The Polonia Brothers have broken my spirit.

Like one of Lovecraft’s doomed protagonists, this once enthusiastic reviewer has been reduced to gibbering madness by something so completely awful mere words cannot be formed to describe it accurately. Once, I was happy and carefree, reviewing the sublime, the mediocre, and the cinematic slop that Lawrence P. would send my way with nary a complaint (except for Vicious...that really sucked). Whenever one of his trademark padded envelopes (protected from the elements in a veritable cocoon of packing tape) would arrive in the mail, I would gladly slit it open and shake out the booty contained within (no, not Misty Mundae films) with nary a moment’s hesitation. Now, I am a completely broken man, terrified to poke my aching head out of the bottle I’ve scurried my way into to see if there’s any new shipments from the Head Vampire. I’m afraid of what might pop out.

However, I have to be strong, gentle readers. We film critics (yeah sure, and those folks at Subway really are "Sandwich Artists") are supposed to be made of sterner stuff: we take the blows so you don’t have to. Unfortunately, taking a celluloid bullet for you offers me no benefit. I get no extended recovery time, no medal for my valor, no fancy gold watch. Regardless, it is my obligation--no, my duty--to inform you of the pain that this simple two-for-one deal Sub Rosa has put out is capable of forcing upon even the strongest of film watchers.

Feeders

Space. We are given a brief introduction to the history of alien visitations both benign and malicious (with illustrations kindly provided by a 6-year-old boy), and their impact upon our world. The impact that they have will be illustrated further, as we are invaded by, well, mummified Muppets. Therein lies the first problem: it’s difficult to believe that these spindly beasts are capable of overcoming a full-grown human and sinking their nonexistent teeth into tangy flesh. Sure, they employ a walkie-talkie antenna cattle prod thing to disable the overly concerned park ranger (who actually says "That meteor’ll burn the whole fucking forest down!") before chowing down, but most of the time, they somehow manage to get the jump on people and rip them to shreds. Even more confusing, the creatures were designed by effects-guy Bill Morrison, who wowed the shit out of us in earlier efforts like The Dead Nest Door and Ozone. Apparently, he suffered 17 strokes before beginning work on the eponymous Feeders.

Okay, back on track. Two buddies, Derek (Jon McBride) and Bennett (John Polonia) are making a trek across the country to the east coast, stopping to take pictures (complete with ridiculous camera-iris matte shots) and hit on amazingly unattractive women. Unfortunately (for us, anyway) their trip is cut short when they fall smack-dab in the middle of the Feeders’ invasion of Pennsylvania. Look out, Lawrence!

To put it simply, this movie was unbelievably terrible. Absolutely nothing was done right, from acting, to effects, to direction. It’s an outright mess. The characters were either whiny, or immature, or as wooden as a cigar-store Indian. The Feeders themselves, as said before, are completely non-threatening. Watching them put on the human feedbag is more laugh-inducing then horrific, with the mouthless extraterrestrials violently humping their victims while rubbing their faces in some open wound or atop one of the worst matte effects in history. Yes, that is actually in the film! By the time the final few minutes were rolling, I was practically cheering to see the "heroes" of this film either being massacred or going through the horrible living death of watching the world being destroyed by an armadaof CGI flying saucers. Hell, if the planet was destroyed, there couldn’t be a sequel, right? Right???

Sadly, the end credits dumped me back to the menu, which reminded me that there was still another movie on the disc to review. A sequel. A sequel to Feeders. My resulting wail was heard three towns over.

Feeders 2: Slay Bells

Despite my horrible fear of the "enter" button on the DVD remote, I soldiered on. No guts, no air medals, as my father always says.

Dare I say it, Feeders 2 actually starts off rather well: cuts of a frazzled Derek (Jon McBride again) being interviewed as recording equipment is slowly being turned on shocked me with their stylishness. Maybe, I naively hoped, this one wouldn’t suck as bad. Sadly, it wasn’t meant to be. Despite the end of Feeders, showing the U.S. being peppered with explosions indicating a full-scale invasion, life still continues on its normal (well, in a Polonia Brothers sense) track. A family man (Mark Polonia) is trying to get through a day at work in order to spend Christmas Day with his wife and kids. Sadly (again, more for us than them) his plans are derailed by those darn Feeders, who have been a little...redesigned. These new Feeders, built to supplement the original Bill Morrison puppets, are completely ridiculous. Resembling the bastard offspring of an Art Clokey character and a foam craft ball, I challenge any viewer to feel even remotely threatened by those damn things, despite the fact that they are once again eating everyone they can.

Of course, is there any reason to be threatened when you have Santa Claus on the case? Yes, old Kris Cringle must have a side hobby of munitions, because he leaps in to save the day with a goddamn laser gun! I am not kidding! Santa’s got a gun! IT SHOOTS GODDAMN LASER BEAMS! I watched this sequence with my mouth completely agape, and absolutely nothing I can say can possibly convey the sheer lunacy of it all.

Sub Rosa somehow managed to cram both Feeders films and a load of extras on a single-layered disc, and it doesn’t bode well for the audiovisual quality. The SOV picture is rife with compression artifacts, video glitches, muted colors, and is genuinely unpleasant. Audio is also muffled and hissy, certainly a holdover from its VHS roots. However, I am rather impressed by Sub Rosa’s inclusion of an ungodly amount of extras. They gave us a Polonia Brothers-fueled commentary track for both films, still galleries, trailers, and little featurettes. While it certainly held no interest for me, the effort is quite commendable.

I am battered. I am bruised. I‘m ragged around the edges. However, I am alive, having survived the one-two punch of the Feeders films just to tell you this one thing: FOR THE LOVE OF CHRIST DON’T WATCH THIS!!!! I was forced to trudge through it, and there’s no reason for you to. Of course, there are so many others like this out there. The Polonias have just released their Sasquatch "epic" Among Us for human consumption...

Save yourselves.