“Nothing happens in this movie!” Ever hear that one? I’ll admit, it’s one of my pet peeves. I’d be hard pressed to think of a movie where nothing actually happens; even in Jean Rollin movies something happens—it just takes a long time full of awkwardly extended close-ups to get there.

Of course, I guess there’s a time for all innocence to be lost and all naïveté to be shattered; for me, that time has come, for I have just borne witness to Ray Dennis Steckler’s The Hollywood Strangler Meets the Skid Row Slasher, a movie in which—honest to god!—absolutely nothing happens.

I suppose this isn’t entirely accurate, however. For nothing to truly happen, the screen would have to be blank for the film’s duration. Since this seems a rather cheap gimmick, even by Ray Dennis Steckler standards, Hollywood Strangler takes a rather novel approach: it takes a small bit of something and creates nothingness out of it. How does one do this, you ask? Let’s find out...

The “plot” of the plot-less film concerns the Hollywood Strangler (Pierre Agostini—incorrectly credited as “Agostino”), a lonely man who has the nasty habit of strangling models after photographing them topless. This man will eventually meet the Skid Row Slasher (Carolyn Brandt), a lonely woman who works in a bookstore and slits bums’ throats in alleys after hours.

When we first meet the Hollywood Strangler, he is doing the three things he does best: photographing a model, ranting in voice-over narration, and strangling a model. After this, he takes a walk to his neighborhood bookstore (which seems to contain about twelve books and has a cash register that’s a dresser drawer!) where he sees the beautiful Skid Row Slasher. Sitting outside, he watches a bum stagger in, take a few swigs of booze and then stagger out again. The Strangler then leaves, the Slasher closes shop, follows the bum out to the alley he crawled into and slits his throat, which causes red paint to appear all over it and bubble out of his mouth.

After this, the Strangler meets some more models, photographs them, and strangles them; the Slasher opens her book store, sits around until a bum staggers in, closes shop, and kills him; the Strangler meets some more models, photographs...

You see where it’s going? See how the repetition creates nothing out of something? Basically, this sequence repeats itself for about an hour before the whole thing draws to a close with the two finally meeting for the most lackluster confrontation ever. (Note to those who’ve seen it: I’m not opposed to the ending itself—I actually think it’s quite good in principle—; I’m just opposed to the fact that it could have occurred one cycle into the film rather than seven.)

Admittedly, there’s a little more charm here than in the other Steckler feature I’ve seen, Blood Shack, which was so lacking in cinematic value that its having a plot couldn’t even redeem it. For the first half-hour or so, Hollywood is kind of intriguing: it gives you exactly what it promises without any padding: boob after boob, strangling after strangling, slashing after slashing. However, about halfway into the film, things reach a point of overkill, and, like the masturbatory addict who conquers his addiction through over-indulgence, the audience grows weary of the repetition (have you been noticing it with the photos?). How long can we watch characters we know nothing about perform the same actions over and over again? Hollywood Strangler is like the Groundhog Day of horror flicks.

It doesn’t help things, either, that the entire movie was shot without sound and has been filled with Agostini’s ranting narration. While this might have been effective if used properly, again, the repetition simply mires the audience in boredom. If, during each murder, we had learned more about the Strangler’s character instead of the same information (hookers are trash, etc., etc.), the film might have been the slightest bit compelling. Similarly, the more interesting of the two characters, the Slasher, isn’t given one word of internal monologue, which squanders a valuable opportunity.

Of course, I suppose the whole film is really a squandered opportunity. After all, almost any variation could have made this a unique and possibly very affecting cinematic oddity. If we’d learned anything at all about the Slasher or the Strangler and their motivations, the film could have provided a fascinating character study; if the violence and sex had been ratcheted up a bit, this could have been a masterpiece of sleaze. Alas, it was not to be; Hollywood Strangler is just a good ten minutes of film re-interpreted six or seven times, and, in defiance of all mathematical logic, these good ten minutes repeated six times equal an hour of nigh unendurable tedium that only leaves the viewer wanting what could have been.

Any characterization of the Skid Row Slasher, for instance, could have made this entertaining; the movie clearly shows the pieces to be there. After all, she’s a mild-mannered bookstore-owner by day and a killer by night with a back room stuffed with more S&M accoutrements than de Sade’s chamber at Charenton, and Carolyn Brandt definitely has that Isabelle-Huppert-is-“The-Piano-Teacher” pretty-ugly vibe going on. If only Steckler had employed an ounce of imagination, even as much as he’d used on Blood Shack, he could have had a classic here; instead, we’re left with the cinematic equivalent of Purgatory—a void where nothing happens and even despair dies.

