Tom Logan | Through the Shattered Lens

The small town of Pakoe has 1,251 residents but that number is about to steadily decline because there is a killer on the loose. Wearing overalls, a burlap sack, and a pair of swimming goggles, the killer comes out at night and removes people’s heads from their bodies.

Sheriff Carl Carson (Kerry Knight) and Walt the coroner (Joe Fishback) suspect that the killer might be a disfigured handyman named Charlie (Chuck Whiting). Not only has Charlie been disturbed ever since he returned from Vietnam (where he served with Walt) but he also just happens to wear an outfit that looks exactly like the outfit that the killer wears. Charlie seems like the obvious suspect but, when he refuses to confess despite all of the evidence against, Sheriff Carson wonders if he’s really guilty.

The Night Brings Charlie has plenty of flaws. The acting is often amateurish and the pacing is slow, especially at the start of the film. For a film that only runs 77 minutes (and seven of those minutes are devoted to the opening and ending credits), there’s a lot of filler, most of it dealing with Walt’s daughters and their idiot friends. But, all of that aside, The Night Brings Charlie is not that bad. At its best, the film does capture the feeling of a small community under siege by a mysterious killer. (The influence of The Town That Dreaded Sunset is easy to spot, in both the look of the killer and the emphasis on on a town paralyzed by fear.) There’s a few moments of unexpected humor, my favorite being the killer taking the time to update the population number on the town’s welcome sign after committing his latest murder. Even better, the film has not just one surprise twist but two! Though the first twist was easy to guess, the second one was actually pretty clever and it did take me by surprise. Finally, while the first hour is slowly paced, the same can’t be said of the final 17 minutes, when the film comes alive. The Night Brings Charlie may start off on the wrong foot but it ends strong. Stick with The Night Brings Charlie and the film will pay off.

For a low budget, direct-to-video slasher that was made with an obviously amateur cast, The Night Brings Charlie isn’t bad at all. Unfortunately, it’s never been released on anything other than VHS but it can be found (with Spanish subtitles) on YouTube.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YzX2RNGGM7U

With a title like Massacre at Central High, you probably think that this 1976 film is a low-budget slasher film. However, you’re totally wrong. Instead of being a low-budget slasher film, Massacre at Central High is a low-budget political allegory and it’s a pretty good one at that. It’s also not exactly an easy film to see (I had to watch it off of a scratchy, old VHS tape), which is unfortunate because it’s probably one of the best exploitation films of the 1970s.

Massacre at Central High takes place at a high school in Southern California. The first thing that you notice about Central High is that there aren’t any adults around. The students don’t ever appear to go to class. Instead, they spend their time roaming the halls. The school is run by four wealthy jocks who enforce order, repress independent thought, and spend most of their time hanging out in an exclusive lounge. Of the four ruling jocks, Mark (Andrew Stevens) is the most sensitive, an overall nice guy who doesn’t approve of the excesses of the others but, at the same time, isn’t willing to stand up to them either.

The Ruling Clique

As for the other students, they spend their time being alternatively harassed and cared for by the jocks. They’re told, of course, that everything is for their own good and that their survival depends on the survival of Central High. Spoony (Robert Carradine) is caught and punished for spraying political graffiti on the lockers. Oscar (Jeffrey Winner) is regularly bullied by the jocks on account of his weight. School librarian Arthur (Dennis Kort) is attacked for being an intellectual. When Rodney (Rex Steven Sikes) makes the mistake of parking his car in one of the jock’s space, they react by stealing and wrecking his car.

Things start to change when track star David (Derrel Maury) transfers to Central High. David is an old friend of Mark’s and, at first, Mark attempts to get him to join the ruling clique. However, David is disgusted by the other jocks and starts to stand up for the oppressed students. The jocks (with the exception of Mark) respond by lowering a car down on David’s leg, crushing it.

No longer able to run track and now moving with a permanent limp, David refuses to tell anyone the truth about how he injured his leg. Instead, he returns to school and gets his revenge, methodically murdering all of the jocks except for Mark. Mark and his girlfriend Theresa (Kimberly Beck) now find themselves transformed into societal pariahs within the halls of Central High. Meanwhile, the formerly oppressed students step up to fill the power vacuum and, to David’s disgust, they quickly turn out to be just as bad as their now deceased oppressors.

David Is Disappointed

Now realizing that most revolutions are waged by the lower class against the upper class for the sole benefit of the middle class and that there’s absolutely no way to bring any real change to Central High, David instead makes plans to destroy the entire high school…

Surreal and dream-like, Massacre at Central High is a potent allegory that takes the concept of absolute power corrupting absolutely to its logical extreme. It’s a film that celebrates revolution while, at the same time, asking, “What’s the point?” It’s a film that looks at politics, society, and culture and actually has the courage to suggest that it might be better just to give up on all of it. Featuring excellent performances from Maury, Beck, and Stevens and wonderfully off-center direction from Rene Daalder, Massacre at Central High is not an easy film to track down but it’s definitely one worth seeing.