Horror Film Review: The Pit (dir by Lew Lehman)

Posted on October 7, 2025 by Lisa Marie Bowman

The 1981 Canadian film, The Pit, tells the story of a creepy little jerk named Jamie Benjamin (Sammy Snyders).

Now, admittedly, Jamie is only twelve years old and, usually, I make allowances for bad behavior from people who aren’t old or mature enough to know better. But there’s just something off about Jamie. He comes across as creepy from the first minute he shows up, with his intense stare and his blonde bowl cut. He spends a lot of time in the woods, where he has discovered a hole in the ground. The hole is full of hungry creates that Jamie calls Trogs. Jamie regularly takes raw meat to the hole and tosses it in. Unlike all of the kids at school and his own parents, the Trogs are always happy to see Jamie.

It may sound like a bad idea to give meat to a bunch of monsters that you just happened to find in the woods but Teddy thinks it’s a good idea. Teddy is Jamie’s teddy bear. Teddy talks. Teddy has all sorts of ideas for how Jamie can get back at everyone who has ever made fun of him or left him feeling insecure. Why not just toss them into the pit? Is Teddy real or is he just in Jamie’s mind? The film tries go for some ambiguity. That said, the Trogs are definitely real so it’s not that difficult to go from accepting the idea of carnivorous monsters to buying into a talking teddy bear.

Jamie is entering puberty and his hormones are going crazy. When his parents leave for a trip, they hire a psychology student named Sandy O’Reilly (Jeannie Elias) to keep an eye on Jamie. Jamie develops a crush and soon becomes obsessed with Sandy. Jamie is the type of kid who pretends to drop something just so he can look up Sandy’s skirt. (Bad Jamie!) Despite Jamie’s crush on Sandy, he still steals money from her so that he can buy raw meat for the Trogs. When he can’t get any more meat, he starts tempting real people out to the woods and pushing them in. When he tells Sandy about the Trogs, she doesn’t believe him. He takes her to the pit and that’s when things really start to get bad….

The Pit is an odd little film, one that never quite settles on a tone. In the original script, the Trogs and Teddy’s advice were all meant to be in Jamie’s head and Jamie himself was only meant to be 9 years old. The horror elements were meant to be products of Jamie’s disturbed imagination and one can still see elements of that in the completed film. However, director Lew Lehman decided to make Jamie older, to leave no doubt that the Trogs were real, and to add a small amount of humor. As such, The Pit is a film that veers from being a horror film to being a somewhat depressing coming-of-age film to a somewhat mean-spirited comedy. Sammy’s behavior, which might have been understandable for a 9 year old, becomes even more creepy now that he’s a twelve year-old who still takes orders from a teddy bear.

It’s a confused film but Sammy Snyders gives one of the best creepy kid performances of all time and there’s something undeniably satisfying about the ending. As Jamie discovers, he’s not the only kid with a pit and teddy bear can only protect him for so long.

Command 5 (1985, directed by E.W. Swackhamer)

Posted on April 8, 2025 by Jedadiah Leland

Morgan (Stephen Parr) is a mysterious government operative who puts together a special paramilitary force to take on extreme threats. He says that only misfits are allowed to join his group because they have the edge he needs. Smith (William Russ) is a wild Texan who drives like a maniac. Psychiatrist Winslow (Sonja Smits) can fire an Uzi better than any man. Kowalski (John Matuszak) is a demolitions expert who listens to Beethoven. Jack Coburn (Wings Hauser) is a rebellious detective who is good with a throwing knife.

After a montage of their extensive training and a scene where our heroes take a look at the bullet-proof RV that they’ll be traveling the country in, the movie finally gets down to business. A motorcycle-riding terror cult led by Delgado (Gregory Sierra) has taken an entire town hostage and is threatening to kill everyone unless they’re given a flight out of the country. Our heroes drive their bulletproof van into town and try to defeat the bad guys. There’s one good scene where the RV is driving down the town’s main street and getting hit nonstop with bullets. The scene was obviously ripped off from the end of Clint Eastwood’s The Gauntlet but it’s still exciting to watch. Otherwise, the action in this one is pretty rudimentary.

I guess Command 5 was supposed to be a pilot for television show that never went into production. It is very much a television production. There’s a lot of shooting but no blood. Wings Hauser is less dangerous than usual. The whole thing ends with Command 5 looking forward to adventures that were never to come. Watching the pilot, you can see why it never became a show. The characters were all thinly-written and never seemed to have much of a connection with each other and Hauser and Russ both seemed to be competing to be the loose cannon of the group. This one is for Wings Hauser completists only.

