Woo hoo! School’s out for summer and that means that it’s time to have a slumber party! It’s time to gather at the home of whoever has the biggest house and dance around in your sleepwear before falling on the couch, watching a really bad TV show, and talking about how all the boys in town suck. What fun! Seriously, I used to love slumber parties! Of course, the parties I went to were a lot more fun than the one featured in the film that I am about to review.
The 1988 film, The Last Slumber Party, is called The Last Slumber Party because it features an escaped homicidal lunatic who wears surgical scrubs and mask and who carries around scalpel. The lunatic shows up at the party and makes sure that, for the majority of the cast, it is their last slumber party. But, to be honest, I think this would have been the last slumber party even if the killer didn’t show up just because the party sucks so much that I don’t think anyone would ever want to run the risk of throwing another one.
Seriously, this is the most boring slumber party that I’ve ever seen. First off, there’s only three guests and only one of them, Chris (Jan Jensen), has a personality. Of course, that personality is not a particularly likeable one, in that it leads to Chris constantly cursing and making fun of every boy at the school for being, in her opinion, gay. Speaking of the boys at the school, four of them attempt to crash the slumber party but again, none of the really have a personality beyond not being able to open up a can of beer without spilling it on their shirt. As well, most of the guys are quickly dispatched by the scalpel-wielding killer. The girls are a bit perturbed when the guys start to mysteriously disappear but none of them are upset enough to actually look for them or to pay attention to the reports on the television about an escaped murderer. Instead, Chris just suggests that the boys got scared off because they were gay. Seriously, Chris is a bit obsessed.
Also obsessed with Dr. Sickler (David Whitley), who is the father of one of the girls and who was scheduled to give the escaped lunatic a lobotomy. Of course, Dr. Sickler isn’t obsessed with his missing patient as much as he’s obsessed with remembering to pick up some orange juice. His wife really likes orange juice and there’s way too much talk of orange juice in this film. Oddly enough, Dr. Sickler never actually picks any up.
I’m grasping at things to say about this film because there’s not really a whole lot to be said about The Last Slumber Party. Judging by the accents of the majority of the cast, The Last Slumber Party was a regional production and it was made down in my part of the world. I actually enjoyed hearing the familiar accents but I just wish the characters had been a bit less unlikable and the dialogue had more of a natural rhythm. As it is, this is just one of those slasher films that’s full of padding and feels considerably longer than just 77 minutes. For the majority of the film’s characters, this would indeed be their last slumber party. It’s a shame they couldn’t have ended things with a better get-together.
The 1993 film, The Chill Factor, is a bit of an oddity.
The film opens with a shot of young, attractive people racing their snowmobiles across a snowy landscape. One of them, Jeannie (Dawn Laurrie), narrates. She tells us that she can still remember everything that happened as if it was yesterday. She and her friends were visiting the ski slopes of Wisconsin. She was engaged to be married to Tom (Aaron Kjenaas), who she secretly knew didn’t really love her that way that she loved him. She mentions that they were traveling with their friends and none of them had any worries because they were young and the year 2000 was right around the corner. She mentions that one of her friends was “dating a black girl.” It’s an odd line, especially when heard in 2023, when interracial couples in movies and television are so common that it’s almost become a bit of a cliché. One thing that makes the line feel all the stranger is the rather flat tone of the narrator’s voice. The narration almost sounds as if it’s being delivered by someone who is under hypnosis.
Jeannie, Tom, and their friends stop off at a rustic lodge. Karen (Connie Snyder) is Tom’s little sister and Chris (David Fields) is her boyfriend, as well as being a medical student. Ron (Jim Cagle) is a friendly football player who has just been drafted by a pro team. Ron’s girlfriend, Lissa (Eve Montgomery), is the black girl mentioned in Jeannie’s opening narration. When two local racists confront Ron and Lissa and spit out a racial slur, friendly waitress Bessie (Bekki Vallin) makes it up to the group by telling them about a great place to race their snowmobiles. It’s called Black Friar Lake and Bessie promises to tell them why it’s named that if they come back. Even though Tom has been drinking all day long, he insists on going out to Black Friar Lake.
