Anyone get the new Andy Milligan book yet?

[Avowed Cultural Snob]

Reportedly, Jimmy McDonough's new book on Andy Milligan, The Ghastly One, reveals a life as depraved and disgusting as one of Milligan's movies-yet is extremely well written, and sympathetic to its subject. It received high marks from no less than Richard Corliss, Time Magazine's esteemed critic, who even wrote a long piece on Milligan for Time on-line. But in the face of all of this newfound praise for the most consistently inept director who ever lived, I can only lament: MST3K, where are you? We still need to mold the aesthetic values of the unwashed masses, and it is my eternal regret that you never had the chance to tear apart the oeuvre of the most wretched of auteurs. Had not fair Crow and dear Tom steered clear of Messr. Milligan's fetid celluid concotions, they would be recognized for the worthless flotsam they truly were, instead of being hailed as the works of a "genius". Such is what passes for art nowadays...

[Chris K.]

Andy Milligan is truely a genius at his master craft at making a movie on a small budget. Milligan's films ARE NOT "worthless flotsam" but films that ultametly tell the truth about life. Yes, the truth about life! We have Speilberg and Disney making candy coated features that are in a "black and white society". Yet Milligan made gritty features that showed that their are perverts, psychos, madmen, etc. who are out there and need to be controled before it gets out of hand. Milligan had good writing tallent (his scripts are that of Shakespeare's tragic plays), solid 16mm camerawork, and passible acting from people who acted in theatre groups and not on the edge of the streets in the guttar. And like with Shakespeare's plays, Milligan shows love, tragedy, and death which are key elements in Shakespeare's plays.

The reason why Milligan's are unwatchable is what the distributors did to them such as cutting out important scenes or advertising them as sexploitation features when they are not of that genre! Plus, critics at the time of Milligan's rise liked his films for their entertainment value, NOT FOR BUDGET REASONS OR WELL KNOWN ACTORS! That's not what Milligan's films are all about.

Milligan died of AIDS in 1991 and that to showed that he was a tormented old soul. His mommy was a b***h, his whole family were wackos who never commited, his distributors were penny pinching bastards who cheated him out of his fair share, and he almost fell into poverty! Now that is a man who SUFFERS FOR HIS WORK. Milligan used these themes in his films to show what he is going through and what others go through. In other words: he is showing the real world. And his work is still impressive. So how is this man a "bad filmmaker". I'd rather have this talented man behind the camera than Tom Green (FREDDY GOT FINGERED) or Michael Bay (PEARL HARBOR). Compare Milligan to these a***oles and you can easily tell who has more tallent and imagination!

Milligan's best features are THE BODY BENEATH (1971), VAPORS (1965), THE GHASTLY ONES (1967), LEGACY OF HORROR (1978), BLOOD! (1974), THE MAN WITH TWO HEADS (1972) and BLOODTHRISTY BUTCHERS (1970).

Becasue of Hollywood and their tendency to call the independent market a "bad production" is what ruins filmmakers, like Andy Milligan or Herschell Gordon Lewis, a chance to go out there and make something better.

[Avowed Cultural Snob]

Next thing you know, you'll be telling me that Manos is a triumph of guerilla filmmaking at its finest.

[Chris K.]

I found MANOS to be a dull-as-ditchwater feature that tries to be a good film but at the same time fails miserably. MANOS is not "a triumph of guerilla filmmaking at it's finest", yet Milligan's films are.

If my earlier response sounds like I snapped at your opinion on the Staten Island auteur, don't be offended. It sounds like I am p**sed off, but in turn I am being quite honest about what I think about the man and his work. And hey, why not a bio on a legendary filmmaker like Milligan? He is an artist like that of van Gough, Michaelangelo, or DiVinci who were misunderstood people who died for their work like Andy Milligan did and in turn became famous later on.

I think what easily describes how Milligan is a good filmmaker is that he had the balls to make a film for little money, get it released, and keep going an extra mile. He may have been a bit "weird", but weirdness makes his work even better. And at least he tried. I defnd this man because his work is really worth something special. Think how Sam Rami became a mainstream director after THE EVIL DEAD, a low budget horror flick with no name actors. Or what about Peter Jackson's BAD TASTE, a low budget horror-comedy that lead Peter to mainstream and his upcoming THE LORD OF THE RINGS trillogy.

Yes, Andy didn't make it that far but HE TRIED. And that is how he suffered for his work. The director of MANOS went nowhere, Andy Milligan went somewhere. And the thing about this is Andy now has a bio, the director of MANOS does not! That just shows who is the gifted director.