Lifetime Film Review: A Mother’s Lie (dir by Stefan Brogren)

Posted on November 22, 2021 by Lisa Marie Bowman

Even the best of families have secrets.

Unfortunately, the family at the center of A Mother’s Lie is hardly one of the best. Sure, they’re wealthy. And sure, they’ve got several very nice and very big homes. But matriarch Joyce (Sonja Smits) is a little bit …. well, unhinged. She was shocked when her teenage daughter, Katherine (Alex Paxton-Beesley) got pregnant. Joyce demanded that Katherine not tell her boyfriend, Chuck (Gabriel Venneri). Instead, Katherine went into hiding for 9 months. When Katherine gave birth, Joyce told her that the baby was stillborn.

Now, 20 years later, Katherine and Chuck are married and they’re raising a daughter, Haley ( Zoe Sarantakis). Katherine has never told Chuck about their first child and Katherine feels guilty about that. When Haley is diagnosed with leukemia and her parents are told that she’ll die without a bone marrow transplant, Katherine can’t help but wish that their first daughter had lived. After all, she would be the perfect donor!

Well, it turns out that Joyce wasn’t being honest when she said that the first baby was stillborn. The baby was born alive and was put up for adoption, without Katherine’s knowledge. Libby (Madelyn Keys) was adopted by a poor but good family. She’s now attending college and dreaming of going to medical school. But how will she be able to pay for it!?

One day, Libby receives an offer from a mysterious benefactor. All Libby has to do is agree to donate some bone marrow to a young girl and Libby will receive more than enough money to pay for medical school! She’ll even be allowed to recuperate in an isolated and mysterious mansion! The only condition is that Libby has to remain anonymous and she can’t have contact with the girl’s family. Of course, Libby agrees!

Yay! Haley’ going to live! Libby’s going to be rich! And the family secrets are going to remain hidden! Except …. well, as I said, Joyce is a little bit unhinged, to the extent that she’s willing to kill anyone who might reveal the secret of what happened the night that Katherine gave birth to Libby. It quickly becomes obvious that Libby is going to be lucky to escape from the mansion with her life….

A Mother’s Lie is an enjoyably gothic Lifetime film, the movie equivalent of one of those old paperback books that always featured a nervous-looking woman standing in front of a shadowy mansion. It even features a sinister housekeeper (played well by Louise Kerr), who will do anything to help Joyce keep her secrets! It’s all appropriately melodramatic and the film is made with enough self-awareness that it never makes the mistake of taking itself too seriously. It’s an entertaining Lifetime film, pure and simple.

It’s also a very Canadian film. From the minute I saw Libby casually walking down a snow-covered path on her way to class, I knew that this was a film that made north of the border. That’s not a complaint, of course. Many of the best Lifetime film were made in Canada and I always enjoy spotting former Degrassi actors. And while this film’s cast may not have featured any Degrassi grads, A Mother’s Life was directed by Stefan Brogren, who played Mr. Simpson on that venerable show. He does a good job of keeping the action moving and maintaining a properly gothic atmosphere. It’s an enjoyable 90 minutes.

Horror On The Lens: The Pit (dir by Lew Lehman)

Posted on October 28, 2014 by Lisa Marie Bowman

For today’s horror on the lens, we have an odd little Canadian horror film from 1981.

The Pit tells the story of 12 year-old Jamie Benjamin (Sammy Snyders, giving a genuinely creepy performance), a weird kid who lives in rural Wisconsin. Jame is an outcast who is regularly picked on by the other kids. His only friend is a teddy bear with whom he has regular conversations and yes, Teddy does talk back.

One day, Jamie comes across a pit out in the middle of the woods. The pit is full of cannibalistic monsters. Jamie quickly takes a liking to them and starts to bring them raw meat. However, Teddy has a better idea. Maybe Jamie could start feeding them people…

In the original script, both Teddy and the monsters were supposed to be figments of Jamie’s imagination. However, director Lew Lehman made the decision to make the monsters real and to keep the audience guessing as far as Teddy was concerned. The end result is a very odd film about a very odd kid.

And you can watch it below!

(Warning: Though this film is tame by our standards, it would still probably be considered to be NSFW.)

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3UmP4lr-Efw