One of the best things about watching shitty movies is that it is far more likely to find a film that goes extreme compared to a Hollywood flick, or even compared to a Film with a capital ‘F.’ A good case in point is 1985’s Tenement, released under various other titles, from outsider filmmaker Roberta Findlay.
Findlay spent most of her career directing obscure exploitation films or smut, the smut usually under a male pseudonym. Late in her career she dipped her toes into more of the mainstream, her most well-known flick being Prime Evil. Having come from a world where anything could be put onto film, those sensibilities carried through into work that fell under the scrutiny of the censors at the MPAA.
It’s easy to picture them clutching their pearls at the MPAA when Tenement was submitted for review. In my notes, a sentence reads, “A never ending register of violence.” And that’s this movie’s most prominent feature — set piece after set piece of grisly death at the hands of psychopathic antagonists who have no regard for morality or the feelings of their victims, nor do they really seem to care about each other.
For the violence, the MPAA slapped Tenement with an ‘X’ rating. According to the internet, so it must be true, this made Tenement the first, and only, film to earn an X from the MPAA based on its violence rather than its sexual content. That would also mean Findlay is the first, and only, filmmaker to refuse to tone down violence to get a looser rating, other filmmakers either agreeing to cuts, or going without a rating at all.
Released in 1985, Tenement serves as something of a time capsule of urban decay of the era. Many location shots use the area of the South Bronx that was most rubble strewn at the time, with the titular tenement standing alone, isolated amongst the piles of bricks. 
Interiors were shot at a city-owned building in Harlem that didn’t have any tenants.
A street gang, led by ever-enraged Chaco (Enrique Sandino), has taken up residence in the basement of a rundown tenement building. They’re down there doing drugs, shooting at rats, playing loud music, and generally making life miserable for the tenants up above. The super, Rojas (Larry Lara), decides to do something about it, and drops a dime on the gang, leading to their arrests.
The residents of the building are ecstatic. So much so that they throw a party to celebrate the gang being removed from their building. But, the gang ditched all incriminating evidence before they were arrested, so they are released from jail before the day is out, and Chaco is super pissed. He decides they must go back and retake their gang clubhouse, and get revenge on the tenement dwellers in the process.
Here is an interlude, showcasing the lives of the residents, that is the best sequence in the film. Findlay doesn’t bang the audience over the head with exposition, or delve into the backstories of the protagonists. Rather, this sequence shows the normalcy that happens behind closed doors. A poor, single mother cooking a can of soup for her young daughter’s dinner while making daydream-like promises about the things they will do as soon as they have a little money. A Jewish widow praying as she sits down for her own meal. An old man having a friendly chat with a young boy and his mother. We don’t need many details on these people. Findlay provides us just enough to show the audience that these are regular folk, just like us. Then, the chaos starts, and doesn’t stop until the credits roll.
Chaco and his gang (including veteran That Guy actor Paul Calderon in his first film role) arrive back at the tenement. They’re wired and ready for violence, starting on the ground floor and working their way up. The first target is a dog, of which viewers see the bloody aftermath. Then comes the scene that really sets the tone for everything that comes later. The single mother, Leona (Rhetta Hughes), is attacked and raped in her apartment. She fights back to bloody effect, and is then murdered in a way that is probably what got this flick the X rating. That’s one tenement dweller and one gang member down, with still half a movie to go.
Chaco and company continue to work their way up the building killing residents and taking their own casualties, until the movie becomes a siege, kin to other films like Assault on Precinct 13. Death after death after death, in bloody fashion, leading to inevitable denouement.
Objectively, Tenement is exploitation trash. There is only that one sequence of humanity, with the rest of the film being a shallow feast for the senses. That, however, is what makes this movie a compelling watch, especially for b-movie mutants. The relentlessness of the film is a powerful draw, and covers up flaws in storytelling and acting. In many ways, this is a terrifying look at what can happen when the rule of law can no longer keep people safe — our worst fears as a society writ large. But, any message can’t hold a candle to the visuals.
Tenement is a wild ride. Even had the violence been toned down to get an R rating it would still qualify as shitty gold. It lands in the hallowed top fifty of the Watchability Index, taking over the #35 spot from Tammy and the T-Rex. Check it out.