It came from Channel 41

I apologize in advance, but this one popped into the brain a couple of nights ago, and I just have to purge it...

Gymkata



If you haven't seen Gymkata, then you just haven't lived. It's something that I was lucky enough to catch once on WDRB - Channel 41 in Louisville when I was a kid. It was one of the myriad movies that they ran to fill time on Saturday afternoons, and this may well have been the absolute worst of them all.

It's a movie that is notorious for being horrible and a movie that clearly deserves that notoriety, because Gymkata really is a horrible film.

It's pure horrificness, however, isn't the reason for this post. Instead, the reason is for the one scene that has stuck with me for twenty years.

It's the most famous of the scenes in all of Gymkata: the village of the Crazies.

The Village - seriously, the movie actually calls the place The Village of the Crazies is where this rinky-dink, Eastern European nation throws all their crazy, dangerous people and gives them pitchforks and hatchets - apparently hoping to thin the herd a bit.

It is into that Village that Kurt Thomas - yes, Olympian Kurt Thomas - finds himselfs trying to run through. He stumbles into a narrow alleyway - straight out the forest - and sees the big, iron gate lower shut behind him. From there, all modest amounts of hell break loose.

Crazy people start doing crazy things left and right - man in monkish outfit turns out to not have any back to his outfit, guy has a mask on the back of his head, loony chops off his own hand while the hand stays holding on to a rope - crazy people, I tell you.

And then the crazies come after our noble American with the hatchets and pitchforks, herding him into the tiny town square where there happens to be some sort of stone pommel horse - practically tailor made for our intrepid, gymnastic hero. From the horse, Kurt commences to run flairs back and forth, kicking - with gigantic *snap* sound effects - each Villager in the face, one at a time, until he can escape.

It's a horrible scene - poorly coreographed, poorly dubbed, poorly acted, poorly stunted, not dramatic or effective in the least.

And two nights ago, in a dream, I found myself attempting to explain the scene to someone.

I have no clue to whom I was trying to explain the scene or why.

But here it is in all its glory.


We simply are not worthy.

And if you want more, there's a much more thorough breakdown of the film - with animated gifs for your enjoyment - over at i-mockery. The Village scene shows up on the third page of the review.

Thankfully, Gymkata is available on DVD.

If you're still looking for that elusive gift for my upcoming birthday. Please, do not consider this DVD.