INSANE CLOWN POSSE BLOWING UPI figure that now was a good time as ever to review “Big Money Rustlas” since it’s finally starting to gain some recognition from the movie industry, premiering on Showtime this week. |
 |
PHAT OR WACK?
In my opinion, business wise, this was Psychopathic first project to flop in a major way for many years. I feel like they had anticipated the movie to be more successful than it actually was. Back in 2010, it seemed like they promoted the movie for the ENTIRE year, and when “Miracles” blew up, they tried to parlay that attention into buzz for “Rustlas”. Unfortunately, when August came and went, it seemed like nobody had seen the movie.
 |
Of course, the X-Factor here is that movies tend to be more timeless than albums. Albums tend to have their most success a year or so removed from the release, but for some films, especially cult films, it takes a decade or longer. Will that be the case with Big Money Rustlas? I’m not sure. I do think that Rustlas will be more popular in time, but it’s hard to say if it will ever be a true “cult film”. |
Don’t get me wrong, if you’re not familiar with what Psychopathic has been up to within the last several years, you WILL be surprised at the quality of this film. This feels like a big budget film, even though it’s not. By movie standards, this film is probably lower budget than most of the movies that you’ve ever seen.
LOW BUDGET, BIG CONCEPT
The movie was made for $1.5 million, but feels like a $20 million movie. Allow me to put that into perspective… Psychopathic doesn’t do million dollar projects… ever. Their previous film, “Big Money Hustlas” was made for about $350,000. Their strategy has always been to make projects for bare bone budgets in order to reap as much profit as possible… to get as much juice as possible out of the lemons that life has given them, to coin an overly elaborate metaphor. However, their projects have always “sounded” like they were big budget, which is the case with “Rustlas.”
| At the time, “Rustlas” was the most anticipated project that Psychopathic was working on, and they certainly pulled out all of the stops when it came to promoting the film. I attended the 2010 Gathering, which was themed after the movie with a “Wicked Wild West” theme. This is how I attended the “Second Premiere”, which coincided with the DVD release. This was a special moment, as it was an impromptu screening on the day BEFORE the Gathering officially started. It was only a handful of juggalos there, and the Psychopathic crew and artists in the back. This was such an exclusive screening, that even Scottie D of Faygoluvers missed it, being cooped up in his RV hunched over a laptop screen, straining to watch it, while we watched it on the big screen at the seminar tent. |  |
So yeah, that experience might have given me something of a bias towards the movie. I do have fond memories of the film. However, I think I’m able to look beyond things like that and offer a fairly objective review.
STYLE AND TONE
Paul Andreson and Violent J wanted the movie to resemble a Tex Avery cartoon, and it definitely does. The movie does not take itself seriously at all, and is quite goofy. I wouldn’t go far enough to call this a “family” film, but it’s definitely not as objectionable as “Big Money Hustlas”, and it does have a lot of artistic merit, believe it or not.
For a while, “Rustlas” seems like a serious independent movie… that is until you get to witness Shaggy 2 Dope wrestle with a stuffed “little person” dummy for a solid minute of screen time. But it’s little silly touches like this that makes the movie what it is.
SUMMARY
I recommend “Big Money Rustlas” for all juggalos, and for anyone who has even the slightest bit of an open mind toward ICP. I can also recommend the movie for people who enjoy silly comedies that don’t take themselves seriously. If you spend a lot of your time on IMDB, debating with people about what “good cinema” is, you’ll probably hate this movie, though.
