintentionally breaks most of the genre rules as it goes along. But there’s just something about it, I tell ya! From it’s banger soundtrack (XTC! Haysi Fantayzee! Jon Brion’s teenage band, The Excerpts who are featured prominently!) to all the little set design details (multiple Groucho Marx figurines appear) there’s simply a vibe which transcends the fact that I didn’t know what the hell was going on half the time (the serial killer — who is revealed too fast and murdered by the cops too — early isn’t responsible for those phone calls? Wait, what?).

It’s a complicated concoction of clear SBIG energy (notably in the poor but very funny performances — s/o to Mark Walker as the filler Franklin, especially how he ends almost every conversation with the peculiar "see ya, bye") and what’s without a doubt the artistic vision of an auteur. AKA ‘the sweet spot’ honestly. All I can say is: Gorman Bechard Director Focus, incoming.

---

CHRONOLOGICALLY
⫷ MOVIE #1,546 - (YOU ARE HERE) - MOVIE #1,548 ⫸

---

Disconnected is a 1984 American psychological slasher film produced and directed by Gorman Bechard, written by Bechard and Virginia Gilroy, and starring Frances Raines, Mark Walker, and Carl Koch. Its plot follows Alicia, a young video rental store clerk in a small Connecticut town who is tormented by bizarre, unearthly phone calls. Meanwhile, a string of violent serial killings are occurring amongst locals. It was released on May 11,1984.