IT GETS WORSE: 2008
It Gets Worse is a Twenties-style silent horror film, a slapstick Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde in which two starving, shipwrecked fishermen, adrift on a dingy, are on the verge of delirium as one of them falls into febrile reverie. He remembers cremating passengers — victims of some sort of plague — on the boat during an ill-fated journey to Cuba. The reality is that during the voyage, a band of pirates stormed the vessel, robbing and slaughtering its passengers.
After their nefarious deeds are discovered, the thieves stuff the sailor into a coffin-shaped arcade game named “Wakey Wake.” When the sailor’s scrotum is slammed in the coffin lid, he transforms into a Hyde-like alter ego reminiscent of Snidely Whiplash, his balls swelling menacingly and his pubes blooming like kudzu. He exacts revenge.