At Black Friar Lake, Tom pulls a Kennedy and crashes his snowmobile into a tree. His friends drag the unconscious and blood-covered Tom to an abandoned Dominican summer camp. They bandage his wounds and try to keep him warm. Chris says that Tom probably has internal injuries. However, Tom suddenly opens his eyes and, other than having a headache, he acts as if nothing serious has happened. While Ron heads back to town to try to get help, Karen searches the camp and comes across a makeshift Ouija board. Even though Jeannie believes that Ouija boards can actually summon evil spirits, she still joins the others in fooling around with it. (As Jeannie explains in her narration, “It was my nature.”) Soon, Tom is waking up more often and speaking much more aggressively than usual. (When Karen — HIS SISTER — tells him that he’s a pain in the ass, Tom tells her, “I’ll give you a pain in the ass,” and then suggests that she and Chris should go have sex.) Soon, people are dying, blood is being spilled, and the Ouija board keeps trying to send out messages.
The Chill Factor is an odd film. On the surface, it seems like a typical mash-up of slasher mayhem and EvilDead-style supernatural activity. But there’s an intriguingly off-center quality to the film. The film moves at its own dream-like pace, with certain scenes going on longer than one might expect while other scenes end rather abruptly. When the group first arrives at the summer camp, their conversations are a bizarre mix of the mundane and the philosophical. Random shadows can be spied moving along the walls and the main characters never seem to notice that fresh blood is flowing from the eyes of a statue of Jesus. Towards the end of the film, there’s a Rosemary’s Baby-style sex scene between Tom and Jeannie, except occasionally it’s not Jeannie that Tom is making lover to but instead Karen. The falling snow gives the entire film a chilly and rather bleak atmosphere. (This may be the only film to feature a demon chasing his prey on a snowmobile.) The cast was obviously made up of amateurs and the majority of the performances are extremely stiff. However, even that contributes to the film’s otherworldly atmosphere. Indeed, watching the performers, I was reminded of Werner Herzog’s Heart of Glass, in which Herzog had his actors perform under the influence of hypnosis.
Finally, there’s an interesting subtext to this film. Jeannie, who fears that Tom will never love her the way that she loves him, has a night of passionate sex with him, just to wake up the next morning and discover that he had suddenly changed. He’s not the man who she thought he was. Now, in Tom’s case, this is because he’s been possessed by a demon. However, this scene captures a fear that every woman has felt. Will your lover still be the same man when you wake up in the morning? Or, having gotten what he wanted, will he then reveal his true self? As much as Jeannie feared the Ouija board, she still used it because, deep down, she wanted to know who Tom really was. And the board revealed the truth. In her final piece of narration, Jeannie speaks of still dreaming about that night with Tom and her flat tone leaves it up to the audience to decide if she dreams of who Tom become or who she thought Tom was before.
I suspect that The Chill Factor may have been a happy accident, a case of a low budget and an amateur cast actually coming together something that turned out to be far better than anyone was expecting. Accidentally or not, The Chill Factor is an intriguing work of existential horror.
In 1980’s Stoned, Scott Baio plays Jack Melon, a teenager with a problem.
Jack is shy, awkward, and can’t escape the shadow of his older brother, Mike (Vincent Bufano). Mike is champion swimmer. Jack is someone who can barely walk down a hallway without walking into a wall. But then Teddy (Jack Finch) gets Teddy hooked on marijuana, the so-called weed with roots in Hell! Soon, Jack is acting weird, making strange jokes, and getting all of the attention in the world. Unfortunately, Jack is also alienating those closest to him and his newfound habit leads to a near-tragedy.
Stoned was aired as an ABC Afterschool Special and, while it’s not quite Reefer Madness, it does adhere to the general anti-drug formula. In record time, Jack goes from being shy and dorky to being goofy and potentially dangerous. We get all the expected scenes of Jack devouring ice cream, Jack wandering around in a daze, Jack realizing that the girl he likes what’s nothing to do with the new Jack, Jack’s well-meaning teacher (played by the show’s writer and director, John Herzfeld) confronting his students about their drug use, and Jack accidentally hitting his brother with an oar. Jack thinks that marijuana is opening his brain because, while stoned, he suddenly realizes that a tree looks like “Old Man Eber.” Stoned goes on to show Jack ruining his life but I have to admit that I spent most of the running time wondering who Old Man Eber was. (Seriously, Old Man Eber sounds like some sort of Lovecraftian ghoul, waiting in the shadows to drag one to an Arkham cemetery.) Of course, someone nearly dies as a result of Jack’s marijuana use. What’s interesting is Jack is able to save the person’s life, even though he’s stoned. Would non-stoned Jack have been able to do it?
