Lair of the White Worm

**** / *****

Lair of the White Worm (1988) is a wicked piece of business from cult auteur Ken Russell, an admitted favorite of mine during the 90s Midnite Movie era of my teenage years. Russell loved introducing blasphemous imagery, shot in this hallucinatory style, often incorporating dream logic to kind of inundate us with a lot to absorb. It can be a bit wild what Russell throws at us, joyfully thrusting upon us shocking visual subject matter often warping Christian history. In this film you have Eve (Catherine Oxenberg) merely touching the venom spit from the enraged “pagan priestess”, Lady Sylvia Marsh (Amanda Donohoe, going for broke, deliciously embodying her dedicated immortal serpent cult follower looking to feed Eve, a virgin, to her pig/snake god, Dionin), upon a crucifix nailed to the wall of a room, “receiving” a trip back to when Christ was on the cross, enwrapped by a white snake while Roman soldiers rape and brutalize nuns on the ground who had been kneeling, reliving the horrifying experience! It was jarring and Russell really wallops us with it. Eve’s experience is a shock to the senses, and Russell visualizes it as surreal and blunt-force in approach.

Lady Marsh obviously targets those near her estate at Temple House, looking to sacrifice someone to her god. Talk of the D’Ampton worm included a little pub ditty I consider so addictive and memorable (it just sticks in the brain, too!), with a funny appearance of a costume worm introduced in a party set up by Lord James D’Ampton (Hugh Grant). James’ ancestor supposedly chopped a worm to pieces near Stonerich Cavern, a continued local legend that remains a topic of discussion and debate. James is happy-go-lucky about “student from uni”, Angus (recent Doctor Who, Peter Capaldi) excavating on his land, locating the skull of what could be the D’Ampton worm, eventually such news reaching Marsh who wants it for the sacrifice ritual in an underground lair where Dionin will once again rise to eat human lunch put before it! Nutty as all this is, Russell directs it all with nary a serious note…the tone is playful and naughty. Like when Marsh seduces a Cub Scout (!), taking a bite out of his dick, paralyzing the youth before drowning him due to James’ unexpected arrival. The use of a peculiar dildo gets plenty of onscreen time, harnessed to Marsh in an attempt to penetrate Eve for Dionin (all of this is just hard to write without grinning from ear to ear, it is just perverse), while Angus feigns a demise through snake bite…in order to deceive Marsh so he could immobilize her.

Donohoe gets plenty of time to don her serpent fangs and hiss while either naked or body painted. She drives sports cars, works her fashionista wardrobe like a confident vogue model, applies sexual innuendo in implied delivery recognizing a persona perfectly comfortable in her own skin, and preys heartily without a care in the world. Marsh thoroughly enjoys her handiwork and sacrificing Eve isn’t as much a chore as it is a pleasure. Eve’s sister, Mary (Sammi Davis), had been consumed by the disappearances of their parents and finds herself becoming involved with Angus, for whom she has good chemistry. Angus digs near her B&B, eventually discovering a floor with a snake mural (representing Dionin), unearthed during the “great archeological excavation”, resulted in Mary and him hitting it off. So a convent was built upon a place of worship to a pagan god…the imbalance is exploited by Russell with very little restraint. Marsh never fails to repeatedly mock God/Christ with the “false god” insult as she conducts her affairs for her own pagan god. There’s no shortage of snake activity and iconography, including “snakes & ladders” board game! Bagpipe, a record featuring Indian music, and a melody from a harmonica all serves as musical devices that could lure Marsh against her will, similarly to snakes captured by the influence of a particular piece played in a fashion too difficult to resist (however, Marsh does pull one over Angus through the use of earplugs). Not to be totally vulnerable, Marsh sends out victims of her bite to try and attack others: police officer, Erny (Paul Brooke), and matriarch of the Brents (Mary unexpectedly is bitten by her when she excitedly approaches her), both threatening the life of Mary.

Stratford Johns, as manservant Peters, has those expressive eyes and often a giddy reaction to topics in conversation (going back in the past to his duties for James’ father), always bookending his sentences with, “Yes, milord.” I found Johns a joy to watch when given bits here and there with Grant. Hugh, of course, being the recipient of his family’s wealth, orders Johns to the most menial of tasks (draw up his bathwater, open a locked door so that supposedly Marsh would enter, lock up the chambermaids…), often reinforcing the irksome position as a burden. Johns especially gets excited when thinking about the ladies.

I was also most amused at how Mary and Angus are often almost always annoyed at James, particularly when returning to Stonerich Cavern in the hopes of finding evidence, because he persists in the pursuit of a worm they consider just a myth and nothing more. But James considers the possibility has merit, specifically because of Angus’ finds and the disappearance of Mary and Eve’s parents, their father’s watch found in the area. So even as they often balk at James for offering the threat of a worm, his position ultimately is correct. The discontent between Erny and the other police officer (one cop car, a broken pump leaving the bike option mute, the taxi driver in jail due to a drunken stupor!) , voiced by Russell, is a hoot!

A giant worm with a large mouth with plenty of room to munch on an entire human in seconds is a bit much, but the film doesn’t shy from the absurdities of its content. Russell, in fact, embraces the lunacy, bolstered by his panache and sense of humor. It is all certainly a matter of distaste, but if you like such cult cinema, Lair of the White Worm fits the bill. Not to be outdone, Russell even provides a weird dream for Grant inside a plane (of all places) as Mary and Marsh serve as stewardesses. There is a catfight, Grant restrained, the parents practically catatonic, attempt to poison, and a trip for Grant from the plane briefly into the caverns before Peters’ noisy tray clumsiness awakens him before answers to it all could be found…just the right kind of enigmatic dream content certain to leave this sense of confusion. Whatever the case, this drives James towards initiating his own real search for answers.