My streaming gem

My streaming gem: why you should watch Terror Firmer

Continuing our series of writers recommending underappreciated films is a shoutout for one of Troma’s most gonzo B-movies

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A film about a series of hilariously grotesque murders on a B-movie film set certainly isn’t going to be to everyone’s taste. But if you’ve ever enjoyed the gross-out stylings of early Peter Jackson or the whack-a-mole, no-holds-barred comedy of South Park then this is a good jumping on point to embrace the long, storied history of Troma Entertainment.

Troma has been making exploitation movies since the 70s, with more cult horror classics under its belt than Freddie Krueger has kills. The independent studio’s main flirtation with the mainstream came via the Toxic Avenger series, as gory and gross as anything else it produced, but somehow deemed suitable for a children’s TV spin-off in the 90s when everything from MC Hammer’s magic shoes to the California Raisins were worthy of animated immortality. To be clear: Troma is definitely not suitable for kids.

I first came across Terror Firmer by accident on TV late one night, as a too-young-for-this teenager. A more perfect way to stumble upon the works of director (and studio co-founder) Lloyd Kaufman I could not imagine. In many ways it is the ur-Troma, a distillation and compilation of everything great (and not so great) about its brand of movie-making.

Set during the filming of a low-budget exploitation movie in New York being directed by an insane blind director (played by Kaufman), it was loosely based on the book All I Need to Know about Filmmaking I Learned from The Toxic Avenger which was co-written by Kaufman and James Gunn, just a few years before he wrote Scooby Doo. It’s no wonder that Gunn’s sense of humour nearly cost him his place in the big time, when old tweets saw him fired (then rehired) by Disney.

The Troma film within a Troma film gives plenty of opportunities for in-jokes – and no chance is passed up. The succession of nodding winks to the company’s past will mostly be lost on Troma virgins (Toxie pops up, as does the Penis Monster from Tromeo and Juliet), but the gags pour forth at such a rate that there’s bound to be something in there to tickle you.