From the fashion choices to the cast to the message that marijuana is the most dangerous thing on the planet, Stoned is one of those TV specials that epitomizes its time. This was a film that was made at a time when it was inconceivable that there would some day be commercials for edible gummies and it shows. Watching Stoned is like stepping into a time machine.
Today, of course, Scott Baio is better known for his politics than his acting. Whenever I see a headline that reads, “This veteran Hollywood star is calling out his industry for not understanding America,” I know the story is inevitably going to be about Scott Baio complaining about his taxes. That said, Scott Baio is convincing when he’s playing Jack as being awkward and insecure but he definitely goes a bit overboard once Jack starts smoking. While that probably dilutes the effectiveness of the film’s message (because, let’s be honest, real stoners are going to watch this and easily recognize the fact that Jack is trying way too hard to convince everyone that he’s stoned), it does give this film a certain entertainment value.
Here is Stoned, complete with the commercials that aired when the show was original broadcast on November 12th, 1980:
Welcome to Retro Television Reviews, a new feature where we review some of our favorite and least favorite shows of the past! On Fridays, I will be reviewing T. and T., a Canadian show which ran in syndication from 1987 to 1990. The show can be found on Tubi!
This week, T.S. and Amy continue to keep Canada safe.
Episode 1.19 “Special Delivery”
(Dir by Vic Sarin, originally aired on May 15th, 1988)
“In this episode,” Mr. T tells us during the pre-credits preview, “a young boy’s on the run with only his fears and a mysterious package for company.”
Bruce Johnson (Robert McClure) is an old friend of T.S. Turner’s who is now working as an executive for the Canadian space program. He records a tape in which he tells T.S. that he suspects that someone is trying to sabotage Canada’s latest space rocket and that his life in danger. “If anything happens to me,” Bruce asks, “take care of David and Brenda.” Bruce leaves his office with a package of evidence. He finds his 12 year-old son, David (Jamie Dick) skateboarding in front of a school. He gives the package to David and tells him to deliver it to Decker’s gym. David wears his baseball cap backwards so we all know he’s a rebel. Bruce is nabbed by the police as soon as he gives David the package but, fortunately, David is able to roll away on his skateboard.
With her husband and son both missing, Brenda Johnson (Karen Woolridge) calls T.S. Turner at Amy’s law office. Turner is out but the spacey administrative assistant, Sophie (Catherine Disher), takes the message and then runs down to the courthouse to give it to Amy. As someone who has worked as an administrative assistant, Sophie’s unprofessionalism made me cringe. How can Amy run her law office if the office is so disorganized? I’m surprised T.S. puts up with it.
Amy heads down to the police station, where she discovers that Brenda is being held as a witness in a federal investigation that’s being headed up by Detective Williams (William Finlay), who is a part of the Canadian Bureau of Investigation. Williams asks Amy where Bruce and David are and Amy tells him that Brenda has “civil rights.”
“Civil rights are superseded in matters of treason,” William replies.
Amy threatens to call a press conference so Williams agrees to let Brenda go free. Wow, that was easy!
10 minutes into this episode, T.S. finally shows up. He and Amy get a hot dog on a city street. “Thanks, brother,” T.S. tells the hot dog vendor. Amy fills T.S. in on what’s happening. T.S. suggests that Amy head to the gym while T.S. searches the city. Meanwhile, mysterious men in gray suits watch their every move.
Meanwhile, David continue to ride his skateboard through the city. He gets chased by the cops at one point and has to run through an office building to escape. Seriously, how big is this city? The kid just had to go to the gym!
