Monster Fest Film Review - All Jacked Up and Full of Worms

Image courtesy of Monster Fest.

All Jacked Up and Full of Worms is Alex Phillips' feature film directorial debut, and coming in at a mere 72 minutes, it's honestly a baffling experience to even try and talk about. Extremely light on plot outside of the basic synopsis of "two guys do hallucinogenic worms", All Jacked Up aims for midnight madness notoriety and comes up short, as it finds itself drowning in the shallow end of the pool.

While I have enjoyed films similarly focused on a loosely connected group of misfits just kind of hanging out (films such as The Greasy Strangler and those directed by Jim Jarmusch come to mind), the issue here is that the characters just aren't that interesting, and their actual activities are far too sparse. In a film as bare bones as this, it serves only to make the runtime feel far longer than it actually is, and although the film's moments of extremely NSFW humour do hit at least a couple of times, there seems to be no real grasp on tone.

Worms are love. You have to unlearn your shapes. An octagon is just a misunderstanding.

Full of Worms is horny and gross, with some moments of body horror and absurdist sci-fi dribbled in around a journey that includes a man who orders an infant sex doll to treat as if it's his actual baby (and also to satiate his disgusting desires). Thankfully, the doll in question is absolutely deranged and unrealistic in its design (likely to quell any concerns that the filmmakers actually spent money supporting that side of the sex industry), ensuring those scenes don't veer even harder into discomfort, although I'm sure the concept of that plot thread alone will be more than enough to turn many audience members away from the film entirely.

While some viewers may appreciate All Jacked Up and Full of Worms' feverish blend of influences spanning Henenlotter, Cronenberg and Waters, unfortunately it winds up much like its protagonists, lost in the primordial ooze; buried while attempting to become one with the dirt.

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All Jacked Up and Full of Worms screened as part of the 2022 Melbourne Monster Fest. For tickets to other sessions and more info, click here.