Ticked-off Trannies with Knives (2010)

Bubbles and her friends just want to have a good time and be left alone.  Unfortunately there are some people in this world that just won’t leave people doing their own thing alone.  One of those guys has already smacked her around, but he isn’t ready to leave it at that.  Luring her and some of her other friends to an abandoned warehouse they go off on them with a baseball bat, killing 2 of them.  This leads the survivors to take there revenge on the men that killed their friends.

I love exploitation movies and Ticked-off Trannies with Knives is a pretty good one.  I mean just look at the title of the movie and you can already see that the director and writer, Israel Luna, knew what he was doing.  That said this isn’t a perfect movie and it is with the stuff that I didn’t like that I’m going to start.

The narrative is confusing at times.  My first issue with it is that we see the ladies getting the crap kicked out of them.  It seems like they all get killed, but then Bubbles wakes up in the hospital with a head injury.  A couple of her friends that looked like they were killed are there with her.  One of them, Rachel, had her head bashed in but looks fine.  Really there isn’t a mark on her.  That kind of bugged me.  I also could have done without the attempts to make this look like a ‘70s grind house flick.  The fake scratches in the film and the missing reel card that flashes on screen has been done to death already.  Plus they only did this here and there with the rest of the movie looking like the shot on digital project it was.  This makes it feel forced and doesn’t do them any favors.

Now that I’ve gotten off my chest what bugged me about Ticked-off Trannies with Knives I have to say I had a blast.  The movie does a great job introducing the characters and spends just enough time with them that the audience will start to like them.  Then it does terrible things to the characters and sucks you right into the revenge bit of the plot.  You really want to see Bubble and her friends get the bastards who hurt them.  Oh and when you get to the end of the movie and you see what happens it is very satisfying.  I have no idea if the director/writer Israel Luna is an exploitation fan or not, but he made a pretty badass movie that fits perfectly in the genre.  I think that I read somewhere that this is an exploitation revenge movie with a John Waters sensibility, and that is a perfect way to describe this one. 

There are a couple of other things that I wanted to point out about the movie.  First off there is a strange bit of comedy in the middle of the movie after the 1st attack that initially bugged me.  But then I realized that it was used to reinforce why we like the characters and gives the audience a chance to catch their collective breath before jumping back into the violence.  The other is the movie’s use of it’s limited special effects.  Much of the nasty violent stuff happens off screen and what doesn’t is CGI.  But this is handled well.  There is one bit of practical effects work that is really effective and kind of disturbing.  In the initial attack we don’t get to see much, but there is a bat that has blood and hair on it.  The camera doesn’t focus on it, but it is there and really brings some weight to the attack. 

I like this movie.  It has some issues, but at the same time is entertaining and captures the spirit of the movies that I like to watch from the ‘70s.  If you get the chance to check out Ticked-off Trannies with Knives I would recommend that you do so. 

3 out of 4

reviewed by John Shatzer

© Copyright 2010 John Shatzer