Finally, 15 minutes into this 23-minute episode, David reaches the gym. However, he can’t go into the gym because the feds are staking it out! So, he just stands around outside with his hands in his pockets. T.S. shows up at the gym and announces, “The Kid’s not going to show up here with federal agents outside!”
After putting on camouflage gear, T.S. grabs Decker and heads back to the office. (Amy stays at the gym.) While Sophie flirts with Decker, T.S. calls the gym and tells Amy that David is at the office. T.S. knows the lines are bugged so this is his clever plan to throw off the feds. And it works! As Amy and Agent Williams head to the law office, Decker and T.S. head back to the gym.
And yes! David is now in the gym. He gives T.S. the package.
“Hey, little brother,” T.S. says, “everything’s going to be alright.”
Suddenly, a random bad guy shows up in the gym, holding a gun. He demands the package and promises no one will get hurt.
“Someone sticks a gun in my face, that don’t exactly inspire confidence!” T.S. explains.
T.S. then punches the guy out. One scene later, a news reporter informs us that Bruce Johnson has been found alive so I guess that’s the end of that.
This was a weird episode. For all the talk of international intrigue and Canada’s space program, the majority of it was just filler footage of the kid rolling around on his skateboard. T.S. was barely in it, leading me to suspect that maybe Mr. T had some vacation time and wanted to leave early. Either way, at least Canada’s space program was saved.
Episode 1.20 “Pros and Cons”
(Dir by Don McCutcheon, originally aired on May 23rd, 1988)
“In this episode,” Mr. T says, “some high-rolling crooks make a very big mistake when they pick on my Aunt Martha.”
Two con artists — Harry (Booth Savage) and Louise (Janet-Laine Green) — pretend to be members of law enforcement and trick T.S.’s Aunt Martha into withdrawing a good deal of money from the bank. Martha thinks that she’s helping them catch a criminal but actually, she’s just given up her hard-earned money. T.S. isn’t going to stand for that! However, Martha doesn’t want to tell T.S., even though T.S.’s nice, Renee (Rachael Crawford) thinks that she should.
So, Renee decides to investigate on her own. After rather easily stealing a book of mugshots from the police station, Renee shows it to Aunt Martha, who immediately identifies Harry and Louise. By running a fake credit check on Louise, Renee and Aunt Martha are able to track them down to a ritzy hotel. Renee dresses up like a maid and Aunt Martha dresses up like a rich guest and they infiltrate the hotel.
Meanwhile, T.S. is shocked to discover that a check that he wrote to fix his car has bounced.
“Why would it do that!?” T.S. demands.
T.S. and Amy go to Aunt Martha’s and find all of Renee and Martha’s notes. Realizing that the two of them are confronting the con artists at the hotel, T.S. and Amy arrive just in time to see Harry and Louise trying to run from the hotel. T.S. blocks Harry’s escape. Harry grabs a mop and points it at T.S.
“Ain’t no way, brother,” T.S. replies.
T.S. subdues Harry by tossing him over a railing (don’t worry, Harry lands on a table) and Aunt Jackie punches out Louise.
The problem here is pretty obvious. The name of the show is T and T, not Renee and Jackie. The fun thing about this show is listening to T.S. growl at the criminals. This episode pushed both Amy and T.S. to the side and, as such, it just wasn’t that much fun. Sorry, Aunt Jackie!
Kane Hodder was a veteran stuntman when he first played Jason Voorhees in 1988’s Friday the 13th Part 7: The New Blood. He would go on to play Jason three more times. He also played Leatherface in Leatherface: The Texas Chainsaw Massacre III and, when Freddy Krueger’s gloved hand appeared at the end of Jason Goes To Hell, that was Kane Hodder’s hand grabbing the famous Jason mask and taking it to Hell.
Sadly, when Freddy vs. Jason went into production, Hodder was replaced by another stuntman. (Ironically, Hodder had been considered for the role of Freddy in the original Nightmare on Elm Street.) Still, for Friday the 13th fans, Kane Hodder will always be Jason Voorhees.
In the scene from Friday the 13th Part 7, Hodder shows off the physicality that made him the ideal zombie Jason.
