Class of Nuke 'em High Part II: Subhuman. Meltdown Reviews

With a knack for rendering the potentially offensive--violence, sex, nudity--inoffensive, except perhaps for Ph.D. holders, the savvy, New York-based, zero-budget Troma Inc. honchos Lloyd Kaufman Jr. and Michael Herz have, from their earliest successes (SQUEEZE PLAY, WAITRESS) to the current CLASS OF NUKE 'EM HIGH PART 2, always known precisely what kind of films they make: cheerfully inept, overbearingly outrageous, and fueled by a ferocious chutzpah. The Tromaville Institute of Technology, built on the nuked ashes of Tromaville High School, is run by Dean Okra (Scott Resnick), who has nurtured Professor Holt (Lisa Gaye) and her experiments to create a genetically perfect mutant slave race. Through his Nukamama Corporation, Okra plans to replace the student body with them, and then the world. However, there's a glitch in the process: the subhumanoids, who have a human mouth instead of navel, tend to melt down under stress into little furry creatures. Student and ace journalist Roger Smith (Brick Bronsky) uncovers the plot, although he's fallen in love with one of the mutants, Victoria (Leesa Rowland). Even though his editor Jones (Shelby Shepard) squelches his reporting, Smith, aided by a friendly meltdown critter named Murray (M. Davis), rallies the students to defeat Okra and his cronies, including a tough local motorcycle gang (who are subhuman all on their own) led by Yoke (Michael Kurtz). Meanwhile, a real squirrel, who has eaten some radioactive waste and grown into a giant monster, destroys the school's nuclear reactor, which levels the place once again, while Smith, armed with Holt's antidote to the meltdown problem, faces an uncertain future with Victoria. CLASS OF NUKE 'EM HIGH PART 2 exemplifies the kitchen sink school of filmmaking, amazingly well-promoted and edited with a sledgehammer. The pacing is fast and furious; if one joke or gore effect fails, which is often the case, it's on to the next without missing a beat. Kaufman and Herz, who usually put their kids and relations somewhere in their huge casts, unashamedly have fun with their teen-flick junk films, and their pleasure is contagious. Like Roger Corman and Samuel Z. Arkoff a generation earlier, they employ unknown or up-and-coming talent who will work cheaply; their films are technically ragged--the only real quality in NUKE 2 is some decent stop-motion animation by Brett Piper and Alex Pirnie. Still, Troma films manage to employ some pointed social criticism (the anti-nuke message in both NUKE pictures; corporation honcho Okra wants his mutants to replace the often upstart "working class scum"). They also have a lot of fun with contemporary cultural icons, especially television (Smith reports throughout the film to "Diane" on his tape recorder a la "Twin Peaks"), advertising (one scene promotes the merits of supermarket, white-packaged generic-brand condoms), and movies (the 50s sci-fi genre is neatly skewered when the giant squirrel, obviously some poor guy in a rubber suit, stomps on the even more obvious cardboard models). And for the true cineaste, the films, especially NUKE 2, are self-reflexive even to rival, say, De Palma and Antonioni: as Smith destroys the power plant computer terminal, a character admonishes him to take it easy as they might need the prop on the next movie, and NUKE 2 is literally "stopped" by Toxie, Troma's bona fide star of the two successful TOXIC AVENGER films, who has shown up for work on the wrong set. While a direct sequel with different characters, NUKE 2, which begins with a visual synopsis of the CLASS OF NUKE 'EM HIGH (1986), is actually more a remake. (Profanity, nudity.)