Saturday, January 6, 2024

MONDO NEW YORK (1988) (MVD Rewind Collection Blu-ray Review)

MONDO NEW YORK (1988)
2-Disc Collector's Edition Blu-ray + CD

Director Harvey Keith’s 1988 documentary Mondo New York (1988), which was produced by Night Flight creator Stuart S. Shapiro, opens with notorious no-wave performance artist Lydia Lunch (The Gun is Loaded) giving a monologue with the NYC skyline behind her; "Home to outcasts, misfits, losers, perverts, lunatics, gangsters, pranksters, outlaws, neurotics, psychotics, maniacs, brainiacs, hippies, yippies, yuppies, junkies, flunkies, monkeys, all trying to claw their way to the top of trash heap, all screaming me, me, I want my fame my fortune, my lousy fifteen minutes, my, what the fuck whatever it is - You want it? We got it! It's MONDO NEW YORK."

We then meet a nameless young woman (Shannah Laumeister Stern, Vegas Vacation) who wanders through the streets of Manhattan where she encounters junkies weirdos, and the strange and shocking performance artists found in the basement clubs and alternative performance spaces of New York City in the 1980's, a time before the city was sanitized and Disney-fied. One of her first encounters is a band headed by Phoebe Legere (The Toxic Avenger II) performing the song "Marilyn Monroe" as the singer (Legere) jaunts around stage, writhing on the ground provocatively and flicking the bean, which makes for quite a spectacle. Then onto a church (of all places!) where a performance artist calling himself Professor Mambuzu (Joe Coleman) delivers a weirdo monologue, bites the heads off of two seemingly still alive white mice and then sets his shirt on fire which sets off firecrackers strapped to his chest. A bit later she peeps through a hole in the wall and witnesses a man (Frank Moore, Sex O'Clock U.S.A.) with what looks to be some degenerative muscular disease in a wheelchair being danced around and upon by nude women, Veronica Vera (Night Hunger) and Annie Sprinkle (Young Nurses in Love), whose are bodies are painted.

Up next on this tour of NYC decadence is an encounter with the gender-bending Devilish Joey Arias (Big Top Pee-Wee) in a neighborhood performance art-installation junkyard crooning "Fish Out Of Water", before heading to Washington Square Park to watch  comedians Charlie Barnett (D.C. Cab) and Rick Aviles ("Rat Man" from TV's The Stand) perform stand-up centered around racial and homosexual stereotypes. that would certainly get them both cancelled today in New York minute. Other encounters include a monologue from Ann Magnuson (The Hunger), an unsavory cock-fight, a sex-slave auction, the kinky tune "Hustle With My Muscle" by John Sex, some threatening poetry from Emilio Cubeiro (Subway Riders), scenes from the mosh pit at CBGBs during a ripping performance of The Dictators "New York New York" by Manitoba's Wild Kingdom, performance art not involving yams but egg yolks and glitter from Karen Finley, and closing the flick with a wild performance of "Fuck You" from Dean Johnson & The Weenies, a tune that rails against pop-culture and capitalism.

As a late 80's shockumentary it succeeds, an anti-yuppie tour de force as odyssey through the seedier side of NYC, chock full of shock, sex and bad taste. At times it tries a bit too hard to be "mondo", and I could have lived without seeing the heads bitten off live mice and a chicken, that kind of animal cruelty is just not necassary and will likely be a deal-breaker for anyone with an aversion to such nonsense contemplating a watch, but as a time capsule of the late-80s NYC underground scene I found it quite a fascinating doc. 

Audio/Video: Mondo New York (1988) makes it's Blu-ray debut from MVD Rewind Collection in 1080p HD framed in 1.78:1 widescreen, sourced from a brand new 2K HD transfer from the original camera negative. Having never seen it before I cannot say how this compares to past releases but I thought it looked excellent here; the source shows some blemish by way of minor scratches and speckling in spots but grain looks solid colors are pleasing and the black levels are adequate. There are some inconsistencies here owing tot he way it was originally films, some scenes are blurry or soft-focused, but this is baked-in to the source.  Audio comes by way of uncompressed LPCM 2.0 stereo with optional English subtitles. The track is clean and free of any major issues, the source does have some audio that I strained to decipher as levels dip a bit due tot he way ot was recorded, so I was thankful for the subtitles, but overall it sounds authentic to the source. 

On disc extras include a 50-min producer/performer Interview with Joe Coleman; a 50-min Interview with Joey Arias; a 36-min Interview with Shannah Laumeister and a 27-min Interview with producer Stuart Shapiro, plus a Photo Gallery. The interviews which were filmed in 2022 are all pretty great, exploring the explore the boundaries the doc pushed, question what art is, gender identity and much more. We also get an 14-track Soundtrack CD featuring music and stand-up from Johnny Pacheco & Louis Perico Ortiz, Rick Aviles, Phoebe Legere, Dean And The Weenies, Manitoba's Wild Kingdom, Joey Arias and John Sex. and it makes for uneven listening just as it did uneven watching. 

The 2-disc Blu-ray/CD arrives in a standard keepcase with a Reversible Sleeve of Artwork which is replicated on the Limited Edition (First Pressing Only) Slipcover. Inside there's an 18-Page Illustrated Booklet Booklet with new writing of the film by Producer/Creator Stuart S. Shapiro chock full of archival images, and we get a Collectible 2-Sided Mini-Poster.

Special Features: 
- Brand new 2K HD transfer from the original camera negative presented in its original 1.78:1 aspect ratio LPCM 2.0 Stereo Audio
- Optional English Subtitles
- Interview with Joe Coleman (HD, 49:33)
- Interview with Joey Arias (HD, 49:48)
- Interview with Shannah Laumeister (HD, 36:16)
- Interview with producer Stuart Shapiro (HD, 27:20)
- Photo Gallery (80 Images) 
- Soundtrack CD (14 Songs, 36 min) 
- 18-Page Illustrated Booklet
- Reversible Sleeve of Artwork
- Collectible 2-Sided Mini-Poster
- Limited Edition Slipcover

This at time over-the-top, shocking/disturbing cult-classic 80's shockumentary is a pretty mondo time capsule of New York City at a time when it was still edgy and dangerous, clearly made in the vein of Mondo Cane and a cool companion piece of sorts to the cult punk rock doc D.O.A: A Right of Passage - which is also on Blu-ray from the MVD Rewind Collection. 

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