Combat Shock

by Buddy Giovinazzo

In 1984, Buddy Giovinazzo’s Staten Island-lensed debut feature COMBAT SHOCK instantly obliterated the line between arthouse and grindhouse. Birth. Movies. Death. calls it “outsider art of the first order… an authentic nightmare vision of a man’s downward spiral in a total sewer of a city.” Starburst says, “it’s still as relentlessly dark and hopeless as we remember it, and even today, the final scenes stand up as some of the most shocking and powerful you’ll ever see.” And PopMatters proclaims, “this is Buddy Giovinazzo’s unsettling masterwork. There has never been a movie this fetid, this streaked with the stains of a million displaced and dour people.” It remains one of the most brutally relevant indie film experiences of all time.

Nearly four decades later, Severin Films’ David Gregory convinced Giovinazzo to revisit COMBAT SHOCK, this time as a 138-page paperback novelization. “The film had been out of my system for many years,” says Buddy, “plus, I was so far removed from the characters I didn’t feel I could go back and live with them again. But then I started thinking about the limitations of the film, my limitations as a young screenwriter, about the super-low budget, and I realized there was more to be told. Now they’ve returned with even more depravity than before. It’s still a nightmare, still dark as f*ck, but now it’s up to your imagination to sort it all out.”

Buddy Giovinazzo’s landmark gut-grinder is now an all-new page-turner, so real you can smell and taste it. Welcome (back) to the jungle.

138 pages, Paperback

Published May 7, 2024

About the author

Buddy Giovinazzo is a filmmaker and author, perhaps best known for his shocking debut film Combat Shock about a troubled Vietnam War veteran. He holds a Masters in Cinema from College of Staten Island.

Reviews

[Paul · Rating 3 out of 5]

I saw Buddy's film adaptation of Combat Shock (as released under the title American Nightmares) in the 1990s. It contains some of the bleakest, grittiest, and most nihilistic scenes ever committed to celluloid. I never had any reason to watch it again. That said, I picked up this book last year and a film convention and shockingly found myself reading it cover to cover in a couple of days. The book provides greater insight into the characters and their motivations than you get in the movie and I'd dare say that this is the preferred medium for telling this tale. Surprisingly engrossing, but nearly impossible to recommend due to the shockingly grim subject matter.

[SnobMaynard · Rating 5 out of 5]

Great adaptation of a great movie!

[Tim · Rating 4 out of 5]

A tar black novella of man chewed and spit out by society.