Fried Barry

Weird, trippy, extreme, hallucinogenic and psychological madness from South Africa! The story focuses on a junkie named Barry who is a living wreck, his life is unenviable, and to top it off he is abducted by aliens who send a scout in his body back to Earth to explore it! The actor playing Barry, Gary Green, has such a nasty looking mug that he will give anyone nightmares. He embarks on an exploration of a town full of sex, strange people, drugs and violence, and though there's no outright gore, which is a shame, it's weird, disturbingly repulsive and creepy more or less all the time. The first half hour is solid madness that's not very nice to watch. (Barry's unexpected birth and dancing trip at the disco is almost physically uncomfortable). A strange film for an obscure and marginal audience. 6/10. (17.03.2021)

The grotesque journey of junkie Barry from the word fried in the sense of "deep-fried" to fried in the sense of "cooked" by the world around him. By the end, it's an interesting variation on E.T., subtly suggesting that while some completely useless individuals are still here, those with contributions can be limited by temporariness. It's hard to say whether Green's little man Gary resembled Tomáš Berdych after 30 years of regular heroin use or Gollum after 300 years of living with the Ring, but that role suited him well. (04.01.2022)