That said, at least the film itself has been gussied up fairly well by Media Blasters, courtesy of their Guilty Pleasures line. Presented in its 1.85:1 ratio with anamorphic enhancement, the film generally bears fairly bright colors and looks surprisingly good considering it was shot 25 years ago for a few thousand dollars by one guy with a camera and a light. Audio is really kind of a moot point, as the film wasn’t really supposed to have any, but what’s here is good enough, I suppose; all of the Strangler’s ranting narration can be heard loud and clear, for what it’s worth, though since this is the mother of all throw-away soundtracks as it is, none of that really matters.

The one gripe I have with this release is a major one, though—at least in principle. Around the 50-minute mark, the disk omits the entirety for chapter 9, which counts for about 8 minutes of missing footage (remember that this is a 71 minute movie with the 8 minutes). Now, of course, in reality, this doesn’t really matter. I can piece together what happens in this chapter with no problem: the Strangler meets yet another hooker, she dances around topless for a while and he strangles her, then the Slasher opens her book store and maybe closes it again in order to kill a bum. In reality, we’re not really missing much, and this glitch may in fact be making the movie more bearable; nevertheless, it’s the principle of the thing that matters, and I find it disturbing that when I picked this up in March, nine months after its June 2004 release, a disk with an error like this had not been recalled and no information had been posted on the internet about an exchange or re-pressing to fix the error.

While the film itself may not all be there (in more ways than one), extras are nevertheless in abundance. Starting things off is a 9-minute interview with Ray Dennis Steckler himself, who talks about what it’s like to make a film with your ex-wife and how he cast Pierre Agostini, an old friend of his, after the two met while being interviewed for jury duty. (I guess in some small way, Hollywood Strangler Meets the Skid-Row Slasher is just another wonderful blessing from our government.)

Next is a 9-minute, Steckler-conducted interview with Carolyn Brandt, who seems rather mystified not only that she has fans, but that they’d want to see her interviewed on a DVD. Nevertheless, Brandt comes off as a nice enough woman, which makes the viewer feel kind of sorry that fate conspired to give her a ticket onto the rapidly-sinking SS Steckler. News that she dances in Las Vegas reviews nevertheless reassures us, however, that she’s happy enough right now, so I guess no harm, no foul, right? I mean, even the Titanic had a few survivors...

Concluding the video extras are a still gallery, which provides a few interesting video covers but is mostly dispensable, and trailers for Blood Shack (another enraging Steckler oddity I’ve reviewed), Rat Pfink and Boo Boo, Slaughter Hotel and Jess Franco’s Nightmares Come at Night.

A commentary with Ray Dennis Steckler is also available, and, while it’s more interesting than the Blood Shack commentary, I still didn’t feel the need to listen to much of it; it frequently lapses into simple narration (“All right, there’s Carolyn...”), sing-song-y repetition (Steckler really has some strange rhetorical habits), and information that’s of limited interest.

Much more appealing is the intro and commentary by cult film critic Joe Bob Briggs, which, while not quite as brilliant as his track on the Blood Shack DVD, is nevertheless entertaining enough. Playing like a cross between Mystery Science Theater 3000 and a subtitle fact-track, Joe Bob alternately takes pot shots at the threadbare production and provides fascinating background information about the film. Thankfully, too, the DVD glitch coincides pretty much perfectly with pauses in his commentary, which means it doesn’t seem like we’re missing much. Sadly, while it is entertaining, the commentary isn’t necessarily the best of Joe Bob’s work, though this really isn’t so much a fault of his; after all, the film is so repetitious that it really gives him very little material to work with. After all, how many times can he observe that the Slasher’s bookstore has about as wide a variety of reading material available as an illiterate’s tool-shed? Eventually, the mind-numbing repetitiveness of it all even starts to break Joe Bob’s saintly patience, leading to his outburst of “Please, God! Make her stop doing that!” as Brandt opens her bookstore yet again. Still, Briggs proves how entertaining he’s capable of being during the film’s one break from its repetitive cycle, which consists of a peculiar scene in a topless roller disco. All in all, while it’s not his best work, Briggs’ commentary is still miles about the film’s actual soundtrack, and so I guess I’ve got to say that, since this is the only reason I bought this DVD, I’m satisfied with what I got (despite the fact that there are assumedly 8 minutes of missing commentary floating around out there somewhere).

So, anyway, is this thing worth picking up? Sure, if you’re a Joe Bob Briggs fan or one of those masochists who likes “later-era” Ray Dennis Steckler productions (I’ve heard his earlier films are much better, but I’ve never seen them, so with respect to this I will keep my mouth shut—for now). However, if you’re looking for an entertaining piece of schlock or even a DVD that works properly, I’d stay clear; all around, The Hollywood Strangler Meets the Skid Row Slasher is a monument to unrealized potential.