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The Story of "Chester The Molester"Jul 30 '06 Write an essay on this topic.
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The Bottom Line A now exploitation director looks back on his disastrous first full length, and still unreleased, film.
"Chester The Molester" is a movie that I rarely talk about. I hate talking about it. I loathe even the remote thought that I had anything to do with this movie. When I look back upon this movie, I grow depressed and often sad. If I sat here now and said that I know nothing about this so called "Chester The Molester," then that would be a complete lie and I would have to lower my head in shame. Not only did I act in a supporting role in this film, but I also wrote the script and directed the movie. This was going to be my first full length movie, shot on a decent sized budget, all on a newly purchased digital camera that I had saved years to buy. The movie that I made before "Chester" was a short 30 minute comedy called "Sinners." "Sinners" was a gross out sophomoric pic about the shenanigans of sex crazed door to door salesmen. That's putting it lightly. I have no problem with that film, it is what it is, a silly comedy made by someone fresh out of high school with his goofy friends. "Chester" was going to be my step away from that. What I had pictured in my mind was a dark, morbid and shocking character study in the vein of a "Bad Lieutenant," riddled with scenes of Catholic guilt and sudden bursts of violence. "Chester The Molester" follows the last day in the life of an elderly priest named Father Chester, played by Nick Foster, who looks back on his life and is in a deep depression and regret over his past dealings with child molestation. While walking through a playground filled with children, Chester sits at a picnic bench, and spends a great deal of the movie talking with a mysterious figure that is supposed to be Jesus. The film is not shown in sequential order, and these Jesus scenes are cut and spread out through the entire movie. A subplot has to do with my character who comes back to town to take revenge out on Chester for molesting him as a child. I come to the church office and threaten him with a gun, then leave. Later I show up at the park to threaten him some more. Other scenes have to do with Chester's some what half hearted and non-specific confession to a random nun. Plus Buford Stowers plays Father Simon, who finds a death threat written in blood saying "Death To Chester The Molester." Chester has frequent nightmares envisioning himself standing over the bed of a sleeping child while holding a knife. Towards the end, after getting drunk off of a bottle of tequila, Chester orders an escort, and looses his virginity while "Hey Paula" plays on the radio. It's then that he is abducted by my character and nailed to a tree. While he begs for forgiveness, I pull out a gun and empty the entire clip into his chest. Looked good on paper. There are only a handful of people who have seen this film. I have shown it to most of the people who were in the movie because I felt that I owed it to them. The only two people who have seen this film and had nothing to do with it's making, are Brian and Katie Hubbard (two close friends), only because I knew that Katie would be the only one to give this movie the proper trashing that it deserves. No one else will ever see this film. It was never shown in a theater of any kind, and I refuse to show it to anyone. Not even clips. I have it kept in my home, and after I die, I hope that someone either burns it, or keeps it as a novelty. What went wrong with this movie? The fact that it was given the unfortunate title of "Chester The Molester" probably begins it's streak of disaster. For something that I had predicted would be our first great film, how did it get saddled with this comic strip title? In high school I teased Nick that I would one day make a film called "Chester The Molester," and have him star as Chester. No plot came from it, just the title. One day, years later, I was driving home from working at a radio station, when I heard on the radio about the sudden bursts of priest controversies involving molestation. My thoughts went back to that stupid title, and my promising Nick that he would one day be Chester The Molester. Then I thought how great it would be if a serious piece of drama came from that title. One thing led to another, I had a story idea, and I gave it that title. A lot of people tried getting me to change the title, but I refused. I felt that the movie never would have come into fruition if I hadn't come up with the stupid title for Nick. So I kept it. Lets talk about the first cut of the film. The first cut was full length. I had edited it all together myself, and waited until it's "premiere" to watch the thing pieced together. I saw this edit, David Gobble saw it (co-star), Buford saw it, and Jessica Stone (who played the prostitute) saw it. After it was over we kind of sat in a silence. It was like imagining that you are going to be kissed on the cheek, but you unexpectedly get a punch to the throat, instantly killing you. You have to understand that during the making of the film, we did not see it for what it was. We had fun making the movie, talked about it in very high regards on our blogs, and really thought we were making something of important dramatic stature (for us). But after watching it, we didn't know what to make of the thing. It was boring, pointless, horrifyingly acted (with the exception of Buford), and paced at a snails speed. Buford was nearly put to sleep by the thing, Dave was fascinated by the completely inane dialogue, I was in a state of shock, and all Jessica could do was laugh, maybe because she thought she was supposed to. The movie also didn't make any sense. With it not being put together in a sequential order, it was hard telling when exactly one scene occured in the film's time span, or if one scene maybe took place before something at the beginning of the film. On the plus side, the cinematography was very good. The movie is shot in a very gritty black & white. There's a beautiful shot of Buford's character Father Simon standing at the church balcony in front of a giant stain glass window. So, another edit for the movie was made. This one cutting out half of the movie's length. It was no longer a full length movie. I had on my hands just a crappy short. It was all just an attempt to salvage that few minutes of the movie between Father Chester and Father Simon that are honestly kind of okay. None doing though. Over half of Chester's discussions with Jesus were removed. A lot of his hallucination about dead children were taken out. The bizarre scene of Chester in an empty field calling up to Jesus is gone. And