EASTER CASKET (2013)

Available for to rent or own on Vimeo here (Look out! The link is NSFW)
Directed by Dustin Mills
Written by Dustin Mills
Starring Josh Eal, Erin R. Ryan, Brandon Salkil, Allison Fitzgerald
Watch the trailer here!

One thing you can always count on in a Dustin Mills film is that you’re going to see a lot of boobs. There’ll be a fucked up FEEBLES-like puppet or two. And the level of insanity is cranked to 14. Churning out films faster than I can watch them, Mills has an impressive lineup of grossout comedy horror films under his belt with ZOMBIE A-HOLE, THE PUPPET MONSTER MASSACRE, NIGHT OF THE TENTACLES, and my favorite BATH SALT ZOMBIES. Mills is at it again, this time taking on modern religion with EASTER CASKET, a film to watch right after you find that last Easter egg in the yard.

Though I must admit, some of the humor in EASTER CASKET is quite lowbrow; all of the usual jokes are used from sexually repressed clergy to commenting on chocolate eggs looking like “little poops” as one nun notes. But still, I found a lot to love in this DIY indie.

Mills continues his own special brand of lunacy casting a hand puppet as the Easter Bunny, Peter Cottontail. But this time, Cottontail has an agenda to combat the Catholic Church who decides that the pagan rituals of coloring and hiding eggs, gifting Easter Baskets, and idolizing a magical bunny should be abolished in favor of focusing on the death and rebirth of Christ. Cottontail ain’t having it and strikes out on a holy Jihad, wiping out nuns and priests in sacrilegious fashion.

I found myself laughing a lot at the twists, turns, and atomic wedgies unleashed on religious tropes. A knight from the Vatican is sent out by the all-powerful Mega-Pope (a talking Oz-like head) who reports to the night, Father Asher, that there’s a disturbance in the Christoshpere. Mega-Pope arms the knight with a Holy Hand Grenade to be used at just the right time. There are multiple references to a dead nun’s pubic hair, stating that one would think it would be a “gnarly nun bush” but turns out it’s quite coiffed and much humor comes in the repetition of that line. One amazing computer animated sequence has Asher taking on a flock of flesh-eating peeps with a broadsword. And the whole thing wraps up with a giant Easter Bunny puppet going all Godzilla on a cardboard city and some toy jet fighters.

If any of that listed lunacy made you giggle in the slightest, then you are the right person for EASTER CASKET. It’s absurd, it’s tasteless, and Mills proves himself again as an underground directors like few others, combining some ingenious computer animation with real life comedy. Some of the acting is wooden and/or over the top, but it fits the low fi mood of the whole thing and adds to the charm instead of takes away from it. If you’re a fan of laughing when most folks are gasping and don’t mind low budget horror (remember, at one time, such cult favorites you drool over like THE HILLS HAVE EYES and EVIL DEAD were once considered to be in this category), I think EASTER CASKET and any of the offbeat horrors Dustin Mills has to offer is something you’re not going to want to miss.