 I'm
a firm believer in film as an art form - though admittedly
it certainly is an art form that can be meddled with and manipulated
by outside influence. But when the planets align, great things
can come from the entertainment industry. Orson Welles creates Citizen Kane and leaves a lot of jaws agape. Sergio
Leone films extreme close-ups of faces you'd rather not see
in close-ups. Kubrick steals a few lenses from NASA to film Barry Lyndon. But sometimes, just sometimes, you kind
of want to watch a woman jam a kiwi fruit into her vagina
until it explodes.
The kiwi fruit, not the vagina.
And so in that Grand Guignol tradition of Salo: The 120
Days of Sodom, Visitor Q, The Cook, The Thief,
His Wife And Her Lover and Steel Magnolias (wah
wahhh wahhhh) comes Singapore Sling, which can roughly
be summed up as. God, I don't know. Gorepornincestnoirsploitation?
Yeah, that sounds just about right.
Singapore
Sling refers to the mute title character: an alcoholic
detective who has grown obsessed with a missing woman named
Laura. The man retraces Laura's steps, which bring him to
an isolated little dwelling populated by an incestuous mother/daughter
team. When not reminiscing about the recently deceased (and
mummified) father who took his daughter's virginity, Mother
and Daughter pass the time by sexually torturing and then
slaughtering their maids, chauffeurs, and whoever manages
to catch their eye - which might or might not include Laura.
 I guess with bullet wounds and bloodstains it's easy to slip
into a how-bad-can-this-get mentality, so the detective knocks
upon the door, only to be pistol-whipped, dragged inside,
raped and tied to a bedpost. Don't you hate it when that happens?
It's understandable that Mother and Daughter are a bit paranoid
when you consider a strange man rings their doorbell, clutching
a notepad with the phrase "WHO KILLED LAURA?" etched into
it, especially when you consider that they're probably guilty.
So, what are a murderous psychosexual mother and daughter
team to do? Of course! Sexual torture and mind control!
Mother and Daughter devise all sorts of nightmarish activities
to inflict upon their new pet, now named Singapore Sling.
When the electrocutions followed by water sports don't crack
his mouth wide open, they move on to mind games, as Daughter
starts imitating Singapore Sling's long lost love. But things
start to get a little sticky as  Daughter
starts believing her own ruse and starts devising a plan with
Sling to do away with Mother. But then again, Singapore Sling's
recent ditch digging fetish seems to indicate a burial plot
for two.
Fans of "extreme" cinema are
definitely going to want to check out Singapore Sling,
as it certainly does have a lot of gross-out material. Even
the more harmless scenes of excess have a disturbing sexual
undercurrent - sure, a daughter being forced to fellate her
mother's fake penis is a bit of an eye-catcher, but there's
just something outright wrong in a scene where the
mother and daughter gorge on food to the point of gagging,
spitting and vomiting, all of it simply to torture the starving
detective, who is strapped to a wheelchair and forced to watch
them rub their own regurgitation into their breasts.
But it's not just an unpleasant film to watch. There are a
few amusing touches in the film. For example, during a scene
where Mother and Daughter participate in rough sex, the daughter
role-plays as a maid, while the mother punishes her making
her state something called "the servant's basic rules," which
happen to be adapted from Isaac Asimov's Three Laws of Robotics.
 At
nearly two hours, there are many scenes that outstay their
welcome, but then again this entire movie is designed to have
that effect. If there's one thing that really irked me about Singapore Sling, it's the constant breaking of the
fourth wall. While Singapore Sling himself narrates the film
from time to time, both Mother and Daughter have multiple
scenes where they address the audience directly and talk about
how they feel, their past and what's going to happen in the
future. It comes off both gimmicky and unnecessary.
But hey, if the idea of a mother railing her daughter after
stating "The servant may not injure his master or through
an action allow his master to come to harm" makes you howl,
this might be the movie for you.
It also makes you both creepy and nerdy - but don't worry,
you're in the right place for that.
Disc Presentation
You don't expect much from a low-budget black-and-white gore
flick from Greece, but Synapse manages to somehow polish Singapore
Sling to look absolutely gorgeous for the most part. Sharp,
lacking in both grain and print damage and with great contrast
for roughly 3/4ths its running time, the final 10 minutes
or so has a lot of specks and a few scratches. This wouldn't
be as noticeable except for the fact that the previous 100
minutes were so pristine.
The audio is presented in basic mono. It's clean, but you'll
have to crank up the volume, since there are a few points
in the movie where the recording wasn't all that good.
 The
video and audio are more than sufficient, however there was
a bit of a problem with the film. The film is in a mishmash
of English, Greek and French, and Synapse was only able to
nab a print with burnt-in English subtitles, which were deemed
inaccurate. To rectify the situation, Synapse had the film
re-translated and the DVD comes with new subtitles. Sounds
good, right? But the problem (and let's face it, it was pretty
unavoidable considering the situation) is that the subtitles
are presented in a closed-captioning style, with huge gray
borders surrounding the text, which covers a lot of the screen.
However, since the original subtitles are burnt-in, you can
simply turn off the new translation and watch it without any
blocking. The new translation flows better (and also translates
the French, which does not show up in the original burnt-in
subtitles) and the Greek narration doesn't dominate the film,
but you might want to consider the original version if such
a thing bugs you.
Disc Extras
I'm a bit torn when it comes to extras on this disc. A film
like this almost feels like an ultimate statement, as if there
just shouldn't be anything at all, but there's a part of me
that also wants to know just what the hell was going on in
the director's mind. No matter my feelings on the film, all
we get is a moody theatrical trailer and a gallery with a small collection of photographs. Even the standard
liner notes that are usually present in Synapse's releases
aren't found in the release. It's all rather enigmatic and
somehow appropriate.
The Bottom Line
Singapore Sling isn't a guilty pleasure. In fact, it's
something else entirely. It's not guilt - it's shame. Singapore
Sling is a shameful, unclean, ugly pleasure. I dig it.
But I don't recommend it. Unless you're a cretin with patience.
Like me.
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