Seeing as they’re usually comprised of varying-in-quality shorts made by varying-in-talent directors, anthology movies can be fairly difficult to review. Critiques generally come down to “some of the segments were better than others,” or “whether it’s worth sitting through the two bad stories to get to the good one is a matter of opinion.” That’s a difficult enough challenge with the usual anthologies, which generally have no more than 4 or 5 segments, so effectively reviewing an anthology movie like The ABCs of Death, which is comprised of 26 short segments made by 26 different directors, feels like something of an impossibility. Because of this, instead of writing a traditional review, I decided to take to Twitter and compose a quick reaction to each segment (one for each letter of the alphabet, if you haven’t caught on to the gimmick yet). Here were the results...
A) Over the top violence featuring some fun, practical gore. But nothing more. #ABCsOfDeath
B) Getting a little girl to go to bed by terrifying her is darkly funny, but there’s nothing too clever here. Features boobs. #ABCsOfDeath
C) Time loop story that unironically goes nowhere. Laughable acting. Low budget look. No bueno. #ABCsOfDeath
D) A bum and a dog fight to the death while onlookers cheer. As offensive at it sounds, but stylish and finds a fun ending. #ABCsOfDeath
E) Tries to make you squirm with creepy crawlies, but the CG spider looks too fake to be scary. More amateur acting/aesthetic. #ABCsOfDeath
F) This is literally a fetish story about lesbian fart sex. So juvenile and terrible. What an embarrassment. #ABCsOfDeath
G) A first person shot of a surfer drowning? Interesting idea, but not pulled off well. I didn’t know what I was watching. #ABCsOfDeath
H) Anthropomorphized fox strippers and dog pilots, Naziism, doomsday weapons, all in a sort of live action cartoon. So bizarre. #ABCsOfDeath
I) Creepy short about a kidnapped and tortured girl. Body horror. Definitely gets under your skin, and is even a little artful. #ABCsOfDeath
J) Samurais making funny faces? Features some weird, Beetlejuice-esque makeup effects at least. The Japanese ones are weird. #ABCsOfDeath
K) Animated. More terrible bathroom humor. Were some of these directors 7-year-old boys? Pathetic. #ABCsOfDeath
L) Captive men forced into jackoff competitions, loser dies from spike in the ass. Contemptible, but goes far enough to shock. #ABCsOfDeath
M) A minute of your life wasted. A 16-year-old might find this to be darkly humorous after huffing paint. Shameful, Ti West. #ABCsOfDeath
N) Like a bad SNL sketch, it takes one joke and repeats it until enough time has been eaten up. Mercifully short. #ABCsOfDeath
O) Abstract sexual and asphyxiation imagery. Striking enough, I guess. #ABCsOfDeath
P) Gorgeous, vibrantly colorful photography. Tells a story without using dialogue, but relies on shock to find a cheap ending. #ABCsOfDeath
Q) Meta movie about making the movie. Kind of has a slacker charm, but definitely seems phoned in. #ABCsOfDeath
R) Almost satirically abstract and “artsy,” but has an interesting look and legitimately disgusting makeup effects. #ABCsOfDeath
S) Self-aware, campy grindhouse throwback. Unfortunately, on the more egregious side of the Tarantino/Rodriguez wannabe scale. #ABCsOfDeath
T) Claymation short that looks like it’s going to be more toilet humor but then gets completely awesome. So fun. #PlayDohGore #ABCsOfDeath
U) Exorcism story shot entirely from the demon’s POV. Kind of fun. Pretty violent. #ABCsOfDeath
V) Post-apocalyptic, dystopian sci-fi stuff that did a lot with its budget. Now this is how you make infant death funny. #ABCsOfDeath
W) More Meta movie about making the movie stuff. A mess of ideas thrown together that tries too hard to be absurdist, so fails. #ABCsOfDeath
X) Horrifically disgusting and actually manages to include effective satire. This is what all of these shorts should have been. #ABCsOfDeath
Y) More abstract absurdism. Some striking imagery, but too overtly hipster. Feels like a bloodier ‘Tim & Eric’ segment. #ABCsOfDeath
Z) Guess they needed to end with another pathetically juvenile attempt at shocking with sexual imagery. Japan has hangups. #ABCsOfDeath
