JoeKarlosi A friend brought this DVD to my house after we got a kick of revisiting the unintentionally hilarious DEATH WISH 3. However, the goings on in TENEMENT aren't nearly as accidentally funny, as this is more of a straight-ahead gore film involving a violent gang of young junkies and losers who terrorize the people living in a slummy tenement building in the heart of the rapidly decaying South Bronx area of New York. They are arrested and taken to jail early on, but manage to get out quickly and return to the tenement for revenge by leaving the tenants no route of escape while these punks set out to kill them for their own kicks. As far as trash cinema goes, this one has its brief moments along the way. Directed by Roberta Findlay, who used to work with her late husband Michael on exploitation fodder from the '60s like the infamous "Flesh Trilogy", and who now is one of the few female porn directors, among other things. The title song by Kool Krew is delightfully stupid. *1/2 out of ****

Jonny_Numb A street gang squatting in the basement of the worn-down title structure is thrown in jail, only to be released the same day, and gunning for the occupants who turned them in. Thus begins "Tenement," a bargain-basement attempt at outdoing the violence and depravity of "Last House on the Left" and its imitators. Instead of increasing its admittedly warped charm, the low budget instead hinders the production, with lamely rendered deaths (that employ the same Campbell's Tomato Soup blood FX), a plodding pace, uneven acting, and some of the most regrettable fashions of the 1980s (which is saying a lot). Director Roberta Findlay (co-author of the notorious "Snuff") poorly juggles windy dialog scenes intercut with violence that is more shocking in theory than execution (the broom-handle rape being a prime example), but also presents a few daringly unconventional characters (including a woman who whores herself out to support her boyfriend's heroin addiction) that raise the interest factor a little. "Tenement," long a lost video relic from the '80s, didn't necessarily deserve to be found, but could actually benefit from a decent remake.

TM-2 I bought this DVD last Friday because I was looking for some early 80's, politically incorrect, sex'n violence balance to the banality of to-days oh-so-correct trash that Hollywood spews out. As I scanned the shelves for something that would scream Independence, I came across 'The Tenament'.You usually cannot go by what the cover says. They can't ALL be the 'most shocking', 'depraved', 'explicit', 'gut wrenching', 'gory', 'perverted'...well, you get the picture.As I picked up 'The Tenament', I hoped the cover-art hype would be, for once, right on. The claim was it got an X certificate on release and it wasn't because it was a porno in drag! My wife saw the cover and excused herself. She knew I was on an odyssey to combat the effects of the sanitized hogwash we bathe in daily and was not quite ready to cleanse her brain. She has a much higher tolerance, being a woman.I sat down with a very nice glass of chardonnay, dimmed the lights and fired up the DVD.....I was in luck! This was definitely a find - a throwback to the days when you 'made a statement'. Sleezy sex, violence, gore, disco music, electrocution, did I say Gore?, slashings, drug use and other assorted bad stuff. They don't make 'em like this anymore! This is definitely an NC-17 or 'X' for real.Talking of 'X', I really miss the category. I don't mind the porn industry but I'm ticked of they hi-jacked my favorite movie certificate. The Should have used 'P' (for Porn) or 'PPP'.Afterwards I watched the directer interview. Roberta gave some very interesting anecdotes that indicated life during filming was just as bizarre.Well, I'm re-balanced and ready to absorb more of the bland, bleached offal being forced on me by the media moguls.Highly recommended. Watch the extras on the DVD. Not a date movie. Has multiple viewing potential.

udar55 If one were to crown Roberta Findlay's best film, I think TENEMENT would be it. A variation of "people trapped in the house" genre, TENEMENT takes place in a run down building, all in one day with Findlay keeping the tension going with on screen titles giving the time (and sometimes even the apartment levels). This helps as the gang ruthlessly tries to make its way up to the tenants.The gang is, as most gangs in films were during this time period, cinematic-ally goofy. It is a multi-ethnic gang dressed to the hilt in chains and leather. Findlay admits on the DVD audio commentary that during filming she encountered many real gangs in the Bronx and subsequently found out that her vision of gangs "wasn't very realistic." Regardless, the cast, comprised of mostly unknown but professional actors, is very convincing. Both Sam (Joe Lynn) and Chaco (Enrique Sandino), the leaders of the good guys and bad guys respectively, are given very strong portrayals by the actors. An interesting bit of trivia, TENEMENT marks the film debut of Paul Calderon, a recognizable character actor who went on to be in a wide range of stuff from PULP FICTION to LAW & ORDER.One of the multiple films in the mid-80s urban warfare genre, TENEMENT is perhaps the sleaziest of the bunch. Director Findlay goes for the throat in terms of the violence, featuring brutal rapes, stabbings, throat slicing, animal mayhem and castration. It created a cumulative effect so strong that the film was award an X rating by the MPAA (interestingly, so was the gang war epic DEATH WISH 3 at the time, but it was reversed on appeal).