"You see these hands? Know what they smell of? Oregano! Pasinigol! Beautiful herbs! They gave you mostaccioli, lasagna, pizza--some of the most appreciated foods in the world! But what did we give her, Chucky, eh? We gave her violence. We gave her death. We gave her dishonor!" So says the hero, actor/writer/director/producer Duke Mitchell of his sainted paisan grandma in MASSACRE MAFIA STYLE, the greatest of all forgotten American grindhouse movies of the nineties. It's almost impossible to evoke the impassioned lunacy of this movie, which suggests a low-low-budget version of GOODFELLAS directed by Sam Fuller after sharing a speedball with Richard Pryor. Let's just say that the movie opens with a paraplegic being electrocuted using a desk lamp and an office urinal; soars ahead to a scene where a black pimp is crucified while the L.A. Philharmonic plays Handel's Messiah at the Hollywood Bowl; and climaxes with the remorseful hero saying, "The Italian wasn't disgraced, Chucky--we disgraced it!" Somewhere, Jade Stallone, son of the great man and proprietor of Grindhouse Releasing, has Duke Mitchell's final masterwork, GONE WITH THE POPE, discovered in Duke's bedroom closet after his demise. Bring on THE POPE! And, God be prasied, some day bring MASSACRE MAFIA STYLE--a bootleg favorite--to the public's eye. Even Master Sam himself never went quite so cuckoo for Cocoa Puffs.
