Beware of “The Greasy Strangler”

There are some films I want to rave about, and then there are films that I want to warn you about. Be prepared to flee in abject ambivalence from The Greasy Strangler.

A pure-blooded exploitation film that takes no prisoners and offers no apologies for its excesses, The Greasy Strangler revolves around a father and son team who like to eat foods with lots of, you guessed it, grease. In their down time the duo give “disco tours” that consist of showing paying customers run down houses where one-time disco crooners once lived.

The family that eats together stays together and yet the father and son who kill together still have difficulties living in the same house. Dad pours extra grease over his morning grapefruit and steals his son’s girlfriend. When the old man goes on a killing spree he climbs naked into a barrel of grease, performs his criminal mischief and then walks to his friendly car wash and scrubs the grease off his still naked body.

This movie will play well to a theater full of people who like the communal experience of being grossed out. The Greasy Strangler is much more visceral than what I have described.

The Greasy Strangler is currently playing in an exclusive engagement at the Vintage Park Alamo Drafthouse.

by Michael Bergeron