PussyCake (Emesis: El Amor Mata) (2021)
a review by Evan Landon
Now, I know what you are thinking: “are we reviewing pornography now?” or “how does a pussy or a cake even go together?” or, my favorite, “seriously. . is this pornography?”
No, sir. This is an Argentinian horror film. In fact, Argentina has been releasing tons of fantastic horror movies, as of recent. Titles such as When Evil Lurks, Terrified, The Wailing, Into The Abyss, and History of the Occult spring immediately to mind, but there is surely more to come.
Let me set this horror masterpiece up for you: an all-girl pop band (that everyone seems to love, or at least enough for them to have a manager) is out enjoying their tour, but then their van breaks down. That serves to be a minor inconvenience to the stylistic group of vixens because their van happens to break down in a town under attack by a body-snatching inter-dimensional final boss that plants humans in the ground so it can attach roly-polies to the backs of their heads, thus making them his braindead killer zombies army. Pretty simple, right?
I mean, there is a loose origin story at the beginning about a kid trying to find out about his father creating man-made blackholes that should be discussed a lot more, but you get the drift. All the same, these girls act just like anyone else their age would, as immature rockstars, taking copious amounts of drugs and fucking around with the other band members. As a former musician and band member, I can tell you that is a BIG problem in bands.
PussyCake (Emesis: El Amor Mata) is the first film that I have witnessed by prolific Argentinian sci-fi/horror director Pablo Parés and am flummoxed as to how I have never crossed paths with any of his films until now! I am now currently running through his catalog of titles such as Daemonium: Underground Soldier, Plaga Zombie: American Invasion, I Am Toxic, and Doctor Cerebro which I will gladly watch and report back what I find.
By the way, I might be the only person who gives these movies favorable reviews, so make your own decisions when it comes to what you watch. Or what I watch. I know that nobody agrees with everything I do because I don't agree with everybody else about everything they do. So there. Formulate your own opinions. That being said, it seems that this one did not get a lot of favorable reviews and that is just fine.
As with any horror film, I love my gore and this one has it in spades. Pablo Parés started his production company Cine Salvaje and Bum-Fi-Bum with his brother, then distributed through FARSA Producciones that does a lot of audiovisual work all over Argentinian television and film. Their production value and cinematography is miles above what we do with our practical effects in horror films these days.
Described as a “horror musical”, there really is not any aspects of a musical, unless you count their rendition of their hit song, “Espejos de una Tormenta”, which is not played by the actresses (who do a fantastic job btw), but by Pablo Fuu, who is huge in the Argentinian horror scene and deserves a lot more international credit. I also think it's hilarious how the girls in the band all have the last name “cake” like they are The Ramones. I mean, their names are literally Elle Cake, Sara Cake, Sofi Cake, and Juli Cake.
Like I said, PussyCake (Emesis: El Amor Mata) is not going to change the mind of any sane person. A foreign horror film described as Josie & The Pussycats meets Evil Dead is ill-equipped to do that, but to those of us who delight in this dumb, gory fun, it is fundamentally everything we ask for... and boy, does it deliver!
4 Out Of 5