Thanks to the magic of crowdfunding, there’s now a breed of film made by fans, for fans which doesn’t really seem to see itself much beyond the film festival circuit. If you aren’t there with all of the other contributors to see your name on the credits, has it really happened at all? Mad Heidi (2022) is one such film, proudly championing its crowdfunder credentials right from the moment we first see its faux-grindhouse opening credits, and a film full of the kinds of schlocky gore, whoop-inducing in-jokes and ringing one-liners. Now, there’s nothing wrong with any of this, but it begs the question: how well does all of this work once the festival season is over, and you find yourself watching Mad Heidi alone, on a sofa?
The basic answer to this is that, for the first thirty minutes or so, it’s infuriating; after that point, because it lags its way to the inevitable showdown and takes a while to really drive at its conclusion, it kind of wins you over via its determination to please genre fans with its ‘throw enough mud at a wall’ ethos. However, all things considered, it can’t quite hang together as it must have been intended to do so, not for a home audience at least. The recommendation would definitely be to see it on the big screen, something which is possible as – at the time of writing – we’re a few weeks away from a limited theatrical run in the US.
Anyway, what happens is this: Switzerland, in the world of the film, has turned into a cheese-based authoritarian state where all dissent is crushed. What do we mean by a ‘cheese-based authoritarian state’, exactly? Well, it seems to be Switzerland’s chief industry, and also the source of a lot of its patriotic fervour; the country, under the sway of its dictator (Casper Van Dien!), is also working on a version of Swiss cheese which is going to dominate all the countries of Europe, because of reasons which we can’t go into here.
We’re told that twenty years go by between the opening scene and the next (why?): after a literal roll in the hay, we meet Heidi, all grown up and fraternising with one Goat Peter, a relationship which is of concern to Heidi’s grandfather/only living relative (David Schofield!), as it’s rumoured that Goat Peter has some dicey interests which risk bringing him to the attention of the regime. Any cheese-related insurgence will draw down the wrath of the state – as it does, bloodily, with Goat Peter.
Her subsequent grief brings the bereft Heidi into the firing line, too, and she is subsequently jailed; via a bit of ‘women in prison’ homage, Heidi must turn into a kick-ass heroine to avenge those she loves: she must track down those responsible and make them pay. It takes rather too long to get to this point – directors Johannes Hartmann and Sandro Klopfstein know their fan base and linger in the girls’ cells for a little too long – but the film does have the good sense to save some of its most full-on, crowd-pleasing scenes for later on in the film.
It tries very, very hard to tick every exploitation box you can get away with ticking today. The problem with all of this is that, at this point in time, it always feels a little strained: we’re self aware about genre and film history in ways which can’t but add in a dash of cynicism to proceedings. But this doesn’t stop the film showing a certain, commendable dedication to what it’s doing, even in all of the clutter. ‘Swissploitation’ is coined and namechecked a number of times during the film; this is, by the seems of it, its first outing, and no one can deny that it takes aim at pretty much every Swiss stereotype there is, right down to giving us a death by fondue. There is love here.
Mad Heidi is clearly a low budget film, but no one can deny that it’s actually pretty technically sound, even if you can almost feel the budget straining around the edges of every scene. The lead actress – Alice Lucy – gets fairly stuck onto her role, too, which is very physical in places. She does it all in earnest, which is the only real way to do it, and she is one of the key reasons that the film – sort of – wins you over by the end. It’s probably a film which depreciates in value as the number of viewers declines, but by and large its ardent enthusiasm carries it through the ninety-minute running time enjoyably enough.
Looking at the bigger picture, now that we’ve had Winnie The Pooh: Blood and Honey (a film I personally vetoed for the site) and Mad Heidi, it’ll be fun to guess what other beloved children’s characters are out of copyright and ripe for a horror treatment. My money’s on Pippi Longstocking – I think one book’s public domain now – so watch this space, maybe. Stranger things have happened.
Mad Heidi (2022) will be available is selected US screenings from June 21st 2023.