Meat for Satan's Icebox (2004)

A dark and grainy tale of women being tortured  with no regard for boundaries whatsoever. I can truly say I have not run across a movie like this in a long, long time - it was nonstop, relentless horror of the sleaziest, most depressing kind.  I can't quite put it into words, so let's have a look.

 Cassandra (Diana Silvio) runs a place called Satan's Icebox, where rich cannibals pay top dollar to literally eat young girls.

One of Cassandra's employees, Janet (Tiffany Apan), just can't do it any more.   Cassandra tells her that if she leaves, she'll take her daughter and make her the next main course.

Janet says goodbye to her friend Daphne (Jasmine Short). 

Oblivious to the cannibalism, Daphne thanks Janet for the opportunity to work here.

Daphne then goes to the room with the rich cannibals and performs for them.

She doesn't realize she's about to be their next meal.

Daphne is forced down into the basement and butchered.

 Janet drives her daughter Cindy (Crystal Aura) to safety.  

Janet herself is killed by the Satan's Icebox thugs, but Cindy escapes and makes it to her father's house.

 One year later, we find Cindy at a Catholic school.  She's in the midst of a quarrel with her arch enemy at the school, Jessica (Stephanie Settlemire), who has stolen her boyfriend, Simon (Grant Settlemire).

Jessica and Cindy get into a fight rolling on the playground.

Christian (Dennis M. Kusluch II) is a boy who fancies Cindy, but the feeling is not mutual. Christian arrives at a house where he makes a delivery; a rather odd scene involving a police officer and a woman - played by the same actor in drag.

Cindy's home life is a nightmare.  Her father is an incestuous creep.

Her creep father introduces Cindy to Charles Maddox (Daniel Baxter). It so happens that Charles co-owns Satan's Icebox with Cassandra.

Back at Satan's Icebox, Cassandra is torturing Dorothy (Heather Lucas).

Dorothy's backside is branded.

Charles then cuts Dorothy's throat.

Dorothy is then served up for dinner.

In the school bathroom, Cindy is pleased with her handiwork.  She wrote "Jessica eats girls" on the mirror.

Suddenly, a man bursts out of the stall and grabs Cindy.  She's choked and knocked out - then dragged back into the stall.

Then Jessica enters the bathroom and sees the writing on the mirror.

The cannibal is about to cut into Cindy when the stall door opens.

Jessica walks in - but instead of trying to help, she reports her to the principal.  

The nun in charge spanks Cindy mercilessly.  When things get out of hand, Cindy grabs the sister's spiked paddle and kills her with it.

Cindy and Christian make an escape from their hellish lives, but are caught and tied-up by a cannibal.  Charles Maddox, arrives in the nick of time. Pretending to be their savior, he releases them from their bonds. Little do they realize, it's out of the frying pan and into the fire.

At the Icebox, Charles chokes out Cindy.  

Christian is beat up badly, then thrown in a cell.  Cassandra arrives and kneels beside him.

Note that actress Diana Silvio is the wife of the film's writer/director, David Silvio. 

Cassandra is torturing Cindy when a special guest arrives - it's her nemesis from school, Jessica. We should have known this Jessica bitch would be one of the cannibals.  She tells Cindy that she looks forward to eating her.

But the mean girl shouldn't have been quite so cocky.  At Cassandra's command, a henchman chloroforms her.

Cindy and Jessica are tied up and forced to watch Christian tortured to death.  Jessica is next up to be killed for someone's dinner.

Amber (Angie Azur) arrives - she's one of the cannibals, happy to be working with the fine folks at Satan's Icebox.

Amber should have known better.  The Satan's Icebox administration is not to be trusted. Charles chloroforms her.

Amber and Cindy share a room, waiting for their inevitable demise. Even though Amber was, only moments ago, delighted to see Cindy prepped for a meal, Cindy still consoles her, making her feel better.  Good ol' Cindy.

Cassandra and Charles arrive and take both Cindy and Amber to the basement.

Amber is hanged.

In a film full of disturbing scenes, this is among the most disturbing.  Charles plays with Amber's dead body.

He dances with Amber's corpse.

Finally, Amber is put in a pot to marinate for supper.

Charles gets frustrated with Cassandra and strangles her to death.

Cindy is taken away, and Cassandra's body is left with the executioner.

This allows Cindy to get out of that place.  Her first stop is home where she kills her sick, incestuous father.

The final scene features two new characters - Candy and her druggie boyfriend.  Candy is played by Shanna Anne Killen who was also the assistant producer for this film.

Candy is molested by Klaus, the gross henchman of Satan's Icebox.

Just as Klaus is about to kill Candy, someone enters the room...

It's Cindy.  But she's not going to save them.  In fact, she's now filling the role of Cassandra.  She has Candy hung and her boyfriend has his balls ripped off.  THE END

What can be said?  It was like a sick fetish film was made by Todd Solondz and Harmony Korine, taking inspiration from The Sinful Dwarf and Bloodsucking Freaks... on a shoestring budget. 

What stands out is the nonstop, relentless nature of the movie, just shoving warped and demented shit in your face in rapid succession. Being a Troma movie, I guess a degree of ADHD film-making is to be expected, but this was ridiculous.  I had to leave out a ton of weird tangents this film took (otherwise this review would be a mile long) - for example, the bizarre character of the sheriff's cannibal sister who is clearly the same actor in drag.

But make no mistake, it's poorly made - with poor sound, terrible acting, etc.  It also has basically no nudity.  Other than Daphne's opening striptease, no one gets naked in this movie!  One other aspect I didn't care too much for was the "gross outs" - the Lloyd Kaufman urine drinking scene, and the castration.  That stuff seemed like childish attempts to shock.

Writer/Director David Silvio didn't do much after this - just an episode of Nocturnal three years after this was made.  Eight years after this film, he made Fetish Dolls Die Laughing.  I'm curious if it retained that  Bloodsucking Freaks/Sinful Dwarf flavor, or whether he tapped the breaks a little.  I'll have to check it out... once the soul crushing effect of this film has dissapated.

★★★★★★★☆☆☆ 7/10