the truth about the 1 percent

October 31, 2011 10:39 AM

The last ten minutes of SOCIETY (the movie) is revolting, disgusting, horrifying and completely unsuitable for work, children, decent folk in general, and particularly anyone named Billy.

SOCIETY (the whole movie) starts here.

From the wiki:

Bill Whitney (Billy Warlock) seems to have it all. His family is wealthy and he lives in a mansion in Beverly Hills, California. He's popular at his high school, looks to be a shoo-in for class president, has a cute cheerleader girlfriend and owns a new Jeep Wrangler to drive around in. Despite this, he feels as though he does not fit in with his family or their high-society friends. When his sister's ex-boyfriend Blanchard (Tim Bartell) gives him a surreptitiously recorded tape of what sounds like his family engaged in a vile, murderous orgy, Bill begins to suspect that his feelings are justified.

posted by philip-random (48 comments total)

Looks amazing. Must find HD quality release...
posted by Foci for Analysis at 10:47 AM on October 31, 2011 [1 favorite]

SPOILERS!
posted by Artw at 10:47 AM on October 31, 2011

Geez... saw that soooo long ago.... Kind of a weird classic of sorts.
posted by ph00dz at 10:49 AM on October 31, 2011 [1 favorite]

Those last 10 minutes are the closest modern film has gotten to the grotesque satire of something like "The Life of Gargantua and of Pantagruel."
posted by Bunny Ultramod at 10:50 AM on October 31, 2011 [3 favorites]

You can take your CGI and shunt it. This is awesome.
posted by munchingzombie at 10:51 AM on October 31, 2011

SPOILERS!

Well, I did say it's the last 10 minutes.
posted by philip-random at 10:52 AM on October 31, 2011 [1 favorite]

The Aristocrats!
posted by Billiken at 10:54 AM on October 31, 2011 [13 favorites]

The film stars Billy Warlock as Bill Whitney...

"This is Arnie Pie with...Arnie in the Sky!"
posted by DU at 10:56 AM on October 31, 2011 [3 favorites]

Man, I remember seeing this film years ago and expecting the ending to culminate with the main character's slowly mounting paranoia and insanity driving him to do something terrible and ending up in a mental institution.

I was pleasantly surprised by the actual ending.
posted by emperor.seamus at 10:57 AM on October 31, 2011

Uh..you have to be logged in to see the video.
posted by DU at 11:00 AM on October 31, 2011

Looks amazing. Must find HD quality release...

Nah, this definitely best viewed on a rusty, quivering VHS tape bought from in a charity shop.
posted by pmcp at 11:00 AM on October 31, 2011 [7 favorites]

Alternate link
posted by DU at 11:02 AM on October 31, 2011

Well, that was oddly arousing.

--calling a therapist now--
posted by modernserf at 11:02 AM on October 31, 2011 [2 favorites]

Wait, that's my neighbour.
posted by clvrmnky at 11:03 AM on October 31, 2011 [2 favorites]

If you liked that, then you should also check out James Gunn's ooey-gooey Slither.
posted by Sticherbeast at 11:08 AM on October 31, 2011 [1 favorite]

philip-random: “Well, I did say it's the last 10 minutes.”

Annoyingly, it actually isn't. DU's alternate link is, though.
posted by koeselitz at 11:13 AM on October 31, 2011

SPOILERS!

Bukkakefilter
posted by PeterMcDermott at 11:19 AM on October 31, 2011

Y'know, I once came across a bit of that move on cable one late night. Always meant to try and see the whole thing sometime - mainly because I thought Billy Warlock was hot.
posted by dnash at 11:30 AM on October 31, 2011

I have no idea what just happened but that's not how fisting is supposed to work.
posted by londonmark at 11:33 AM on October 31, 2011 [1 favorite]

What a bat shit scene that is. I've told people about this movie in the past, and I sometimes get the feeling they don't believe me.
posted by brundlefly at 11:36 AM on October 31, 2011

philip-random: “Well, I did say it's the last 10 minutes.”

