Holy Trinity: don't listen to the dead people in your head

REVIEW by Drew Rowsome

22 Jul 2019

The club is our church, our sanctuary, where we're free to express our divine selves. Outside these walls we can't be ourselves without the world being hateful, but here you can be whoever you want.

Holy Trinity is a hybrid of genres, mashing together horror, satire, comedy, scifi and earnest documentary to create a non-exploitative exploitation flick. Trinity, played by Molly Hewitt aka Glamhag who also directed from her own screenplay, is a dominatrix who huffs a mysterious room/spiritual cleanser that gives her the unsettling ability to hear the voices of the dead. This causes problems in her relationship with her willing slave Baby who is a singer in a punk band. It also sets her off in a quest to understand why this is happening.

Trinity seeks advice from a priest, a tarot reader and an energy transfer expert. The priest is a closeted self-flagellating cliché who advises Trinity to attend a narcotics anonymous meeting (not such bad advice as huffing aerosol fumes is probably not a healthy addiction). The other advisors are only able to warn her that it has something to do with danger and an orange crocodile. A chance meeting with a Brazilian man with voodoo credentials seems promising, but the true answer lies closer to home.

Home is a space shared with Imp Queen (who we meet decorating an elaborate cake while critiquing a television psychic) and a witch, Laura Gonzalez whose pronouncements are intense and utlimately astute. It is Imp Queen who, as the host of a vibrant club night, who delivers the speech about a club being a church and it frames the entire film. The club is also home. When Trinity encounters a distraught ghost at the club, Trinity's first question is "What are your pronouns?" before helping the ghost explain to their gossipy friends that their death was not their fault. It was an exploding nacho cheese dispenser.

Holy Trinity is in some ways a film noir played out in a poly candy-coloured (the set design is eye-popping, Fairytale on a budget but just as mesmerizing) world instead of in shadows. The BDSM is colourful and sweet, even when the dominatrixes gather for a cocktail klatsch complete with slave boy servers. New age and established belief systems are gently mocked but also endorsed. The only fly in the ointment is that this world is apparently scifi-ruled by a corporation which has branded all products in the same monochromatic Glamhag logo and design. This is specifically linked to the wounds of Christ on the cross. 

Yes, there are deep threads of metaphor coursing under the vibrant colours but Holy Trinity is essentially a romp. Trinity hesitates to give up huffing, and her communication with the dead, because it is gaining her so many social media hits. But is a fame addiction thrill worth more than the love of Baby? Trinity, exasperated, pulls a dildo from her vagina, unable to get off because Baby's dead father won't shut up and Baby is crushed. And when Baby is incarnated by the luminous Theo Germaine, whose deep wide eyes register nuances far beyond the father issues and creative aspirations, fame versus love is a choice with consequences. 

Hewitt's narrative, dialogue and sense of timing may be shambolic, but she has created a world that we all want to live in. Where sexuality is freely expressed without judgement, gender is causally fluid, drag queens are style guides, a bull dyke who materializes and de-materializes is a tantalizing prospect not a threat, and everything is colourful and bright. Where delightful incidentals happen in the margins (Baby finds a doggy playmate, the energy queen has a catwoman as a pet, nachos from beyond the grave are edible). And Hewitt does it without making it a statement, this world just is as it should be. It is a wonderful place to visit and to aspire to. Don't listen to the dead people talking in your head.They are the past and Holy Trinity is the future.