The version currently on Prime opens with a text saying Chloe Sevigny had something to do with its reissue. Seems to fit, because this movie looks, almost as much as Herzog's stuff from around then, especially Stroszek, like inspiration for Sevigny's ex, Harmony Korine. See especially the scene with a mentally handicapped man singing an Elvis song on a city street, which could be in either Herzog or Korine. Both literally and figuratively, Sevigny and Korine's generation of hipsters was wearing these clothes twenty years later, so much so that it's weird to see actual working class alcoholics and drug addicts in the mirror shades and wide-lapelled jackets. And then, of course, Manz had a last hurrah in Korine's Gummo, in which Sevigny appeared, so perhaps the reissue is the latter's tribute to the former.
Story is a dilatory mess and quite boring, but the profound darkness of the subject matter, touched on in almost no other film I can think of except Taxi Driver, warrants our attention, and it's beautifully shot with great performances - especially from the young Manz - and standout scenes all the way through.
Story is a dilatory mess and quite boring, but the profound darkness of the subject matter, touched on in almost no other film I can think of except Taxi Driver, warrants our attention, and it's beautifully shot with great performances - especially from the young Manz - and standout scenes all the way through.