Annoyingly, it actually isn't. DU's alternate link is, though.

Yeah, I realized that but decided what the hell? If folks want to get the whole picture, let them watch the whole picture. As is, my ten minutes starts sooner than DU's and includes more of the disgusting stuff ...
posted by philip-random at 11:38 AM on October 31, 2011 [1 favorite]

Wow. The rich really are different.
posted by Verdant at 11:41 AM on October 31, 2011 [1 favorite]

Linking to the last 10 minutes of this movie seems like a shame, the rest of it is much more subtle. It's definitely not for everybody, but if you've ever wished that David Cronenberg had co-directed a movie with John Hughes, look no further.
posted by nixt at 11:48 AM on October 31, 2011 [7 favorites]

We saw this at Kneel Before Zod, Nottingham's trash movie event.

And, man, the way everyone else was going on about it, I was expecting worse. Which I think says more about my movie-going habits versus the actual terrible-ness of it.

However, now I can make shunting jokes on a regular basis.
posted by Katemonkey at 11:51 AM on October 31, 2011 [1 favorite]

#OCCUPY GELATINOUS FLESH-SUCKING DEATH ORGY
posted by naju at 11:53 AM on October 31, 2011 [2 favorites]

Plot summary is in wiki link, for others who were curious but not at all interested in watching it, because ew. It sounds like, yes, it fits all the criteria in the description.
posted by maryr at 11:54 AM on October 31, 2011

Linking to the last 10 minutes of this movie seems like a shame, the rest of it is much more subtle.

nixt, I'd agree if SOCIETY hadn't been so effectively forgotten by the culture. Talk about a movie that should be talked about and, for the most part, isn't. So, please excuse my gratuitous gesture in linking to the most gratuitous part of the movie (and thus blowing the ending), but my hope is that it will tweak curiosities and get folks digging for more. Then maybe we can a talk sometime about context. (ie: if SOCIETY isn't about Ronald Reagan's inherently cannibalistic trickle-down America, then what is it about?)
posted by philip-random at 11:57 AM on October 31, 2011 [1 favorite]

CountryWide Xmas Party, 2006.
posted by benzenedream at 11:58 AM on October 31, 2011 [3 favorites]

weird. i thought this film/ending were common knowledge, just because of the ick-out factor.
posted by mrgrimm at 12:23 PM on October 31, 2011

And this is why we cannot abide by tax increases on our nation's job creators - we don't want them to shunt us.
posted by Meatbomb at 12:26 PM on October 31, 2011 [2 favorites]

Isn't this a double...
posted by hal_c_on at 12:53 PM on October 31, 2011

A lot of swear words too.
posted by Flashman at 12:55 PM on October 31, 2011

So, this is a sort of adaptation of Nathaniel Hawthorne's story...

Young Goodman Brown (1835) is set in Salem during the trials; his protagonist, a young Puritan newlywed, sets out at sunset on an errand that takes him through the woods, against the wishes of his bride, Faith. "The road grew wilder and drearier and more faintly traced, and vanished at length, leaving him in the heart of the dark wilderness, still rushing onward, with the instinct that guides mortal man to evil," Hawthorne writes. Along the way, Brown meets a mysterious man who resembles him, and witnesses Faith and the rest of his neighbors — whom he had thought to be righteous Christians — engaged in a witches' sabbath. He resists and the scene vanishes; the next day, his wife and neighbors behave as they always have, but his sense of community has vanished, and he lives in fear and suspicion of them to the end of his days. The story ends, "they carved no hopeful verse upon his tombstone, for his dying hour was gloom."

