Movie Review: Singapore Sling (1990, Synapse Films)

By James DePaolo

This is the one review almost everyone who knows me knew was coming, when news broke of this finally coming out on DVD in America. First off, thank you Synapse Films for finally doing it justice and releasing it on DVD. Released in 1990, this is the film about a private detective, that is called ” Singapore Sling”. He is on the trail of the love that left his life, her name is Laura. The story is she was a suspect in a murder and he was put on her case and became so obsessed with her, and fell in love with her. That's when he found out she had a lover, he became a drunk and lost his job. Well, the film opens with Sling in a car, his story is told with subtitles and he is drunk it is a bad rainy night and he is bleeding. He is watching two women in a garden, digging a hole and burying something he believes to be Laura. This film is black and white, told to the audience at times with different characters becoming the narrator. The two women in the garden are a mother and daughter. The daughter has some issues, ranging from her sexual appetite to her mental state. The mother is not that much different. Well, as fate would have it, Sling makes it to the front door and falls down on his face passed out. The girls bring him in the house and tie him up. The things these women do not only to him, but to themselves and each other really goes from the totally off the wall to the fucking sick and bizarre.

Buy Singapore Sling on DVD



This film deals heavily in incest, from daughter to dad to daughter to mom. Also for some reason their father was wrapped up as a mummy for sex. Then we are watching him have sex and they electrocute him during the act. When done they piss in his mouth. And not one truly sick as hell dinner scene, but two. They vomit on him during sex. Cross dress him to play mom with a knife as a penis. A lot of female masturbation. And this is only part of the film.

Singapore Sling was a take on the 1944 film noir, Laura, with Vincent Price. I cannot picture Vincent Price taking this film as a compliment. I originally saw this film in 2001. And I remember being so repulsed, that I swore I could not ever watch this film again but I listed it in my top ten ever list. This was that once in a lifetime film. This film will never be made again. Thank god. Well, now that I got the DVD and a decade has passed, it still repulses me and I still will never watch this film again, till the next time, but this film is still as fucked up as it was then. Original from first frame to last. No film has ever even close to touching all the taboos in this film. If you think one thing is so shocking, they go further the next scene.

The daughter and her dialogue with the screen, was just captivating, if not utterly insane, but at least it was never boring. If you think you have seen it all, trust me you truly have not. In a era of Wound’s, Bunny Game’s, Subconscious Cruelty, and all the other films that I worship. This is the number one. Is this a film for everyone, me and Jeff Dolniak ( Cinema Head Cheese) have had this talk, to tell you the truth this film is for no one. I do not think today’s horror blogger or fan, will get this film. It makes you use your mind, not dumb you down with dumb dialogue and endless gore. This uses pure shock. This is the film Richard Kern would proudly put in his DVD player and worship film again. This is my Star Wars. 21 years later and this film is still a loud statement.