Intensive Care 

Slasher Trash with Panache?

Review:JA Kerswell

Thinking Hippocratic Oath be damned, a deranged and horribly disfigured medic wakes from a coma and embarks on a killing spree on New Year’s Eve. Either incredibly late to the party or the first nod to a slasher revival, this Dutch (masquerading as North American) effort is very much a film of three parts: starting with Eurotrash insanity, segueing into a cheesy teenage love triangle, before a closing act that serves as a greatest hits of ‘80s stalk-n-slash. 
 
Dr Bruckner (played by George Kennedy for about the first 8 minutes of the movie, more on that later) is an egomaniacal surgeon who doesn’t take kindly to criticism (in the first scene, we see him in the operating theatre stabbing the entrails of a patient with a scalpel after he makes a mistake; walking off to leave his colleagues to fix the bloody mess). His humour is not improved when his colleague, Dr Horvath (Jules Croiset), informs him that the board has decided that his brain-swapping experiments are too dangerous and, despite getting a grant, the hospital is cancelling his trial. Now royally pissed off, Dr Bruckner gets behind the wheel of his car and inadvertently drives into an oncoming truck at high speed, resulting in a fiery inferno.
 
Fast forward seven years and, despite surviving a seemingly unsurvivable accident, Dr Bruckner (no longer played by George Kennedy!) is horribly charred and lying in a coma ward at the hospital. There, the orderlies make fun of the patients, placing dime-store Halloween masks on their faces. Peter (Koen Wauters), one of these reprobates, is trying to get back together with his ex-girlfriend (and next-door neighbour), Amy (Nada van Nie). However, she cuts him off on her talking mouth teddy bear telephone because she is dating the teenager from the other house next door, Ted (Dick van den Toorn). As Peter is closing up his shift, Dr Bruckner revives and kills a nurse (who looks like she has been hit by Homer Simpson’s makeup gun) by twisting her head clean round. Presumably offended by having a cheap Halloween mask put on his face, Dr Bruckner decides to—in what might be a slight overreaction—follow Peter home and kill everyone in the close vicinity before the clock hits midnight … 

INTENSIVE CARE is an oddity even by the standards of other Euro slashers. It is hard to get a handle on whether this was meant to be in part pastiche or was seriously intended throughout. As I mentioned, it is a film very much in three parts. The first third of the movie is pure bad movie heaven (intentional or otherwise). George Kennedy had graduated from warning teenagers ten years previously in JUST BEFORE DAWN (1981) to slaughtering them (or at least a body double half his girth does) and hams it up for all he’s worth as the dastardly Dr Bruckner in the few scenes he’s in. 

The overacting, arch dialogue, the subplot about Tupperware, and that talking teddy-phone are just so over-the-top that they bring to mind the likes of the Belgian RABID GRANNIES (1988). Now, that’s a good thing if you enjoy that kind of Euro-insanity as I do. This is only amplified by the lost art of Eurotrash English dubbing (where it sounds like everyone was drinking in the studio and egging each other on to do ever more ridiculous voices), which only serves to elevate the enjoyment factor (note: it has been suggested that INTENSIVE CARE was shot in two versions—both in English and Dutch—but the credits nix this idea listing the English voice performers meaning it was later dubbed into English, but some sources say that a Dutch and separate Flemish cut was made). 

However, unfortunately, the film’s zany energy dissipates somewhat once the middle section settles into a love triangle between the neighbouring teens, as Dr Bruckner inexplicably shuffles around in the shrubbery outside. Admittedly, it does feature Peter playing sexy saxophone to his cat and a scene where Amy, her kid brother, Bobby (Michiel Hess) (this movie’s little Tommy Jarvis), and Peter make like THE PARTDRIDGE FAMILY and do an impromptu music jam. There’s also the bizarro scene where Amy tells Peter that he is like a brother to her and that’s all he will ever be, before he rips open her blouse exposing her breasts, and then they proceed to fuck. The film then shifts gears again into a relatively straightforward slasher, with the seemingly unkillable Dr Bruckner chasing and trying to kill the teenagers whilst roaring for some reason like an angry seal. Here, at least, it achieves some level of Boo!-type suspense with a splattering of gore (including an unfortunate cop having his eye poked out). There is also a nicely ironic touch that Bruckner is eventually taken out in a way very fitting for New Year’s Eve.

INTENSIVE CARE remains the only Dutch slasher film directed by a woman. She goes to great lengths to make it appear as though the action takes place in the United States. Much like the interminable American Football game playing on the television in Joe D’Amato’s ABSURD (1981), here Peter watches—seemingly entranced—a TV weather forecast for the state of Florida. It was primarily made for the export market, with a budget of 1.8 million guilders, yet the irony is that, while popular in Belgium and the Netherlands (at least on video), it was largely unreleased in its English cut until recently. Apparently, the film bombed at local cinemas despite the presence of Koen Wauters, the singer of Clouseau, Belgium’s most popular band, and the popular actress Nada van Nie.
 
Disjointed and demented in equal measures. Ultimately, as my watching companion said, “This is the kind of film that can only be watched with wine.” Cheers!  

BODY COUNT 7: 
Female 2 / Male 5

1. Female has her head twisted around
2. Male is hit in the face with a medical implement
3. Female Killed (method unseen)
4. Male has his throat slit
5. Male is found dead
   
6. Male is stabbed in the eye
   
7. Male is blown up with fireworks

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