“You Can’t Piss On Hospitality”: My Attempt At A Dissection of Troll 2

I’d like to start off by just giving a brief introduction to the Troll 2 phenomenon to those who are unaware. Troll 2 is widely regarded as one of the worst movies ever made, if not THE worst. In recent years, it has become an overwhelming cult hit due to its AWESOMELY bad nature. It is often cited along previously discussed worst movie ever, The Room. Both of these movies have fervent followings as they are bad enough to warrant such passion. Last year’s SXSW in Austin the release of a documentary based on the Troll 2‘s cast, production, and crew aptly titled Best Worst Movie, which is now spreading throughout theaters in the US. For me, the charm in Troll 2 lies within its very confusing, very hilarious, very, very bad, but VERY earnest attempt at film.

Synopsis
A young boy is pleasantly haunted by the specter of his grandfather who tells him a story about goblins on the eve of a family trip. The next morning the young boy, his sister, and their parents set out for a rustic town called Nilbog. Once they arrive there things are not as they seem and the young boy’s grandfather continually warns them they should leave town as the residents of the town were planning on eating them because they were shape-shifting goblins. No one in the family believes him until one of the townsfolk is revealed to be a goblin and now the family must fight to not become the goblin’s next meal.

Selected Scenes (Selected for awesomeness and availability on YouTube):

And here is a larger clip selection, which honestly, you SHOULD watch if you have time:

A Litany of the Issues With Troll 2 (SPOILERS ENSUE, but you won’t be able to understand them anyway):
- The acting
- The writing
- The directing
- The production values
- Total number of trolls in the film: 0
- Relation to Troll: 0
- Unnecessary characters: 6-10
- Unnecessary Plot Devices/Points: Seemingly all of them
- Communication between cast and crew: 0 (Crew mostly Italian, cast entirely American)
- The music score is from a pet commercial, not a suspenseful horror film.
- Bologna is a weapon of choice
- Vegetables are evil
- Cool ideas: 4-5, cool ideas executed well: 0
- Clever town names: 0
- Inexplicable Dance Sequences: 1
- Number of times a corn cob is used for seductive purposes: 1

Dissection of the Plot
The Plot is bizarre, but not outside the realm of things we’ve seen in horror movies. In fact the isolation/townsfolk turn on newcomers is almost cliche. What’s really WRONG with the plot is that they overload it with devices. Like where the goblins come from has something to do with a magical Stonehenge rock which is located in some with-like goblin’s house. And it’s never explained why the Goblins can’t just grow veggies instead they have to turn humans into vegetables. It just seems mean. There are some cool ideas, but there is so much nonsense, that those ideas get lost in the shuffle, QUITE easily.

Dissection of the Acting
The movie had a small budget and to cut costs they used unknowns as actors. This is a method which has worked really well in some cases, like the recent Paranormal Activity, which by all accounts was scary and well-made on the cheap with unknowns starring. But then there are movies like Troll 2 which remind movie fans why actors get (over)paid.  Rail on Nic Cage as much as you want, against these characters, he is the pudding on the pie. Sometimes you should save money on other things so that your movie isn’t completely lost in the ridiculous shuffle of overacting and confusion. Adding inexperience to communication issues with your Italian director and you have an epic calamity in the making. It’s not so much that everyone involved was a terrible actor, it’s that, no wait that is part of it. They all only have one speed.

Dissection of Themes
Themes, themes, themes. So we know it’ s bad, very bad, in fact. But what can we take away from this film? Well besides tons of belly laughs and more quotes that were never supposed to be quotable, vegetables are evil? I think. I don’t know but when our hero uses a Bologna sandwich as the weapon of necessity to defeat the goblins who are vegetarians.  So they turn humans into veggies to eat and are defeated by the foulest of deli meats. I think that says it all Meat=Good, Veg=Bad. Now while I can’t completely disagree with this message because I do love a steak, I have to think it’s the only move of its kind and in that way it’s kind of twistedly genius. Like the Talking Heads’ almost anti-environmental song “(Nothing But) Flowers”, there’s something to value in a dissenting opinion. Or am I full of it because for me food math goes like this Steak>Lettuce.
Conclusion
A thorough dissection my biology teacher would be proud of. The hard thing about attacking a movie like this is that it’s all too easy. But I promise you if you watch it, you will be enriched. At the very least you will be well aware that ANYONE can make a movie that makes it to a DVD release. Between The Room and Troll 2, I’ve become inspired! I think I heard a script for Troll 3 is out there, I might just take a stab at it. Seriously though, this film is currently up for FREE on Hulu. I encourage everyone to watch it for some strange sense of fascination. I mean let’s be honest, if you sat through Four Christmases or Surfer, Dude, you’ve pretty much reached the dregs, so why not go full force and scrape the bottom of the barrel? And when you’re done, be sure to check out the documentary that came out of the catastrophe, Best Worst Movie.

Have you seen Troll 2? Are you intrigued? For 90 minutes you will be as confused as humanly possible, and unlike in Memento, you’ll never know why.