Affluent Heap: Society (1989)

My dear readers, although something about my manner seems to give the impression that I am perfectly at home among people of considerable means, the truth is I have never been comfortable rubbing shoulders with the well-to-do. I find the terminology of entrenched wealth to be a tad challenging and I am constantly flummoxed by the rules of decorum at formal gatherings. The matter of silverware, to provide but a single example, is one which I often find to be challenging. I never seem to remember which knife is for cheeses, which is for poultry and which is used to defend oneself should the servants descend into violent rebellion. The business of extracting a serrated blade from a mutinous chap’s ribcage in front a room of people who are well aware that such knives are only meant for bread can be an appalling embarrassment, just the sort of scene that might see one disinvited from future dinner parties.

Billy (Billy Warlock) is similarly uncomfortable with the stodgy upper class. He was born a Whitney, a surname that carries a healthy amount of weight among the Beverly Hills elite. Yet Billy feels an eerie disconnect from his family and the world of privilege they inhabit. Though his parents and sister seem encouraging enough, he cannot help but feel that he does not belong. Billy’s feeling of separation is reinforced rather vigorously by the appearance of an audio recording, one that suggests his sister’s debutante ball was merely a cover for a well-attended and deeply incestuous orgy. And as though puritan differences about behavior in the bedroom weren’t enough of a wedge between them, it seems his family and their moneyed associates may also dabble in murder and cannibalism.

Sadly, neither Billy’s girlfriend nor his therapist prove to be a sympathetic audience when presented with these admittedly audacious accusations. The only person who seems genuinely interested in what he has to say is Clarissa Carly (Devin DeVasquez), a mysterious and beautiful woman whose sudden appearances and disappearances lure Billy into a bit of a heated state. But Clarissa is of good breeding and high stature, making her just as suspect as any member of society’s upper crust. And to make matters more complicated, Billy discovers that the wealthy are not merely incestuous cannibalistic murderers -- they are an entirely separate and highly malleable species.

For some reason Billy finds it difficult to relate to his father

Even with the appearance of men whose heads have been substituted for palms and posteriors, it is still difficult to view a film so suffused with social inequality and not ask what serious underlying message is being conveyed. The genius of effects artist Screaming Mad George is marvelous to behold and it can easily lead us to forget that we are watching the rich literally feasting on the less fortunate. And yet past all the visceral delights, it is clear the statement director Brian Yuzna means to make -- being rich is an awful lot of fun. Obviously, Mr. Yuzna’s involvement with films featuring pulsing brain tentacles and decapitated heads committing sexual assault catapulted him into the gilded world of fortune and influence, a world whose pleasures he found impossible to resist.

This support of gleeful extravagance spills abundantly into Society. The joy with which the prosperous meld their bodies into cohesive piles of flesh is positively intoxicating and while I have always pursued the two activities separately, fornicating and feasting simultaneously does look like quite the treat. Even the bloody demise of one of their own is an occasion for a quip rather than a lugubrious pause, a sign that there is simply too much fun to be had to waste time on mourning. It may seem a trifle insensitive to viewers with fewer resources, rubbing it all in their faces like this. And yet I would challenge the staunchest of Marxists to gaze upon this film’s jolly, affluent heap of tissue and ask if they could truly ignore the charms of hedonistic excess. I doubt even old Karl himself could turn down a quick dip in the skin pond.

Society runs 99 minutes and is rated R for bizarre sexuality, violence and language.