nearly every scene where Chester bursts out into tears was cut. This 2nd version is the one that Katie and Brian saw. Bad is bad. No matter how you try and fix it, it's either a disaster of epic proportions, or it's a shortened disaster of epic proportions. Now, why was the film bad? The first answer is the script. A large part of it also goes to casting. I think that Nick is an excellent comedic actor in his own right. And over the past few years he's been great in dramas like "Freak Out" and "Cheap." But here, Nick was playing catastrophically against type: playing the lead role of elder priest Father Chester. We gave him fake glasses, and powdered his hair to make it look white. Let it be known that Nick did not ruin this movie. I gave him an impossible role to play. He could be Sir Nick Gielgud, and it would have come across the same way. With Nick in that fake priest outfit, that obvious powdered hair which flaked onto his shirt, and the fact that Nick's real gift is comedy; there's no way that "Chester The Molester" could be taken seriously. If you have not seen what Nick Foster looks like, imagine a younger Dian Bachar. There is a scene where Chester is getting a confession from a teen who has been knocked up. Afterwards, Chester runs to the window to watch her leave. He then proceeds to masturbate. Nick, masturbating in a priest's outfit with powdered white hair. How is one supposed to take that? As unintentional and unfortunate comedy of monumental bad taste, maybe, or some hack director's vein attempt to make a shocking drama that does...not...work. The movie is filled with moments that can cause laughter like that, but it isn't laughter like you're watching a bad midnight movie. It's just laughter from embarassment and confusion. After Chester sleeps with the prostitute, she looks over at him and asks in pity "was this your first time?" Chester looks at her and all he sees is the corpse of a dead kid. So what we have is a character that is so bad in bed, that a prostitute who is working for money, asks if his lameness in the sack is because he is a virgin. And that unintentional awkward laughter is followed by...a dead child? Which is then followed by a big gruff man storming into the room and literally flinging Chester's skinny light body across the room and into a pile of clothes. In that span of about 2 minutes, we have a person who is bad in bed, a dead child, and bizarre physical comedy. And this was all supposed to be played out like a serious drama. It looked good on paper. I almost forgot about the suicide attempt scene. Chester locks himself in his room, pulls a gun from under his matress, puts it to his head and pulls the trigger. It's empty. Chester then sighs in relief, grabs an angel statue and thanks it for, I guess, saving his life. You know what makes that scene more ridiculous? Chester's cell phone goes off immediately afterwards. And it goes off while camera is pointed at the gun on the floor; so it unintentionally looks like the gun is ringing at him. There's also the completely awkward scene of Chester watching over someone's little girl as the parent goes to the car to get something. Actress Beverly Shields is the one who found the kid, and she also plays the parent of the kid in the film. The scene was just dialogue between the kid and Chester regarding religion. But here's the problem. The kid was so young that she could not read. Her lines had to be reduced to one word sentences. Earlier in the movie, Chester talks with a young boy on the sidewalk, and the conversation ends with the kid saying "I still haven't told anyone yet, Father," then walking away. Chester, looking shocked, lowers his head in shame and walks away. And spliced in with everything else are shots of Chester watching kids play basketball, and also a shot of Chester looming around a school cross country event in a park. Yes, it's Nick in powdered hair doing this; and maybe it would work as a comedy. But it's not a comedy. How is one supposed to react to all of this? It's badness is something that I have rarely experienced in anything that I've viewed in my entire life, nevermind the fact that I made the movie. It's drama is so misguided and unexplainable that it is just completely emotionless to the characters and the viewers. Is this movie actually supposed to create sympathy for Father Chester? When he gets crucified and shot, are we really supposed to care, especially since my character only comes across as a raving sadist? Since we are left with absolutely nothing to care for, all we can do is find laughter in the awkward dialogue, which is still too far in between, and exactly what I just said: awkward. When my character asks Chester if the child he was just talking to was too young for his taste, it isn't a hilariously funny bad line. It's just kind of sick, and even worse because it doesn't even work as drama. It's been years since I've watched this movie. And aside from me simply saying how much I didn't like the movie, this is the first time I've gone into great detail about it, but that's only to get it off my chest. This movie is embarassing. I shudder at the very thought of it. It is worse than any disappointment I may have received in school by a simple F on a test. This movie I feel is my greatest failure in the field that I love best: writing and directing and showcasing. That's why I refuse to show the movie. Watching it with someone, knowing exactly what their reaction will be, would be nothing short of humiliating on my part. And I know that Nick has refused to watch it again since the first and only time that he saw it. It's because of this film that I never try to forcast whether a movie that I happen to be making will turn out to be any good in the end. If something turns out great, then that's wonderful. I love "Freak Out," I love "Cheap," and I have a lot of fun with "Eroticism." But if a movie I make turns out bad, then, how surprising can that be? I made "Chester The Molester." It kind of makes me think about what it would be like if Dave, Buford, Nick, and myself just sat down and watched the thing again as a group, to just try and identify when and where the movie took a turn for the worse. What was supposed to be the point of the thing? Where was it supposed to go? What was the viewer supposed to take away from watching a loathsome sicko wallow in his own guilt? To watch it again though, and to try and answer those questions would be giving the movie far more credit than it actually deserves. This will always remain a "lost film" in my eyes. Not "lost" as in missing, because I hold the only copy; but "lost" as in it being a misguided director's vanity art house project. Because, after all: It did look good on paper.  |
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