It’s been five years since Pamela Voorhees’s went on a murderous rampage at Camp Crystal Lake. Mrs. Voorhees is dead, Camp Crystal Lake has once again been declared off-limits, and the sole survivor of Pamela’s rampage is officially considered to be missing.
Paul Holt, who is renowned for his program that trains summer camp counselors, has opened up a camp on the shores of Crystal Lake. With the help of his on-and-off again girlfriend, Ginny, Paul is training his counselors on how to handle every situation and also making sure that they all know better than to go wandering around the remains of Camp Crystal Lake.
Of course, Paul assures the counselors that Jason Voorhees is just a myth and he’s not really wandering around the woods, regardless of what the old-timers in town say. Of course, Paul is wrong. Jason is out there and he’s not at all happy about having a bunch of rowdy people partying so close to his home. One night, when most of the counselors head into town, a small group remains at the camp and they soon come face-to-bag with Jason himself.
The novelization of Friday the 13th Part II was published in 1988, a full seven years after the film was first released. As such, it follows the plot of the film fairly closely, even to the extent of starting with an extended flashback to Alice’s battle with Pamela Voorhees. The kills happen in the same order and in the same way as they did in the film.
What writer Simon Hawke adds to the story is much the same thing that he added to his novelization of the first film. He gives each of the character’s a backstory and explores how they feel about being at Camp Crystal Lake. He makes them a little less generic than they were in the film. For instance, Terri — who was pretty much just a girl who didn’t wear underwear and liked to skinny dip in the film — is revealed to actually by fiercely intelligent and independent in the novel. We learn a lot more about Mark’s determination to be seen as being an individual as opposed to just the counselor in the wheelchair. We learn that Sandra’s older brother once visited the Spahn movie ranch. Ginny and Paul’s relationship also takes on a bit more depth in the novel than it did in the movie.
That said, for fans of the franchise, the most interesting thing about the novelization will be the passages that take place in Jason’s mind. Hawke presents Jason as being someone who was shunned even as a child and who only had his mother in his life. Jason is also revealed to being addicted to murder, needing the rush that he gets from the hunt. We learn a bit more about how Jason has survived in the woods for all those years and what exactly he was doing in that abandoned cabin. To be honest, it’s not as if Hawke really brings anything new to Jason’s mentality. Anyone who has watched the movies knows that Jason is addicted to murder. But it’s still interesting to see the other characters through Jason’s eyes.
The novelization of Friday the 13th Part 2 is an improvement on the first novelization though, again, it’s probably something for Friday the 13th completists only. A copy of it can be found on the Internet Archive.
In the woods of New Jersey, there sits a summer camp that was abandoned after a child drowned and two counselors were subsequently murdered. Now, nearly 20 years later, Steve Christy is determined to reopen Camp Crystal Lake, the summer camp that his family started and lost their fortune trying to save. Steve has a group of young and enthusiastic camp counselors helping him to get the camp ready to go and, as they soon discover, Steve is a tough taskmaster. He’s so tough that even his occasional girlfriend Alice is thinking about abandoning her job at the camp and returning home.
Of course, it’s not just Steve’s temper that the counselors have to watch out for. There’s also someone else lurking around the camp, someone who is determined to kill everyone involved in trying to reopen it. One-by-one, the counselors fall victim to the killer until finally, only one survivor is left to fight for her life….
Interestingly enough, the novelization of Friday the 13th was first published in 1987, seven years after the film came out. The novelization follows the plot of the film, with each of the murders happening in the same order and in the same way. In many places, the dialogue is recreated verbatim. The same person is the murderer in both the book and the film and the book ends with the same twist as the film.
The most interesting thing about the book — really, the only interesting thing about it — is that the book goes into a bit more detail about everyone’s backstory before they ended up at Crystal Lake. As such, we witness Mrs. Voorhees actions right after the drowning of her son, Jason, in which she begs the Christy family to rehire her as their cook. We also learn about the background of each of the victims, who are a bit less generic in this book than in the movie. We especially learn a lot about Jack and Marcie’s relationship, though I have to say that it’s hard to imagine the confident movie version of Jack having much in common with the more insecure Jack who shows up in the novel.
