Recently watched: Susan Tyrrell in Angel (1984) and Avenging Angel (1985). When I recently posted my birthday tribute to the hellraising whisky-voiced maverick “outsider actress” citing my favourite Tyrrell performances, multiple people demanded, “But what about Angel?” Somehow this one always eluded me. I vividly remember seeing the lurid newspaper ads for Angel as a teen, with its “High School Honour Student by Day. Hollywood Hooker by Night” tagline. Angel isn’t streaming on any legit platform in the UK – but it IS currently viewable on YouTube, so I finally watched this infamous grindhouse cult classick (sic) for the first time Friday night. And it’s a true trash epic! Like any self-respecting sexploitation flick, it finds any excuse for gratuitous female nudity (for no logical reason, the action keeps cutting to the girls' gym changing room). The language is notably filthy (the C U Next Tuesday word gets thrown around freely). All due regards to the leads (Donna Wilkes as plucky Molly aka Angel, Cliff Gorman as the gruff cop trying to save her from a serial killer, Rory Calhoun as a washed-up cowboy), but for me Tyrrell’s fire-breathing portrayal of butch, sewer-mouthed Solly Mosler dominates. Her acting choices here incorporate freaky asymmetrical scrawled-on eyebrows, broken reading glasses and a punk haircut. At full throttle she recalls Susan Lowe as Mole McHenry in John Waters’ Desperate Living (1977). As the AllMovie website concludes “the true entertainment comes from the supporting cast: Susan Tyrell and Dick Shawn steal every scene they are in as a lesbian landlady and drag queen duo who bicker like an old married couple. These performances are almost better than the movie deserves and thus keep it from being the usual b-movie fodder.” Sequel Avenging Angel is a lesser work (Betsy Russell, the actress who replaces Donna Wilkes, is fatally unengaging) but it has its moments. If anything, Tyrrell mugs even MORE furiously and is MORE abrasive this time. As always with Tyrrell, you wonder if anyone dared to direct her or did they just say: “Let SuSu do her thing and stay the hell out of her way.”

Susan Tyrrell in Angel, 1984.

Susan Tyrrell in Angel, 1984. 👓

Susan Tyrrell as Solly Mosler in Avenging Angel, 1985.