My quick rating - 5.9/10. Mad Heidi is what happens when someone looks at the wholesome children’s story of Heidi, watches Dead Alive, and polishes off a cheese fondue pot full of madness, and says, “Yes. All of this.” This is Swissploitation cinema at its most proudly unhinged.
The film wastes no time setting the tone. It opens with a brutal massacre of peaceful protesters by an authoritarian regime, lingering on one woman being executed in a way that practically screams, “This will matter later.” Smash cut to the credits and the wonderfully cheeky “Swissploitation Films” tag, boldly forewarning us of the type of film experience about to unfold. Subtlety doesn’t appear to have made it across the border.
Switzerland is now ruled by President Meili (Casper Van Dien), an autocratic cheese magnate with dreams of global domination through dairy. Yes, cheese is power here. Lactose-intolerant people are treated like subhuman scum, publicly humiliated, dragged off to re-education camps, and literally tortured by cheese. It just doesn’t make any sense, it’s idiotic, but it is also consistently funny. The one area where it really shines is in a joke about a pimp-like character vending cheese because he “keeps his goats happy.” This film is just in on the joke.
Heidi (Alice Lucy), our sweet mountain girl turned vengeance-fueled freedom fighter, is pulled into the madness after her boyfriend, Goat Peter (Kel Matsena), is accused of black market dairy trading. His execution is sudden, nasty, and very, very bloody. In fact, blood sprays so frequently throughout Mad Heidi that it starts to feel like the film was sponsored by the color red. Add in topless cheese servers at tyrant meetings, starvation tactics that force prisoners to choose between death or cheese, and you’ve got exploitation cinema checking off its bingo card with pride.
Things really go off the rails when a henchman is forced to sample the forbidden “Ultra Swiss” cheese, a scene that feels like it wandered in straight from a Troma film and decided to stay. From there, we’re treated to an inspiring, music-themed training montage where Heidi learns to fight under the guidance of forest nuns, because that is what exploitation flix do. Why wouldn’t militant woodland nuns be part of this?
To the film’s credit, the splatter effects are solid, the props are impressively detailed (especially the “final boss” Neutral-izer, a gloriously dumb pun on Swiss neutrality), and the performances fully commit to the insanity. Knowing this came from one of the most successful and respectable crowdfunding campaigns ever only makes it more impressive. Or absurd, you choose.
Mad Heidi is bizarre, wildly original, and unapologetically so. It’s not great filmmaking, but it is certainly a memorable one, and the type of entertainment that I was craving, are you?
https://jackmeat.com/mad-heidi-2022/
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