From today's Writer's Almanac.
posted by IAmBroom at 1:02 PM on October 31, 2011 [3 favorites]

I'm surprised no one's mentioned Screaming Mad George, the rather unique special effects guy whose work on Society is often considered his 'masterpiece'. There's very little info on him readily available on the web - other than a short interview on Youtube - but he's an interesting character; his gore FX are inspired by surrealism and dreams, he was a member of first-wave punk band The Mad (employing effects work and gore onstage), and he's responsible for some of the more impressive pre-CGI effects work of the 1980s.
posted by stinkycheese at 2:01 PM on October 31, 2011 [4 favorites]

Proving that social satire was alive and mucous in the 1980's.

[Seriously: this was seminal (puntastic!) viewing a couple of decades ago]
posted by Cheradine Zakalwe at 2:03 PM on October 31, 2011

Ancient film proves the internet isn't to blame for modern conspiracy theories

You might also want to check out the Ayn Rand interviews where [4/5] a lady sporting an extremely aggressive afro asks her about the Illuminati & world governance of Capital.
posted by Cheradine Zakalwe at 2:06 PM on October 31, 2011

HONEY, GET THE FLAMETHROWER!
posted by not_on_display at 2:29 PM on October 31, 2011

I am the 99%. Fat, that is. Don't eat me, rich 1 percenters. Bad for your cholesterol.
posted by schleppo at 2:48 PM on October 31, 2011

schleppo I fear you've missed the point

If you're not in the 1%, you don't get to spread and share your consciousness through the epiphany of dissolved flesh in the Being-in-the-world.


[Trans: there's a club, and you're not in it]
posted by Cheradine Zakalwe at 2:52 PM on October 31, 2011 [1 favorite]

Isn't this a double...
posted by hal_c_on

Don't think so. But full reveal. I'd originally intended to post the Butthole Surfers Family Barbeque Movie but found that it had definitely already been posted.

This is NSFW. It's crass, crude, cheap, rude, nasty and vulgar. This is a one link 10 minute YouTube video that shows cannibalism, fire, nudity, nerds, fried sperm, rednecks, and perversion aplenty. It is certainly not to everyone's taste, but that's because it's the Butthole Surfers' BBQ.
posted by Elmore

Ah, the good ole days.
posted by philip-random at 3:56 PM on October 31, 2011 [1 favorite]

Has there ever been an HD release of this? I realize Brian Yuzna isn't exactly James Cameron in terms of box office, but I'd love to see this again in good quality (I think the last time was VHS).
posted by Joakim Ziegler at 4:53 PM on October 31, 2011

I remember seeing this movie on cable, right around when it came out. I was in high school, and the ending blew my mind. That scene has always stuck with me. Should be required viewing for horror-loving Marxists.
posted by Saxon Kane at 6:40 PM on October 31, 2011

Still less disgusting than Two and a Half Men. And less goo.
posted by anothermug at 7:42 PM on October 31, 2011

What the actual fuck did I just watch?
posted by magstheaxe at 8:03 PM on October 31, 2011

Twelve years ago my Australian ex-girlfriend rented this and insisted we get high and watch it. I was expecting a(nother) run-of-the-mill crappy horror movie, but that sure as hell isn't what I got.
posted by The Card Cheat at 8:37 PM on October 31, 2011

...

...

we are the 1%?
posted by His thoughts were red thoughts at 12:45 AM on November 1, 2011

I've only seen the end of this, on a loop, at a Halloween party in NYC a few years ago. Seems like it's not worth watching the whole thing now...
posted by JoanArkham at 5:58 AM on November 1, 2011

the value of seeing the whole thing is just how run-of-the-mill late 80s teenage normal it starts out (John Hughes-esque as someone mentioned up-thread). And, short of a few strange moments along the way, it sort of stays that way most of the way through ... which just makes the ending all the more diseased and deranged.

Which makes the truly sublime and mind (and world) smashing Society the one that John Hughes would have made, with one of his typical all-star casts, of course. For instance, imagine Molly Ringwald as Clarissa and Rob Lowe as Billy in the first couple of clips from this compilation ...
posted by philip-random at 8:10 AM on November 1, 2011 [1 favorite]