A man and a woman are in one of those hotel rooms you see in movies, off the side of the road, two small beds, maybe a shower curtain by the dirty toilet. They are both mostly undressed and the woman asks if he is a serial killer because it’s a one night stand and she just wants to get laid but doesn’t want to get hurt. “Look,” the man says, puffing on a cigarette, “it’s not nice to ask those things, you see. For one, I’m offended. I’m just an off duty policeman who happened by the Indian casino on my night off and started rolling some dice and drinking some Pabst and this red headed skinny broad comes up to me and starts flirting and making eyes and I can see down her shirt and she’s all ‘I wanna smoke cigarettes and bone your balls off’ and I’m all ‘you better grab the wall or something because an earth shaking shift is coming… from my pants!’ so I quit my dice throwing and off we go in my pick up I can barely afford on my police salary and we stock up on ludes and cans of beer and go to this shithole hotel and I’ve got a dinger the size of Gary Coleman and I’m wondering if these walls are soundproof and how many watches i can fit in my glove box once I start to become a kleptomaniac and take things from my victims I mean the people I arrest because I’m a cop I mean a dirty cop and boy those watches can bring in some money maybe I can build myself a game room in my condo with a pool table and a pinball machine and I wonder how much it would be if I have to have someone pour cement in there but then i look down and this red headed chick who basically brought me home from the bar where i was minding my own business and not bothering anyone and even tipping the waitress good when she bought me a new beer and a clean ashtray and hahah i would be all ‘here’s one for your old man’ when i gave her a 10 dollar poker chip and one time i pinched her butt and she got pissed and called me a filthy son of a bitch and slapped my hand and i was all ‘look i’m just a cop i clean up after crime and filth all day’ and she winked and said ‘i meant it in a good way you know’ and walked off all happy and i thought things were really looking up because i’ve been depressed a little because my wife and son left me for my partner and they up and moved to Maryland and man i sat in a car with that fucker for ten years and this is how they treat me where’s the fucking justice I was his best man for Pete’s sake and then i got depressed again and was going to go home and blow my brains out with my service revolver because i get into these fits you see and i was down to my last five bucks and then this red headed chick comes along and starts doing her lashes at me and touching my thigh and and i’m all ‘man good god thank you for these gifts you’re about to bestow’ and ‘bountiful harvest’ and ‘you will recite to one another psalms, hymns, and spiritual songs; you will sing and make music to the lord with your hearts’ and things were good again and then we came to this motel and i didn’t even fart in the truck and we seem to be ready to make harvest and you turn around and ask me if I’m a serial kkiller???“

And that’s Part 1 of this movie told in non sequential time. Or is it Part 2? I forget. I think it might have been Part 2 now that I think about it because now that I think about it Part 1 might have been a slow motion bit about this woman running through a field to a remade version of Nazareth’s “Love Hurts”. And – I know that itself was a remake of an older version but i think people my age know it just for the Nazareth version and when this movie started I immediately hated it because they took that song and slowed it way way way down and had a new female singer and I thought “what is this stupid gimmick I hate you”. So – Part 2 came before Part 1 if we’re keeping up, I think, and Part 2 is the opening and shows a blond lady running through a field to a crappy remake of an old love song I liked a long time ago and she comes across a campsite and smokes some cigarettes even though she’s running away from someone and she comes across this house out in the woods and bangs on the door and Ed Begley and Barbara Hershey open the door and I’m thinking things are getting interesting because hello Barbara Hershey and then Part 1 starts up (see above).

Part 3 (I think) continues with our two lovebirds in the hotel and it goes something like this: “And secondly so you think I’m a serial killer do you huh huh do you huh well would a serial killer do this??” and he takes off his underwear and places half a pack of cigarettes up his butt and somehow lights them without burning himself and uses his unusually trained lower intestine to promptly smoke them all at the same time and blow the second hand smoke out of his nostrils like some sort of Asian dragon and he flaps his arms around and says “look at me look at me look at me I’m Puff the Magic Dragon” and he kind of hops around the room for a little while until somehow he manages to put out and snuff all of his butt cigarettes in an ashtray without dropping or burning anything and he gets back on the bed on top of her and says something like “I’m going to shove my entire foot in your mouth up to the ankle” and she starts crying.

