The Devil's Rejects

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The Devil's Rejects
Teaser poster
Directed byRob Zombie
Written byRob Zombie
Produced byRob Zombie
Mike Elliott
Michael Ohoven
Andy Gould
Marco Mehlitz
StarringSid Haig
Bill Moseley
Sheri Moon Zombie
Ken Foree
Matthew McGrory
William Forsythe
CinematographyPhil Parmet
Edited byGlenn W. Garland
Music byTyler Bates
Production
company
Cinelamda
Distributed byLiongate
Release date
  • July 22, 2005 (2005-07-22)
Running time
109 minutes
CountriesCanada
United States[1]
LanguageEnglish
Budget$7 million
Box office$19,390,029

The Devil's Rejects is a 2005 horror-crime-thriller written and directed by Rob Zombie, and the sequel to his 2003 film House of 1000 Corpses. The film is centered on the run of three members of the psychopathic antagonist family from the previous film, now seen as antiheroic protagonists, with Sid Haig, Bill Moseley and Zombie's wife Sheri Moon Zombie reprising their roles. At the time of its release and in the years since, the film has garnered a cult following. The movie has many freeze-cam scenes over the characters.[2]

This is the final film of Matthew McGrory before his death the same year; the film is dedicated to his "loving memory".

Plot

On May 18, 1978, Texas Sheriff John Quincey Wydell (William Forsythe), and a large posse of State Troopers issue an S and D mission on the Firefly family for over seventy-five homicides and disappearances over the past several years. The next morning, Tiny (Matthew McGrory) notices the police arrive, and warns the rest of the family, who arm themselves and fire on the officers. Rufus (Tyler Mane) is killed, and Mother Firefly (Leslie Easterbrook) is taken into custody, while Otis (Bill Moseley) and Baby (Sheri Moon Zombie) escape. They hijack a car, kill the driver, and escape to Kahiki Palms, a run-down motel.

While at the motel Baby seduces Roy, part of the Banjo and Sullivan singing group. Otis and Baby then take the band hostage in their room, and Otis shoots the roadie when he returns. Meanwhile, Baby's father Captain Spaulding, decides to rendezvous with Baby and Otis. On route, his car runs out of gas and he assaults a woman before stealing her car. Back at the motel, Otis sexually assaults Roy's wife Gloria and demands Adam and Roy to come with him on an errand.

Otis drives his two prisoners to a place where he buried weapons. While walking to the location, the two prisoners attack Otis, but he bludgeons Roy and cuts Adam's face off. Back at the motel, Adam's wife Wendy tries to escape by going to the bathroom. Gloria attempts to rebel, and Baby kills her. Wendy runs out of the motel, but is caught by Captain Spaulding, who knocks her unconscious. Otis returns, and all three leave the motel together in the band's van.

The last member of the band is accidentally killed when she runs out to the highway to seek help. The motel maid comes to clean the room, and discovers the murder scene. "The Devil's Rejects" is written on the wall in blood. Wydell calls a pair of amoral bounty hounters - the "Unholy Two", Rondo (Danny Trejo) and Billy Ray (Diamond Dallas Page)- to help him find the Fireflys. While investigating, they discover an associate, Spaulding's friend Charlie Altamont (Ken Foree). Wydell calls a movie critic to learn about the Firefly family's names, and discovers them all to be characters from Groucho Marx's movies. He begins to lose his sanity when Mother Firefly reveals that she murdered his brother. After having a dream in which his brother asks him for revenge, Wydell stabs Mother Firefly to death. The surviving Fireflys gather at a brothel owned by Charlie, where he offers them shelter from the police.

After leaving the brothel, Charlie is threatened by Wydell to give up the Fireflys. With the help of the "Unholy Two", the sheriff takes the family back to the Firefly house where he tortures them, using similar methods to their own. He nails Otis' hands to his chair and staples crime scene photographs to Otis's and Baby's stomach, then beats and shocks Captain Spaulding and Otis with a cattle-prod and taunts Baby about the death of her mother.

Wydell sets the house on fire and leaves Otis and Spaulding to burn, but lets Baby loose outside. Charlie returns to save the Firefly family, but is killed by Wydell. Baby gets shot in the ankle and brutally horse-whipped by Wydell. Tiny then arrives and intervenes, saving the Firefly family and killing Wydell. Otis, Baby, and Spaulding escape in Charlie's Cadillac, leaving Tiny behind. The trio drive, badly injured but alive, toward a police barricade. Otis wakes the sleeping Baby and Spaulding, who then arm themselves. Refusing to surrender, they are shot by the police.