I was a bit disappointed by the book’s backstory for Steve Christy. My personal theory has always been that Steve Christy, with his glasses and his mustache and his ascot and his air of superiority, was a former member of the SDS who later became a Weatherman and helped in the abduction of Patty Hearst. I always assumed that he was working so hard at Camp Crystal Lake because he was on the FBI’s Most Wanted List and he needed a place to hide out. The book, however, portrays Steve as someone who just feels like he has to redeem his family’s name. I think my theory was a bit more interesting.
The novelization of Friday the 13th is probably something that will be best appreciated by Friday the 13th completists. (There’s really not much reason to read it otherwise.) A copy can be found at the Internet Archive.
First released in 1974, Deranged tells the story of Ezra Cobb (Roberts Blossom).
In the 1950s, Ezra is a shy and withdrawn farmer who lives in Wisconsin with his elderly mother (Cosette Lee). Ezra’s mother has raised Ezra to view all other women as being evil and to view sex as being sinful. The end result is that the middle-aged Ezra is absolutely devoted to his mother but he also has no idea what to do with himself after she dies and is buried in the nearby cemetery. After a year of being alone in the farm house, Ezra starts to hear voices telling him to dig up his mother. Ezra does so but, disappointed to see how much her body has decayed over the past few months, he decides that he should start digging up fresher bodies so that he can “rebuild” his mother.
Eeeek!
Yes, it’s a creepy story and it’s all the more creepy for being true. Ezra Cobb is based on Ed Gein, the farmer, grave robber, and serial killer whose actions not only shocked the town of Plainfield but which also inspired Robert Bloch to create the character of Norman Bates. Psycho was based on Ed Gein’s crimes. So was The Texas Chainsaw Massacre, with the bone-strewn home and Leatherface’s habit of wearing other people’s faces lifted directly from some of the more sordid details of what was found at Gein’s home. By the time the police discovered what had been happening at the farm, Ed Gein had moved on from grave robbing to committing murders. It’s known that Ed Gein killed at least three people. It’s suspected that he was responsible for more. Interestingly enough, Ed Gein was described as being very friendly and helpful after he was captured. He spent the rest of his life in various mental hospitals, where he was described as being a model patient.
A low-budget Canadian production, Deranged plays out in a documentary fashion, featuring enough gore that the film was actually banned in some countries. That said, as bloody as certain scenes are, there’s a strong strain of dark humor running through Deranged. As played by character actor Roberts Blossom, the dazed but always polite Ezra never makes much of an attempt to hide his activities. When Ezra’s friend, Harlan (Robert Warner), reads aloud an article about a missing barmaid, Ezra replies that the barmaid is over at his place. Harlan has a good laugh at the idea and Ezra responds with a somewhat shy smile. No one in town suspects Ezra, largely because he doesn’t hunt and he always seem to be so quiet and mild-mannered. Even when Ezra points a rifle at a store clerk, she laughs and asks, “What are you doing, Ez?” and, given that Ezra looks so harmless, it’s easy to understand why. Ezra? Why, he wouldn’t hurt a fly! Interestingly enough, everyone around Ezra is far more openly violent and misogynistic than Ezra. Harlan brags about his ability as a hunter. A man in a bar makes misogynistic comments about the bar maid who has become Ezra’s latest obsession. Though Ezra is the one who acts on his impulses, the film suggests that Ezra isn’t that different from the other men in town.
In a rare starring role, Roberts Blossom gives a strong performance as Ezra, playing him as someone who is so far divorced from reality that he actually seems to be genuinely offended when one of his victims tries to escape from the barn. Blossom plays Ezra as someone who alternates between being a violent madman and someone who has an almost childlike need for approval.
Ed Gein was one of the first serial killers to become national news and Deranged acknowledges this by featuring a newsman (Leslie Carlson) who not only serves as the film’s narrator but who also occasionally shows up in Gein’s farmhouse, speaking directly to the camera and explaining what was going on in Gein’s life at the time. It’s actually an effective technique, one that acknowledges the media obsession with the crimes of men like Ed Gein. That obsession, of course, led to movies, including Deranged. In many ways, Deranged’s use of the newsman is prophetic. It predicted a future in which the media would play their part into turning serial killers into almost mythological figures, sneaking their way through the more shadowy parts of American history.