I’m going to leave it up to you but something in that last paragraph is true but i don’t want to give away any secrets unless you’re itching to watch the thing. Itching! Woo! I hope you don’t have a rash! OK so where were we? I feel like it’s going to be hard to do much talking about this thing without giving it away but it’s not like this is some mystery where we have to wait until the last frame to figure it out so HMMMM what do we do here? Here’s a portrait some of my friends made of me a few years back of me trying to decide something:

First – never stick cigarettes up your butt and try to smoke them, that can’t be healthy and we all know cigarettes are bad – I smoked for a long time and finally quit and I want one every day but i know if i even had one I’d be hooked again until the day I die so I can’t do that. I still like to take the dogs out at night and let them play and I have a cigar which I know is still a vice but I don’t think or feel it’s as bad as cigs since I don’t take things straight into my lungs. I did the math and it’s also less expensive not that I’m trying to justify anything and it is what it is but at least I stopped smoking cigarettes.

Since the story is told non sequentially we’ll jump to the part with Hershey and Begley. They’re sitting at a table eating breakfast and it goes something like this:

EB: Gosh you sure gave me a good, earthy boning last night. I don’t think you’ve balled me like that since the late 80s when we were at that rally in Montreal about the electric cars. Do you remember that my love my life? [Looks dreamy, eats a piece of uncooked kale] Sissy I don’t think I’ve ever been that sore since. Woo howdy. What a great day it will be today. [rubs a buttock, winces] Maybe we’ll capture that Sasquatch.
BH: Bubby I’ve been telling you for forty five years that I don’t have any balls. I don’t know wh-
EB: yes sir. I might need to do some extra yoga today after my morning yoga. [eats half of a carrot and talks with his mouth full] sogf hofdd skrink slezzk ssskkuttrk? [swallows his mess down with beet juice]
EB: the sleep of The Forest Mother?
BH: oh, not last night honey it was more of the same, battling insecurities, seeing my ancestors and that recurring nightmare that we owned a gasoline powered car.
EB: I sure don’t miss those things. Going off the grid and living off the land and using our solar powered electricity to power our Sasquatch attracting speakers and deep freezer was the best decision we ever made. That and eating squash every night for dinner for four decades. Boy I’m not tired of that at all and my colon is sure happy. [frowns] well usually anyway.
EB: [hears a strange sound outside, like a rabbit screaming] do you hear that sissy? I didn’t think it was mating season everywhere [smirks]
BH: [opens mouth to make some sort of point] [stops, cocks her head] hey. What is that? [wipes her mouth irritably with some composted paper product] that’s not what I THINK IT IS IS IT??? LORD ALMIGHTY HAS HE FINALLY COME HOME???!!
EB: [sighs] no. Crap. I think it’s a strange girl pounding in our door in desperation. I bet she’s running from someone hunting her for sport.
BH: That makes me really happy that I keep this can of bear spray right here by our kitchen table. I’m going to spray the fuck out of whoever that is disturbing us before my morning shit. These eggs our home fed chickens make sure do go through me quick. Jesus.

Minutes later, after a brief, nonviolent encounter at the front door:

EB: just sit here for a minute stranger while we finish our natural breakfasts. [cracks egg, slurps contents, crunches shell] feel free to call me Father if you like, while we wait [groans, winces] Mother Nature I’m hurting!

STRANGER CIGARETTE SMOKING NAZARETH SONG RUNNING GIRL: EAT MY SHIT YOU HOSPITALITY NURTURING NATURE COCKSUCKERS!! HOW DARE YOU TRY AND CODDLE ME IVE GOT YOUR FATHER RIGHT HERE!!!!! [grabs kitchen knife, performs murder on Ed Begley Jr] AND NOW IM GOING TO DO MURDER ON YOU!! [brandishes bloody knife at BH, eyeballs a carrot]

Oops where’d that image come from? Has it come from —- the FUTURE???

And now since time, space and logic have become blurred and reality is no longer a constant or stable force, we SPOILERS discover she is the serial killer and she’s been going around killing people for years and the rest of the movie is about her killing everyone. Like everyone. All the cops, the hotel people, the innocent bystanders, the hippies, the roller skating Moonies, the couple that runs the laundromat, the short order cook, the person running tech support at the online mail order company, the influencer and even the guy down your street that burns tires when he thinks no one’s paying attention. How about that for a twist? Zing!

In conclusion or is it the beginning I don’t know any more since everything has been contorted and become perverted and strangled. Mother Corrine may never be the same at those gatherings in the barn. Or do they have them any more? It’s hard to watch things change like that and we thank you for everything and appreciate your time. This movie was decent as agreed upon but there’s probably no need to ever watch it again. Unless you like people smoking cigarettes with their butts.

FILED UNDER: I’M SITTING IN A DR’S OFFICE WAITING ON AN APPOINTMENT AND I WONDER WHAT THE LADY ACROSS THE ROOM WOULD THINK IF SHE KNEW I WAS OVER HERE WRITING ABOUT PEOPLE SMOKING CIGARETTES WITH THEIR BUTTHOLES