Cast

Main article: List of Rob Zombie characters

Production

Unused poster featuring Bill Moseley, Sheri Moon Zombie and Sid Haig.

When Rob Zombie wrote House of 1000 Corpses, he had a "vague idea for a story" about the brother of the sheriff that the Firefly clan killed coming back for revenge.[3] After Lions Gate Entertainment made back all of their money on the first day of Corpses theatrical release, they wanted Zombie to make another film and he started to seriously think about a new story.[3] With Rejects, Zombie has said that he wanted to make it "more horrific" and the characters less cartoonish than in Corpses,[3] and that he wanted "to make something that was almost like a violent western. Sort of like a road movie."[4] He has also cited films like The Wild Bunch, Bonnie and Clyde and Badlands as influences on Rejects. When he approached William Forsythe about doing the film, he told the actor that the inspiration for how to portray his character came from actors like Lee Marvin and Robert Shaw.[4] Sheri Moon Zombie does not see the film as a sequel: "It's more like some of the characters from House of 1000 Corpses came on over, and now they're the Devil's Rejects."[5]

Zombie hired Phil Parmet, who had shot the documentary Harlan County USA because he wanted to adopt a hand-held camera/documentary look.[4] Principal photography was emotionally draining for some of the actors. Sheri Moon Zombie remembers a scene she had to do with Forsythe that required her to cry. The scene took two to three hours to film and affected her so much that she did not come into work for two days afterward.[4]

Rejects went through the MPAA eight times earning an NC-17 rating every time until the last one.[6] According to Zombie, the censors had a problem with the overall tone of the film. Specifically, censors did not like the motel scene between Bill Moseley and Priscilla Barnes, forcing Zombie to cut two minutes of it for the theatrical release. However, this footage was restored in the DVD version.[6]

Soundtrack

Main article: The Devil's Rejects (soundtrack)

Rob Zombie himself is a musician, he decided to go with more southern rock to create the mood of the film. The soundtrack itself was notable as being one of the first to be released on DualDisc, with the DVD side featuring a making-of featurette for the film and a photo gallery.

Release

Box office

The Devil's Rejects was released on July 22, 2005 in 1,757 theaters and grossed USD$7.1 million on its opening weekend, recouping its roughly $7 million budget. It grossed $17 million in North America and $2.3 million in the rest of the world for a total of $19.4 million.[7]

Critical reception

The film had mixed reviews with a 53% rating on Rotten Tomatoes, with the consensus "Zombie has improved as a filmmaker since 'House of 1000 Corpses' and will please fans of the genre, but beware -- the horror is nasty, relentless, and sadistic.";[8] and a 53 metascore on Metacritic.[9] Prominent critic Roger Ebert enjoyed the film and gave it three out of a possible four stars. He wrote, "There is actually some good writing and acting going on here, if you can step back from the [violent] material enough to see it".[10] Later, in his review for The Hills Have Eyes, Ebert referenced The Devil's Rejects, writing, "I received some appalled feedback when I praised Rob Zombie's The Devil's Rejects, but I admired two things about it [that were absent from The Hills Have Eyes]: (1) It desired to entertain and not merely to sicken, and (2) its depraved killers were individuals with personalities, histories and motives".[11] In his review for Rolling Stone, Peter Travers gave The Devil's Rejects three out of four stars and wrote, "Let's hear it for the Southern-fried soundtrack, from Buck Owens' "Satan's Got to Get Along Without Me" to Lynyrd Skynyrd's "Free Bird," playing over the blood-soaked finale, which manages to wed The Wild Bunch to Thelma and Louise".[12]

In her review for the New York Times, Dana Stevens wrote that the film "is a trompe l'oeil experiment in deliberately retro film-making. It looks sensational, but there is a curious emptiness at its core".[13] Entertainment Weekly gave the film a "C+" rating and wrote, "Zombie's characters are, to put it mildly, undeveloped".[14] Robert K. Elder, of the Chicago Tribune, disliked the movie, writing "[D]espite decades of soaking in bloody classics such as the original Texas Chainsaw Massacre and I Spit On Your Grave, Zombie didn't absorb any of the underlying social tension or heart in those films. He's no collage artist of influences, like Quentin Tarantino, crafting his movie from childhood influences. Rejects plays more like a junkyard of homages, strewn together and lost among inept cops, gaping plot holes and buzzard-ready dialog".[15]

