Summary
Nuns and Guns is a 2010 class B action movie directed by Joseph Guzman and co-written with Robert James Hayes II. It is a bold, unapologetically provocative piece of cinema that embraces the grindhouse, “nunsploitation”, and revenge categories intensely. The picture tells a tale of betrayal, divine justice, and brutal vengeance set in a fictional desert wasteland rife with violence, crime, and corruption.
The picture centers on a story of a young nun, Sister Sarah, who is a devotee of a convent around a church that doubles as a drug trafficking, prostitution and human traffaging unit. A group of Los Muertos, a ruthless biker gang, helps run a vendetta style criminal enterprise that deeply engages with clergy, who pose, and by no means protect, the innocent. One of Sister Sarah’s kipid drug deals turns out to be san drug affharay and he is dead and she is sold. When Sister Sarah learns the sobering truth, she pays the price one way or another.
But through a drug induced vision Sarah receives a revelation – she has been chosen by God to restore vengeance upon all sacred religion violators. After escaping her captors, she literal and metaphorically arms herself starting a bloody vengeance crusade. Hunting down the priests, gang members, and anyone else in the web of corruption, she burns with a sense of justice and uses high powered firearms.
As her wrath unfolds, Sarah’s violence escalates to unprecedented levels. In the desert, she is able to locate her enemies where she rescues other women in forced prostitution and exacts vengeance on the people who placed them there. Sarah also encounters Sister Angelina, who has become her ex-lover nun and is now part of the church’s criminal syndicate. Their reunion becomes a personal stake and adds emotional depth to her vendetta.
The film includes powerful figures that Sarah goes against in a climax filled with copious amounts of blood and violence. Her solo attempt to dismantle the operation adds to the drama of the scene. Just like in other grindhouse films, the ending is full of cathartic tragedy served at once.
Cast & Crew
With her hands on the camera is Joseph Guzman, known as the king of exploitation cinema, known for riped open grindhouse films infused with bold irony and scrappy telltale.
The Writers:
Joseph Guzman and Robert James Hayes II
Main cast:
Asun Ortega as Sister Sarah – The protagonist of the film, which features Ortega as a wrought-iron-everything-ornate-strong passive woman nun gone berserk. Ortega gives a stunning performance, filled with a blend of fragility and rage paired with primal grit that carries the film.
David Castro as Chavo – One of the many antagonists, the protagonist Chavo is the son of an evil gang leader fighting for control of the world filled with their low lives.
Perry D’Marco as Father Carlitos – The priest with a warm disposition on the outside, yet within lies an evil twisted mindset is a scumsucker “so-called-coward” hero.
Aycil Yeltan as Sister Angelina – Sarah’s professed romantic crush-turned-partnership sister nun gets intertwined with her relentless pursuit.
A rogues’ gallery of villains and victims in this bloody morality play is Maxie J. Santillan Jr., Emma Messenger, Bill Oberst Jr. and others.
Producers:
Perry Gunn was in charge of the footsteps of preproduction on Set, where Guzman and Hayes filmed through Freak Show Entertainment.
Creation of set where sun-drenched dusty vibes, along with bring riddled with crime and criminal relationships was brought to life by Edwin M Figueroa.
The music was a perfect blend of Napoleon and Nemo, created by Dan Gross and Chris Mosqueda, possessing a roughness meshing between Spaghetti Western and domineering grind of the pulse burning tribe.
Edwin M Figuero on the contumacy set designed the slashing set works, while the production design went overboard aiming directly the the rough 70’s “B”-Movies.
Theme and Style
Nude Nuns with Big Guns is an extreme work that can be disturbing for some audiences. The film straddles the line between satire and exploitation while interweaving violence and sexual iconography, including rebellion. It attaches itself to these major themes:
Religious corruption: The church does not function as a peaceful haven; rather, it is a caricature of a disease looming with insatiable greed, criminality, hypocrisy, or more simply put, a grotesque enterprise.
Vigilante justice: Sister Sarah’s venture is a conventional tale of revenge considering the postulation, “When an institution collapses, the individual is brought to the fore.”
Empowered violence: Sarah’s vengeance is framed as a violent form of reclaiming autonomy, serving as both a spiritual awakening and empowerment. With elements of sexual objectification, her metamorphosis follows that of revenge heroines who turn trauma into action.
Nude Nuns with Big Guns is a film that adopts the stylistic precision of grindhouse cinema. Embracing its B movie roots, it utilizes bold colors, intense action, over-the-top villains, and campy moments. The movie is remarkably low-budget, and the accompanying retro style 70s aesthetic is apparent through the use of zoom cuts, telescoping cuts, narratively motivated stylized violence, and scores reminiscent of spaghetti westerns and exploitation films.
Reception and Cult Status
Upon release, Nude Nuns With Big Guns received mixed reviews. While some could not get past the over-the-top violence and nudity, along with what many described as a an affronting take on god and authority, fans of the genre embraced it as an exploitation masterpiece.
The film boasts a cult following among fans of alternative cinema and those who indulge in midnight movies. Its outlandish title in itself was enough to make it a talking point, while its pandering to every ‘unconventional’ cinema trope makes it all the more interesting for genre-defying audiences.
For fans of Nunchukka, Machete, or even Faster, Pussycat! Kill! Kill! this is a title that relishes in its absurdity, appealing to those who appreciate genre-defying films. Despite receiving little mainstream attention, the film’s appeal lies in its unapologetically lowbrow storytelling.
Conclusion
Nude Nuns with Big Guns is the type of movie that indicates itself through the title. A spectacularly over-the-top and unapologetically brash dive into the world of exploitation films. It definitely doesn’t soften the edges. There’s no subtlety, no moderation, no apologies offered. The film seems to celebrate the grindhouse era by trying to do as much as it can to “entertain,” “shock,” “challenge,” and ultimately assault the viewer with violence, satire, and sexuality simultaneously.
In some ways this film will seem marginalized or even repulsive while for others it brings up memories from the past, rallying a nostalgic kinship to the world of B-movies where there are gun-totting nuns, irreversibly insane antagonists, and the hero’s righteous anger that knows no bounds. Regardless of how someone interprets the movie, it’s safe to say that the audaciousness portrayed in Nude Nuns with Big Guns earns it the spot in the hall of fame for cult classics, solidifying its place in modern exploitation lore.
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