This Is the Perfect Time to Revisit Astron-6’s Father’s Day (2011)
Halloween and Friday the 13th started the popular gag of linking slasher movies to specific days of importance. Another cinematic movement that’s picked up steam lately is the faux grindhouse aesthetic. Modern-day films bend over backward to mirror their late 70s to mid-80s counterparts. While 2011’s Father’s Day is guilty of both these well-tread sins it also manages to create something wholly original, provocative, hilarious, and brutal.
“You know how many dads go missing around here Motherfucker…”
A character exclaims early in the film, before brutally pummeling his married, closeted, scene partner for trying to pay an underage Twink (actual character’s name) for oral services. Astron-6’s Father’s Day is exactly the type of Father’s Day movie you’d expect to see distributed by Troma Entertainment. Due to behind-the-scenes drama that you won’t read about here, you can now catch it streaming FREE on Tubi.
Father’s Day: A Movie with Teeth
Ahab, a man obsessed with exacting a brutal, violent revenge on the man who murdered his dad, joins John, an eager priest, and Twink, a hot-headed street hustler, on an epic quest to find and defeat this mythical monster known as Chris Fuchman AKA The Father’s Day Killer.
Is more or less the official synopsis of the film. Written and directed by the Canadian filmmaking collective known as Astron-6, Father’s Day is definitely an homage to 70s/80s grindsploitation movies, simulated film scratches, and all. But you can’t parody a genre this well without fully understanding it. Astron-6 disbanded in 2020. But, in their decade-plus of collaborative film production, they were responsible for countless short films of a similar style. However, 2014’s faux-giallo The Editor garnered them slightly more acclaim. Members of the group would later go on to work on stuff like The Void and Psycho Goreman.
There’s a fair of amount of rape in this film, more than I think the average moviegoer is prepared for. Father’s Day antagonist Chris Fuchman doesn’t just kill the dads. He catches, he shimmies his fat ass on top of them from behind, and fucks them into the dirt. It’s hard to watch at times, and that’s what gives the movie its edge. It pulls no punches, despite its wits, despite its humor, it’s still got fucking teeth.
…And a Lighter Side
And there’s plenty of wit and humor to spare. Despite its over-the-top graphic brutality for the most part the film plays like a comedy. It features a scene where Adam Brooks’ “Ahab” has to confess to his compatriots that he impregnated his sister while SHE was under demonic possession. That scene honestly needs to be taught in film school. The blocking, the pacing, it’s an unexpected masterwork in the middle of a movie about a fat boy plowing dad ass.
Troma films have always been a DIY “peek behind the curtains” of the filmmaking process and Father’s Day is no different. Sources online cite the movie as costing anywhere from 10k to 100k. Honestly watching the movie you can’t tell the difference. There are car chases, practical effects, and a completely bonkers stop-motion heavy 3rd act that was either made by savvy filmmakers with 100k or complete geniuses with 10k. The truth is probably somewhere in the middle.
Daring, shocking, funny, and sweaty Canadian; Astron-6’s Father’s Day is a great way to celebrate the holiday by watching an often-overlooked grindhouse cinematic gem with the right type of Dad.