Horror author Stephen King voted The Devil's Rejects the 9th best movie of 2005 and wrote, "No redeeming social merit, perfect '70s C-grade picture cheesy glow; this must be what Quentin Tarantino meant when he did those silly Kill Bill pictures".[16]

Awards

Award Category Nominee Result
Fangoria Chainsaw Awards Best Wide-Release Film Won
Killer Movie (Scariest Film) Rob Zombie Won
Best Screenplay Won
Best Actor Sid Haig Won
Best Supporting Actor William Forsythe Won
Best Supporting Actress Leslie Easterbrook Won
Best Score Tyler Bates Won
Best Villain Sid Haig Nominated
Relationship from Hell Bill Moseley and Sheri Moon Zombie Won
Line That Killed (Best One-Liner) Bill Moseley Nominated
Satellite Awards Outstanding Classic DVD Unrated Widescreen Edition Nominated
Scream Awards The Ultimate Scream Nominated
Best Horror Movie Won
Most Vile Vilain Leslie Easterbrook, Sid Haig, Bill Moseley
and Sheri Moon Zombie as the Firefly family 		Won

References

  1. ^ "The Devil's Rejects". British Film Institute. London. Retrieved June 12, 2012.
  2. ^ "The New Cult Canon: The Devil's Rejects"
  3. ^ a b c Tobias, Scott (August 2, 2005). "Rob Zombie". The Onion A.V. Club. {{cite news}}: Cite has empty unknown parameter: |coauthors= (help)
  4. ^ a b c d Lutman, Danny (July 15, 2004). "INT: Devil's Rejects". JoBlo.com. Retrieved 2007-08-06. {{cite news}}: Cite has empty unknown parameter: |coauthors= (help)
  5. ^ "Meet the Rejects". Fangoria. August 2005. {{cite news}}: |first= missing |last= (help); Cite has empty unknown parameter: |coauthors= (help)
  6. ^ a b Ridley, Jim (July 21–25, 2005). "Sympathy for the Devils". Nashville Scene. {{cite news}}: Cite has empty unknown parameter: |coauthors= (help) Cite error: The named reference "ridley" was defined multiple times with different content (see the help page).
  7. ^ "The Devil's Rejects". Box Office Mojo. Retrieved 2008-10-02. {{cite news}}: Cite has empty unknown parameter: |coauthors= (help)
  8. ^ The Devil's Rejects at Rotten Tomatoes
  9. ^ The Devil's Rejects at Metacritic
  10. ^ Ebert, Roger (July 22, 2005). "The Devil's Rejects". Chicago Sun-Times. Retrieved 2008-10-02. {{cite news}}: Cite has empty unknown parameter: |coauthors= (help)
  11. ^ Ebert, Roger (March 10, 2006). "The Hills Have Eyes". Chicago Sun-Times. Retrieved 2008-10-02. {{cite news}}: Cite has empty unknown parameter: |coauthors= (help)
  12. ^ Travers, Peter (July 22, 2005). "The Devil's Rejects". Rolling Stone. Retrieved 2008-10-02. {{cite news}}: Cite has empty unknown parameter: |coauthors= (help)
  13. ^ Stevens, Dana (July 22, 2005). "The Further Adventures of a Murderous Clan". New York Times. Retrieved 2008-10-02. {{cite news}}: Cite has empty unknown parameter: |coauthors= (help)
  14. ^ Gleiberman, Owen (July 20, 2005). "The Devil's Rejects". Entertainment Weekly. Retrieved 2008-10-02. {{cite news}}: Cite has empty unknown parameter: |coauthors= (help)
  15. ^ Elder, Robert K (August 23, 2007). "The Devil's Rejects". Chicago Tribune. Retrieved 2008-10-02. {{cite news}}: Cite has empty unknown parameter: |coauthors= (help)
  16. ^ King, Stephen (December 9, 2005). "Scene It". Entertainment Weekly. Retrieved 2008-10-02. {{cite news}}: Cite has empty unknown parameter: |coauthors= (help)

External links

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