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Mark Desrosiers's Reviews > The Ghastly One: The Sex-gore Netherworld of Filmmaker Andy Milligan
The Ghastly One: The Sex-gore Netherworld of Filmmaker Andy Milligan
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Weirdest of many weird facts in this bio: Milligan's obsession with the Golden Girls. Hang my brain upside-down and it makes sense -- a hit sitcom with a secret queer aesthetic and misanthropic angle, what else could comfort this guy as his hospice Boswell wiped his incontinent ass?
Except Milligan -- whose sexual attentions usually focused on ugly, mentally-challenged, messed up dudes -- hated "queers". And if he had a sense of humor, there's no evidence in this bio or in his dire body of work. The man's films -- I've seen two -- are a fascinating but unendurable hybrid of Coleman Francis and Herschell Gordon Lewis. Claustrophobic, cruel, exhausting -- how did this handsome boy from St. Paul, MN end up here?
The bio -- which ranks with Tosches' Dino as one of the best I've read -- not only enlarges the guy, but gives us a deep look at two NYC scenes. First, the Cafe Cino off-off Broadway scene where Milligan, remarkably, began as an auteur. The same community that also launched Bernadette Peters and Abe Vigoda (in one of Milligan's Bernard Shaw productions). And then we get the 42nd Street sleaze-cinema world where Milligan's odd flicks sometimes made green. The decline and demise of both was echoed in Milligan's hatred of NYC, just about the time the Deuce got bowlderized. He exiled himself to LA, delivered in a car by an oddball named Dennis Malvasi, yes, that guy Made a couple even crappier flicks there, posed for an RV ad while dying of AIDS, muttered and harangued to the luckiest biographer ever.
McDonough's posthumous research into Milligan's childhood in St. Paul, added as a surprise ending here, should give this a sixth star. A creepy sexual mismatch between a pedophile and an adipose nympho begat a rage-fetus whose exit from the womb actually scarred him physically.
I'd like to think Andy knew the shot from day zero, but there's a tale of discovery here, from acting, to puppeteer, to dressmaking, to the grimy Auricon of his stories, slipping on blood, costumes, and hate. All this gives him -- and the bio -- an element of rational wisdom. The rat's are coming. The werewolves are here.
Except Milligan -- whose sexual attentions usually focused on ugly, mentally-challenged, messed up dudes -- hated "queers". And if he had a sense of humor, there's no evidence in this bio or in his dire body of work. The man's films -- I've seen two -- are a fascinating but unendurable hybrid of Coleman Francis and Herschell Gordon Lewis. Claustrophobic, cruel, exhausting -- how did this handsome boy from St. Paul, MN end up here?
The bio -- which ranks with Tosches' Dino as one of the best I've read -- not only enlarges the guy, but gives us a deep look at two NYC scenes. First, the Cafe Cino off-off Broadway scene where Milligan, remarkably, began as an auteur. The same community that also launched Bernadette Peters and Abe Vigoda (in one of Milligan's Bernard Shaw productions). And then we get the 42nd Street sleaze-cinema world where Milligan's odd flicks sometimes made green. The decline and demise of both was echoed in Milligan's hatred of NYC, just about the time the Deuce got bowlderized. He exiled himself to LA, delivered in a car by an oddball named Dennis Malvasi, yes, that guy Made a couple even crappier flicks there, posed for an RV ad while dying of AIDS, muttered and harangued to the luckiest biographer ever.
McDonough's posthumous research into Milligan's childhood in St. Paul, added as a surprise ending here, should give this a sixth star. A creepy sexual mismatch between a pedophile and an adipose nympho begat a rage-fetus whose exit from the womb actually scarred him physically.
I'd like to think Andy knew the shot from day zero, but there's a tale of discovery here, from acting, to puppeteer, to dressmaking, to the grimy Auricon of his stories, slipping on blood, costumes, and hate. All this gives him -- and the bio -- an element of rational wisdom. The rat's are coming. The werewolves are here.
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Started Reading
February 16, 2014
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February 16, 2014
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February 16, 2014
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rated it 5 stars
Feb 21, 2014 09:19PM
You can't go wrong with McDonough. Every one of his books is aces with me. Based on the films I'd seen, Milligan was someone I had zero interest in. But I dug McDonough's SHAKEY, so I gave this a spin - and couldn't put it down. His Russ Meyer and Tammy Wynette bios are also out of this world.
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