Deranged is an effective film. For a long time, it was also believed to be a lost film. After the film’s 1974 run, all prints of the film disappeared. Fortunately, in the mid-90s, a copy was found in Florida and both the film and Roberts Blossoms’s performances got the reevaluation and appreciation that they deserved.
In this twisty Italian thriller from 1975, George Hilton plays one of his signature roles. Hilton is cast as Giorgio Mainardi, a handsome and superficially charming man who is actually a soulless cad. Giorgio is a womanizer who is unhappily married to Norma (Tere Valazquez). Giorgio doesn’t love Norma but he does love her money and he’s eager to get his hands on it.
One night, after an argument with Norma, Giorgio goes for a late night drive so that he can call his mistress from an isolated phone booth. While Giorgio is making the call, he witnesses another man pushing his car into the nearby harbor. The man, who is simply identified as the Killer (Antoine Saint-John), is a serial rapist and murderer whose latest victim was in the car. Giorgio approaches the man and the two strike up an unlikely partnership. Giorgio agrees not to go to the police about what he saw if the Killer agrees to kill Norma for him.
A few days later, while Giorgio is at a party, the Killer drives out to Giorgio and Norma’s house. He breaks into the house and strangles Norma. He then places the body in the trunk of his car. The Killer goes back in the house to make sure that he hasn’t left anything behind. When he comes back outside, his car is gone. Realizing that his car has been stolen, with Norma’s body in the trunk, The Killer steals someone else’s car. Of course, in doing so, he sets off a car alarm and the police are called. By the time Giorgio returns home, both the Killer and the car are gone but the police are waiting for him with the news that Norma has apparently become the latest victim of Rome’s kidnapping epidemic!
(At the time this movie was made, Italy’s terroristic Red Brigades were regularly kidnapping anyone who was considered to be wealthy.)
The Killer’s car has been stolen by Luca (Alessio Orano) and his girlfriend, Laura (Cristina Galbo), who are driving to the beach. Of course, what they don’t know is that there’s a dead body in the trunk and that the Killer is tracking their every move. When they reach the beach, Laura soon finds herself fighting for her life when the Killer manages to track her and Luca down.
The Killer Must Kill Again starts out as a Hitchcock-inspired giallo, with the super-sleazy Giorgio hiring the Killer to kill his wife and apparently assuming that he’ll be able to outsmart anyone who investigates the case. However, once the Killer starts following Luca and Laura, it becomes a thriller with the Killer stalking the two clueless car thieves. Fortunately, director Luigi Cozzi is able to pull off the massive shift in tone without the story falling apart. Cozzi delivers a genuinely suspenseful film, one that will keep you guessing until the final moment. In much the same way that Brian De Palma was often criticized for his obvious love of Hitchcock, Cozzi has often been unfairly dismissed as just being an disciple of Dario Argento’s. But, with The Killer Must Kill Again, Cozzi brings his own unique spin to the giallo genre and shows himself to be a much stronger director than he was often given credit for being.
One final note: The Killer Must Kill Again features one of the scariest psycho killers that you’re ever likely to see. Antoine Saint-John is chilling as the nameless Killer. Later, he would give another excellent performance when he played the doomed painter in Lucio Fulci’s The Beyond.
4 Shots From 4 Films is just what it says it is, 4 shots from 4 of our favorite films. As opposed to the reviews and recaps that we usually post, 4 Shots From 4 Films is all about letting the visuals do the talking.
This October, I am going to be using our 4 Shots From 4 Films feature to pay tribute to some of my favorite horror directors, in alphabetical order! That’s right, we’re going from Argento to Zombie in one month!
Today’s director is the great Wes Craven!
4 Shots From 4 Wes Craven Films
A Nightmare on Elm Street (1984, dir. by Wes Craven, DP: Jacques Haitkin)
Deadly Friend (1986, dir by Wes Craven, DP: Philip H. Lathrop)
Wes Craven’s New Nightmare (1994, dir by Wes Craven, DP: Mark Irwin)
Through the Shattered Lens 