For reasons no one can really understand, Zack Carlson and Bryan Connolly decided to make a comprehensive guide to every appearance of punk rockers on the big screen.
The list ranges from the fiendishly wrong “Surf II” to the horrifyingly true “Suburbia.”
They said it has something to do with punk’s hijacked image and how Hollywood ran the image clean off a cliff of insanity.
Or maybe they were really bored. Either way, enjoy their projecat musings, the death of punk and their thoughts on “new punk.” Here are Carlson and Connolly in their own words:
On why they spent seven years constructing this book
“We decided to completely document every on-screen appearance of a punk or someone depicting a punk because we thought they were the most entertaining and maligned in stereotypes. Punk culture got railroaded by Hollywood in a very entertaining way.”
~Carlson
No, really, why they made this book
“I would go to all the shows. I would wear ridiculous hair and a belt with skulls on it that I had. My parents didn’t enjoy it. My mom would make me sit on the couch with a towel behind my head so I wouldn’t get smears on it. Every Friday and Saturday, I would go to the punk show till late at night. I did that all throughout high school.”
~Connolly
What they found out in the process
“Ninety-five percent of the time, filmmakers got it hilariously,
completely wrong to the point that the punk would be wearing a garbage bag and popsicles would be shoved through his ears. Everyone just latched onto it. … and nobody had ever fucked it up that bad.”
~Carlson
The kinds of punks in the book
“The ones in the movies where some guy head’s could butt through a wall, and he’d have a purple mohawk.”
~Connolly
Favorite punk film
“My favorite is ‘Surf II,’ directed by Randall Badat, and it is pretty much the opposite of ‘Suburbia.’ It’s wholly wrong in its depiction of punks. It literally portrays punks as garbage-eating zombies who bust their heads through walls and fart on command and say ridiculous things. It’s the ultimate pinnacle of 80s fun ever.”
~Connolly
Impressions of punk as a child
“It’s the one character that just bites the top of a beer bottle and then breaks the rest of it against the forehead. It’s the most colorful and completely jackass retarded version of a human being you have ever seen. When you are 12 years old watching this, you’re like ‘Jesus Christ, are there really people like this? I can’t believe it.’”
~Carlson
On the movies that didn’t make the cut
“We decided to go with characters that are deliberately depicted as punk-rock characters in movies. We lost some films that people thought should’ve been included like ‘Over the Edge’ or ‘Straight to Hell.’ There’s not a punk character in those movies so we nixed them. Of course, people are going to argue about that, but if their life is so boring they want to argue about that they will.”
~Carlson
The Current State of Punk
“Once you can buy a Dead Kennedys record at Best Buy for 30 bucks, and then you go the grocery store and the person checking out an old woman’s grocery and has a really big mohawk and a tattoo on her face, and the old woman doesn’t care — it doesn’t mean anything. I think it’s more punk now to say, ‘I vote Republican and love Jesus.’”
~Connolly
On the kids who think they are punk
“I have respect for the dead and am laying flowers on the grave of punk. Kids coming out now going to the mall and buying their rebel wear, like really need to get slapped in the fucking face.”
~Carlson
The duo stops by the Guild to show off their book and classic films, “Valley Girl” and “Times Square” at 7 p.m. today for $10. Be sure to check it out, or don’t if you think too cool for that sort of thing.
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