Film

Street Trash

Name: Street Trash
Genre: Comedy, Horror
Released: 1987
Cast: Mike Lackey, Bill Chepil, Vic Noto, Mark Sferrazza, Jane Arakawa

Horror comedy

Street Trash is a gleefully deranged 1987 cult film that pairs graphic body-horror comedy with trash-compactor-level exploitation. Picture The Toxic Avenger's weirder cousin: hobos melting into neon sludge, a Vietnam vet's violent breakdown, and practical effects that are either disgusting or hilarious depending on your threshold. It's anarchic, deliberately offensive, and absolutely sincere about its chaos. For midnight-movie devotees and gorehounds with a sense of humour.

TMDb rating

3.0

Should you watch it?

Watch it if you love gleefully disgusting low-budget horror that treats its grossest set pieces as punchlines, the kind of outrageous practical goo effects and anarchic bad taste that make you laugh out loud.

Skip it if you need horror that stays scary or comedy that stays sharp; much of the humor is crude and the pacing sprawls across a scrappy hour and forty minutes.

What it asks of you: Expect a loose, rambling shape with abrupt tonal swings, a lot of grime on screen, and a willingness to let absurdity outrun logic for its full running time.

Not sure? Find tonight's pick in a minute.

If you liked this

The Toxic Avenger1984

Troma's absurdist masterpiece that proved low-budget splatter-comedy could be genuinely inventive. Same gleeful disregard for taste and consistency; same commitment to making you laugh and recoil simultaneously.

But The jokes wear thin if you're not onboard with deliberately juvenile provocation. Also genuinely gross in ways that don't always land.

Re-Animator1985

A cult classic that nails the tone Street Trash reaches for: horror-comedy that respects both genres. Deadpan performances grounding absolute bedlam. Practical effects that are inventive and obscene.

But It's a Herbert West adaptation, so you need to tolerate eighties camp and a certain amount of sexual violence played for laughs. Not everyone will.

Brain Damage1988

Frank Henenlotter's fever dream about a man befriended by a parasitic brain. Another film that treats grotesque body horror as comedy fuel. Anarchic, weird, proudly disgusting.

But The horror is played slightly straighter than the comedy, which can feel tonal. Also deeply strange in ways that might feel pointless rather than artistic.

Not sure tonight? Get a pick in a minute, starting from Street Trash

The wildcard

Something you would not have found on your own.

The Adventures of Baron Munchausen1988

Both films prioritise imaginative visual chaos over conventional storytelling. Both ask: how far can we push practical effects and commitment to a vision before the film becomes abstract? Both say: very far.

Terry Gilliam's maximalist visual circus: costumes, sets, and practical effects built to overwhelm the senses. Like Street Trash inverted—ornate and beautiful instead of grimy—but the same feverish commitment to making images that shouldn't work work anyway. A film of pure excess.

But Narrative coherence takes a backseat to spectacle. If you want plot over wonder, or can't tolerate wilfully confusing story logic, you'll feel lost. Also a famously troubled production.

The Adventures of Baron Munchausen poster

Dead Poets Society1989

A teenager infiltrates a rich suburb and discovers impossible body-horror secrets. Rife with the same anarchic practical effects mastery. Similarly committed to making you feel viscerally wrong.

But The plot is thin and the pacing meanders. It's more grotesque showcase than story, which some find conceptually interesting and others find exhausting.

Dead Ringers1988

Cronenberg's twin-gynaecologist body-horror chamber piece. Deeply disturbing practical effects, but controlled and purposeful. Shows how the same genre can be elegant and devastating rather than chaotic.

But It's utterly humorless and genuinely depressing. If you want catharsis or release, this is the opposite. Clinical misery.

Bad Taste1987

Peter Jackson's DIY zombie splatter-comedy made for pocket change. Handmade ingenuity and anarchic energy everywhere. Same year as Street Trash and same DNA: no budget, all commitment.

But The acting is deliberately wooden and the plot is incidental. If you need character development or coherence, this will feel tedious.

The Stuff1985

Larry Cohen's paranoid sci-fi comedy about a sentient dessert consuming America. Daft premise, real satirical bite, and wildly inventive practical effects on a shoestring budget.

But It lurches between horror and satire without always landing either. The message can feel heavy-handed if you're not in the mood for obvious metaphor.

Cannibal Ferox1981

A gloriously unhinged Italian cannibal film that treats exploitation as pure cinema. Transgressive, visceral, utterly committed to its own excess. No irony, all intensity.

But It contains graphic animal violence that's not faked. Real human cruelty on screen, not stylised. Authentically disturbing rather than fun-disturbing.

Possession1981

Andrzej Żuławski's frenzied nightmare about a marriage collapsing into eldritch horror. Visual chaos, intense performances, practical effects that feel genuinely alien. Commitment to controlled mania.

But Nearly incomprehensible and exhausting to watch. The film moves at a fever pitch and doesn't let up. Alienating if you prefer narrative clarity or emotional restraint.

Happiness1998

Both films refuse the comfort of knowing which register to use. Both mix extreme violence or perversion with comedy in ways that feel wrong to watch. Both ask audiences to sit with moral vertigo.

Todd Solondz's bleak, darkly comic ensemble about suburban despair and sexual dysfunction. Profoundly disturbing comedy that treats grotesque human behaviour as simultaneously laughable and tragic. The bleakness is complete.

But It includes child sexual abuse as comedy material. Solondz doesn't wink—he's serious about how ugliness can be funny and funny can be ugly. This will repel many viewers as exploitative.

Begone Dull Care1949

Both films treat their mediums as vehicles for pure sensory assault rather than storytelling. Both accept that coherence doesn't matter—only the visceral impact of what's on screen. Both are fundamentally alive with energy rather than craft.

Norman McLaren's abstract animated short: hand-painted frames synced to Oscar Peterson's piano. Pure visual and sonic delight, anarchic and joyful. A three-minute explosion of colour and rhythm. No plot, all sensation.

But It's abstract animation. If you need narrative or character, you'll find it frustrating. Some audiences experience abstract film as pleasant wallpaper rather than art.