"Death Scenes"(1989)d/Nick Bougas

Due to the overwhelming sales/rental success of the "Faces of Death" series, the mid to late eighties saw the release of a gaggle of direct-to-video death-related shockumentaries, most being detritus of the fifth generation ghosts variety, padded with staged sequences, stock WW2 concentration camp footage, and unthrilling primitive tribal ceremonies.That is, until Wavelength Video entered the sweepstakes at the end of the decade with its 'Death Scenes' series, and raised or lowered the bar, depending on your personal perspective of the admittedly ghoulish sub-genre.The pioneer effort enlists the persona of one Anton LaVey, of The Church of Satan fame, as host/narrator, as the camera peruses vintage crime scene/morgue table photographs from a morbid scrapbook kept by a retired LAPD homicide detective.That the snapshots are black and white does not lessen the visceral impact on the viewer in the slightest.Like a visualization of the most explicitly brutal goregrind song titles one could fathom, the worst crimes humanity could possibly commit unflinchingly pass before the lens.I gotta tell you, no matter who you think you are or how insensitive you might think you are towards real death, there are some images here that'll send your very soul running for the dry cleaners.For serious.

The Devil = Crabby Appleton.
An intro monologue about death given by host Anton LaVey, trying his best to look ominous in a foppish chapeau in front of what looks like the same stone finish wood paneling my mom had up in her kitchen in the seventies leads us into the tattered catologue of crime scene and morgue table photographs dating as far back as the 1920's and finishing up in the 1950's.LaVey kicks the tour all off with some nice suicides.One to the temple from a handgun.As we move into post-depression Los Angeles, we're shown countless shotgun headwounds(and a few where there isn't much head left to wound).Young and old alike seek refuge from the tribulations of daily life with a well-placed bullet or scattershot cartridge.We then move to hangings, both self-imposed and backwoods justice-style, as evidenced by one particularly powerful shot of a lynched black some twenty feet off the ground and what looks to be an entire town of people underneath to coldly bear witness.Then there's ritual disembowelment(Harakiri), opened veins, ingested rat poison, and starvation.Murder-suicides are examined next with several examples of crimes of passion followed by grief-stricken self-murder.Blood splashed cadavers in the bathtub.Faces blown off by point blank shotgun blasts.Bodies chucked into the ocean and drowned.Wives eviscerated by carving knives and mothers-in-law beaten to death with meat tenderizers.An ex-law officer kills and dismembers his unfaithful wife, hiding her severed head and hands in his own home to look at them whenever he liked.One woman dices her best friends up and ships the body segments across the country via train in steamer trunk and luggage(and is later released back into society, wow.)."Bluebeard" Watson kills twenty-five of his forty wives(!), douses them with flesh-eating acid and buries or tosses them into nearby rivers, and is later discovered to possess both male and female genitalia(!!), a true hermaphrodite(!!!).Death comes to the Latino community as several husbands cite marijuana usage as the reason behind slaying their wives in domestic disputes(c'mon now!).

Medical prognosis: Wind knocked out.
A woman's throat is slashed and her powerful assailant drives a carving knife into her trunk with such force, her body is nailed to the hardwood floor.Guttings by broken wine bottles.Coroners piecing together dismembered corpses.A dead pimp on a morgue slab reveals an endowment like a length of black garden hose.Axe murders.A montage of brutal violence against women.The bloodless gunshots of Hollywood westerns.Celebrity death.Thelma Todd, Jean Harlow's husband's suicide( her own death would come as a result of his vicious cane beating on their wedding night when she found out he possessed "the genitals of a small boy"!), the rasor bissection of the "Black Dahlia" murder, Marie Provost(partially eaten by her dachshund!), Lupe Velez's secanol slumber, Three Stooges straightman Ted Healy's deadly drunken brawl, and a sampling of mugshots of the day, with the crimes etched underneath: child neglect, sodomy and carnal abuse(!), "sale" marijuana(I prefer HG nuggs myself), attack "sex", and even... mental case(!).A man's entire skin found at the city dump.Bloody shootouts between gangsters and coppers.Gangland executions.Dillinger.Bonnie and Clyde."Pretty Boy" Floyd."Babyface" Nelson.Death by elephantiasis.Accidental gas leaks.Car accidents, plane crashes, and fires all see some lens time.Sex crimes and despicable child slayings.The Lindbergh baby kidnapping/murder.More unspeakably ghastly remnants of the murder of children follow.When you're sure it couldn't get more savage, the crime scenes of rape-murders are depicted.Finally, we end with the casualties of war.Phew, that wasn't easy.

The handiwork of "Steve the Ripper".Don't look at me, I wasn't even born yet.
Bougas, who dropped vocals on LaVey's 'Satan Takes a Holiday' cd(personal fave of mine), as well as copping a research consultant credit on Nikolas Shreck's Charles Manson, Superstar(1989), went on to helm the equally gross-but-far more entertaining 1992 follow up, the cleverly titled 'Death Scenes 2', which boasts(?) of color Manson crime scene and morgue table photography, frame-by-frame Vic Morrow death, and super slo-mo R. Bud Dwyer footage, as well as the third installment the year after.And if that weren't enough, a coffee table book of the same name featuring all the same grim photography was collaborated upon by Katherine Dunn and retired detective Jack Huddleston and released by Feral House in 2000.I've held the thing in my hands with intent to purchase about five times since, but the selection of dead infants and children always seems to put the kibosh on that.I've always prided myself on my titanium constitution when it comes to any type of gore, real included, but brutalized kids of any age is a fucking drag and not high on my list of favorite things to see.Still, Scenes is unparallelled in its delivery of the shockumentary goods(and bads) and remains a necessary puzzle piece in the oft-gruesome subgenre.Four wops.

Stewed, screwed, and tattooed.