Invariably, when I tell them what the actual movie is like and how it unfolds, my friends go wide-eyed, their mouths hang open, and they look at me like me like I'm completely crazy.
New York financial advisor Chris Thorne (Chase), to impress his new neighbor Diane (Moore), agrees to drive her to Atlantic City, along with a pair of obnoxious clients. Taking the "scenic" route through the village of Valkenvania, Chris unknowingly runs a stop sign, and the village constable Dennis (Candy) takes the foursome to the local courthouse, presided over by the 106-year-old Justice of the Peace, Alvin Valkenheiser (Aykroyd, who also wrote and directed). The Judge and his family have a habit murdering passing travelers who violated even the most minor of traffic laws, and they have no plans of letting Chris, Diane, and the others go free.
In recent years, Nothing but Trouble has built something of a cult following. Hats Off Entertainment has an engaging and informative video on YouTube about the movie along with details about its production and background. I recommend checking it out.
I don't know if I can recommend Nothing but Trouble. I love it, even if there was a period when I felt embarrassed by that fact and tried to downplay it. I grew up watching it (it's one of only two movies I have owned on VHS, DVD, and Blu-Ray), but it is a strange, dark movie with a weird, twisted sense of humor and full of actors known for lighter or broader comedy. It's a creative, inspired cauldron of clashing ideas and concepts that is unlike anything else I can think of coming from a mainstream studio, and many who watch it are understandably confused or repelled.
From Hats Off Entertainment's video, it's easy to see why Nothing but Trouble turned out the way it did. You had a creative Hollywood figure (Aykroyd) cashing in his clout to make a film more or less unimpeded by a studio (Warner Bros) that didn't understand the project but financed it as a leap of faith based off Aykroyd's track record with another horror-comedy (Ghostbusters). The studio had also produced strange, incomprehensible-to-them movie that blended horror and comedy (Beetlejuice) from another out-there filmmaker (Tim Burton).
By the time Warner Bros realized what they had, it was too late. The budget had been spent, and the movie died a quick death at the box office, torn apart by critics.
Take away the comedy stars, and this is a horror movie in the vein of The Texas Chain Saw Massacre. Normal city folk are stranded in the middle of nowhere to be menaced by a bunch of backwoods weirdos. Never mind that the Judge has a machine known as Mr. Bonestripper, a roller coaster that tosses victims into the mouth of a device strips away their flesh and spits out their bones, is reminiscent of both the titular machine from Tobe Hooper's adaptation of The Mangler and the carnival atmosphere of both The Funhouse and Texas Chainsaw Massacre 2.
In fact, I'd go as far as to say Nothing but Trouble is the best Tobe Hooper movie not actually made by Tobe Hooper. It draws on similar imagery and concepts from his filmography and has weird, dark sense of humor plus a touch of absurd surrealism.
Consider the setting and kills of Chain Saw: a family of unemployed slaughterhouse workers, put out of work by automation and left destitute, have descended into cannibalism, waylaying people who unwittingly cross their paths. The long history of victims is represented by a farmhouse full of bones and other bric-a-brac and the yard is full of rusted, abandoned, and looted vehicles.
In Nothing but Trouble, the Judge's family, we learn, were swindled by a New York financier during World War I to invest into a coal mining operation and were similarly left impoverished, the surrounding community left an industrial wasteland of smoke, dirt, and junk. The Valkenheiser courthouse sits literally in the center of a junkyard, including mountains of broken-down automobiles while the building itself is full of skeletons in the attic, the photo IDs of hundreds of victims, and other tacky objects representing Americana.
The courthouse is also a funhouse, full of trap doors, secret passageways, slides in the walls, and other weird mechanical features. In Chainsaw 2, the cannibalistic family has made their home under an abandoned theme park, Texas Battleland.
Cannibalism is never brought up or implied in Nothing but Trouble, but the notorious hot dog scene - featuring the nastiest-looking frankfurters I've ever seen - occurs right after a group of drug dealers take a ride through Mr. Bonestripper, so maybe it's best if we don't ask those kinds of questions.
There are other similarities. Nothing but Trouble features an actor in decrepit, old age makeup as do a number of Hooper films, giving the movie some body horror, and like both of Hooper's Chainsaw pictures, there's a nauseating dinner scene as well as some gender-bending. Leatherface occasionally adopts female personas throughout his series, and here, we have John Candy in a dual role as both the fairly grounded Dennis and his mute twin sister Eldona who falls in love Chris.
And like Hooper, Aykroyd as a director indulges in strange flights of fancy: dinner condiments served by motorized model trains, giant mutant (?) and diaper-wearing grandsons of the judge who live in the junkyard ("We're not allowed in the house.") and work as mechanics, and a completely left field appearance by the band Digital Underground who perform an impromptu song for the judge when brought in for speeding.
Of course, the original Chain Saw was a horror movie (albeit one with a droll, subtle sense of humor). Nothing but Trouble shares more of a kinship with Chainsaw 2: a wacky, cartoon-like gross-out comedy. Mr. Bonestripper spits out the bones of its victims at a bullseye, complete with pinball sound effects, and yes, the judge has a penis for a nose (inexplicably but thankfully, it's only visible on a couple of occasions).
Ultimately, I agree with another point brought up by Hats Off Entertainment: Nothing but Trouble is a bland title for this movie. Had it been called Valkenvania or really anything else that played up the weird horror elements, maybe audiences would have been better prepared for this demented trip.
The production design and makeup effects of the film are first-rate. The junkyard and tricked-up courthouse are "gorgeous in their ugliness" (I can't remember where I heard or read that phase in regards to Nothing but Trouble), lavished full of bizarre details that suggest so much unstated backstory. Aykroyd is a convincing as the old, rambunctious J.P., unrecognizable beneath the poundage of prosthetics.
Chase and Moore seem overwhelmed by their surroundings. They aren't really given much to beyond be rich New Yorkers horrified and grossed out by everything they encounter. Chase gets a few glib one-liners, and Moore does occasionally try to charm their captors, but it's clear the judge and his family are given the lion's share of energy, attention, and personality.
I doubt it would have been enough to make the movie a hit back in 1991, but it might have softened the blow and maybe attracted the right kind of audience sooner, one that appreciated the grotesque surrealism on display and the horror movie elements. If you expect a silly Saturday Night Live-style comedy, you will be repelled.
If you go in prepared for an off-the-wall horror-comedy, you might better appreciate the effort.
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