Body Horror Hidden Gem Gives Fan-Favorite Star Her Best Role, Stream Without Netflix
As a horror fan, one of my greatest joys in life is taking a chance on a “new to me movie” because it has a cool cover, a habit that goes back to the glory days of browsing video stores for the coolest-looking VHS tapes. That’s how I discovered American Mary with its wonderfully striking cover of a beautiful masked woman, some bloody surgical tools, and a tantalizing tagline: “she’s an artist.” I ended up falling in love with this bizarre film, and if you’d like to experience the love (or just the viscera) in the air, you can now stream it for free on Tubi.
All About The Side Hustle
What is American Mary really about, though? We follow the gruesome misadventures of the titular Mary, a surgical student whose financial troubles have made her willing to strip for spare cash. She soon finds a more lucrative job performing illegal surgeries, but the dark nature of her illegal side hustle may ultimately kill more than just her chances of becoming a doctor.
The Perfect Roster Of Talent
The cast of American Mary is, to put it mildly, eclectic. Supporting actors include Tristan Risk, a dancer-turned-actor who has appeared in horror films like Save Yourself and The ABCs of Death 2. The movie also features David Lovgren (best known to spy nerds for his role in the spy show Espionage), John Emmet Tracy (best known to horror nerds for his role in iZombie), and even a cameo by the directors, the Soska sisters (best known for making the weirdest pictures in Hollywood).
Of course, the real star of American Mary is scream queen Katharine Isabelle, who plays the lead role. She is best known for headlining the Ginger Snaps franchise (a personal fave of mine), but her horror resume includes everything from Freddy vs. Jason to, more recently, the satirical It’s a Wonderful Knife. Isabelle has always had that rare gift of imbuing humanity into the most horrific of characters, and she perfectly sells Mary as an essentially good girl who is lured into an increasingly shadowy world because of her own inner darkness.
Caters To A Very Specific Audience
Now, a bit of fair warning before you check out American Mary: this is first and foremost a body horror film, and while the Soskas don’t go full Cronenberg, you can and will see some very weird stuff here. The movie fully explores this strange world full of elective surgeries, and many characters are funhouse reflections of Mary…people sick of their old identity and trying to find a new one. These scenes aren’t for the faint of heart, but they do an excellent job of immersing us into this strange world, one that we must understand and navigate right alongside Mary.
She takes a long, strange trip, but most critics agree that it is worth going on this journey with her. On Rotten Tomatoes, American Mary currently has a critical rating of 62 percent. In general, critics noted that the movie didn’t have the greatest acting or ending, but the mixture of dark humor and stark visuals will appeal to the gorehounds, especially those who love body horror.
Gore As An Art Form
That last point is important because, full disclosure, I’m not a huge body horror guy: it took me forever to watch those Hostel movies, and I’m likelier to squirm than stare when somebody is getting dissected onscreen. However, this movie compelled me because it lived up to the tagline, presenting the most grotesque acts as bloody spurts of revolutionary art. It never reaches the heights of, say, NBC’s Hannibal, but the movie shares that show’s penchant for turning the atrocious into the avant-garde.
Stream American Mary For Free On Tubi
GFR SCORE
Will you agree that American Mary is art for the splatter-house crowd, or will you think this film needs a few more years in school? Like Mary pondering a new world of surgery and slaughter, the only way to know is to take that first step. Whether you love it or hate it, you’ll never look at surgeons the same way after streaming this cult horror hit for free on Tubi.
