Ed van Nuys | Through the Shattered Lens

1984’s Silent Madness opens in a mental hospital in New Jersey. In order to cut down on costs, the hospital’s administrators have been giving early release to some of their patients. Dr. Joan Gilmore (Belinda Montgomery) has only been on staff for a few months but even she knows that there’s a risk that a truly dangerous patient could be released. Dr. Gilmore’s worries come true when a homicidal patient named Howard Johns (Solly Marx) disappears from the hospital. Apparently, a computer errors led to Howard being released instead of a patient with a similar name.

Oh, someone screwed up big time!

Or, at least, that’s what Joan believes. In a scene that has to be seen to be believed, the arrogant Dr. Kruger (Roderick Cook) attempts to convince Joan that Howard Johns actually died a while ago and that’s why he’s not in the hospital anymore. Joan demands to see a death certificate. Dr. Kruger is like, “Oh, I don’t know where it is. We’ll have to look for it.” Yeah, that’s the same thing I used to say in college whenever I was running behind on my paying my credit card. “Really? I never received that bill. Can you send it again?”

Knowing that Howard was imprisoned after committing several murders at a sorority house in upstate New York, Joan theorizes that he’s heading back to the college so that he can pick up where he left off. Pretending to be a former member of the sorority, Joan meets the aging house mother, Mrs. Collins (Viveca Lindfors). Mrs. Collins — who often refers to younger women as being “whores” — tells a story of how a hazing ritual gone wrong led to handyman Howard grabbing a nail gun and wiping out a pledge class. When Joan actually spots Howard on campus, she tries to get the sheriff (Sydney Lassick) to do something about it. The sheriff replies that Joan must be seeing things because the hospital called and reported that Howard is deceased. The sheriff than has a beer because he’s the best character in the entire film.

Howard, needless to say, is not dead. He’s hiding out in the sorority house and he’s continuing in his murderous ways. We don’t really learn much about Howard. As the title suggests, he’s a silent killer. That works to the film’s advantage. A silent killer is far more intimidating than one who spends all of his time coming up with bad puns. Because Silent Madness was originally filmed in 3D, Howard enjoys throwing axes and firing nail guns, often straight at the camera.

Silent Madness is a thoroughly ludicrous film but it’s enjoyable as a product of its time. It’s hard not to smile at the thought of a theatrical audience ducking as Howard throws an axe at the camera in 3D. Howard is a properly intimidating killer but the film is totally stolen by Roderick Cook, Viveca Lindfors, and Sydney Lassick, three veteran actors who knew better than to even try to be subtle while appearing in a film like this. Lassick’s performance as the cowardly sheriff is especially enjoyable. We all know that law enforcement is useless in a slasher film. Lassick’s sheriff seems to understand this as well. He’d rather just stay in his office and who can blame him?

Silent Madness is silly and kind of dumb but it’s undeniably entertaining.

In 1948, one of the richest men in Georgia committed a murder.

John Wallace was a landowner, back when that title actually meant something. He was known as the boss of Meriweather County. Everyone in the county seemed to work for Wallace in one way or another. He controlled the county officials. The sheriff enforced the law only as far as John Wallace would allow him. The bootleggers had to pay Wallace for protection. When one bootlegger, a sharecropper named Wilson Turner, failed to do so, he was fired and kicked off of Wallace’s land.

Turner retaliated by stealing two of Wallace’s cows.

Wallace responded by murdering Turner.

Because Turner attempted to flee and Wallace chased after him, Wallace committed the murder not in Meriweather County but in neighboring Coweta County. What Wallace didn’t realize was that this meant the investigation didn’t fall under the jurisdiction of his hand-picked sheriff. Instead, Sheriff Lamar Potts of Coweta County headed up the investigation. John Wallace was eventually arrested by Sheriff Potts and he was eventually convicted of murdering Wilson Turner. At the time, the case drew a lot of attention both because of Wallace’s wealth but also because two of the main witnesses for the prosecution were the two black men who Wallace forced to help him dispose of Wallace’s body.

It’s an interesting story, largely because the history of America is full of men like John Wallace, people who set up their own little dictatorships. It’s often portrayed as being a Southern phenomena but John Wallace really wasn’t that much different from the crude political bosses who, for decades, dominated politics in city like New York and Chicago, the type who held onto power through a combination of intimidation and patronage. In my home state of Texas, George Berham Parr inherited the political machine that controlled Duval and Jim Wells County. Parr committed numerous crimes during his time as the “Duke of Duval” but he had important friends. He was the one who “found” the votes necessary for Lyndon Johnson to win a senate seat in 1948. (In return, Johnson got Harry Truman to pardon Parr for failing to pay his taxes.) Parr is also suspected of having been involved in at least one murder but it wasn’t until LBJ himself retired from politics that anyone truly investigated Parr’s activities. In 1974, he was again convicted of failing to pay his taxes and Parr was later found dead at his ranch. Suicide was the official police ruling.

As for the story of John Wallace, it was turned into a made-for-TV movie in 1983. Murder in Coweta County stars Andy Griffith as John Wallace and Johnny Cash as Sheriff Potts. Griffith, playing a soulless villain, is chilling as John Wallace. Wallace is all-smiles and good ol’ boy charisma whenever there’s a crowd around but, once it’s just him and his cronies, a different side comes out. Wallace thinks that he can get away with murder because he’s been able to get away with everything else. Sheriff Potts is determined to see that justice is done. Murder in Coweta County is an atmospheric Southern crime story, one that is so full of atmosphere that you can feel the humidity. While Johnny Cash was definitely a better singer than an actor, Andy Griffith’s villainous turn makes the film worth watching.