directed by peter collinson
fantale films ltd.
This title might seem a misnomer, as this mild-mannered British production does not provide its audience much in the way of chills or thrills. For characters in the movie, I suppose the moniker may be more apt, but many of the emotions on display are too restrained for such easy classification. Some anger is displayed, sure, and the young lass played by Susan George spends much of her screen time FREAKING OUT – her mewling, whimpering, sobbing, puling and so forth obscuring her Saxon patois till it’s all but incomprehensible at times – but all this really accomplishes is to annoy the living hell out of certain viewers, such as this one. This film actually is more or less a rumination on various mental states, and does not convey the sensation one reasonably might expect. It does, however, contain a few oddities. The police are depicted as almost comically inutile, seemingly by design, and a thought-provoking sequence involves one of them getting “the gun” out of its secure locked storage. Cultural differences! In addition, one of the characters is a toddler who seems sedated throughout much of his screen time. Overall, the picture feels rather disjointed and haphazard.
why did i watch this movie?
I was scouring lists of pix I’d considered and could remember nothing about this one. I looked it up and thought, oh why not, 1971.
should you watch this movie?
Unless you want to catch an eyeful of some early ’70s ladies’ fashions, there’s no real reason to do that.
highlight and low point
The outmoded attitudes towards any variety of ideas or concepts, including but not limited to mental illness and a woman’s capability and/or agency, provide some food for thought. The ending is spectacularly unsupportable.
For the majority of its 90 minutes or so, this is more of a sex farce than a horror movie. Indeed, at times it reminded me of such bygone classics as Clue, as well as such bygone duds as the Sly Stallone vehicle Oscar. Numerous suspicious or threatening characters abound and … actually, all of the characters are suspicious, as it becomes increasingly more unclear who is trying to kill whom, or why. At long length, it does eventually swing into scary movie mode, but its overweening hucksterism is never superseded. It’s possible this film slipped through the cracks because it has a few moments that are too gory for what is essentially a noirish comedy of manners. As is often the case with such madcap romps, the story doesn’t wind up making a whole lot of sense, either.
Here’s a rarity for this list: a good movie. Actually good, that is, not “good for a horror movie,” not “good” (scare quotes) – a film that’s well-written, well-acted, well-directed … how the hell did this happen? I feel cheated. Not quite the supernatural assault suggested by the promotional artwork, this Australian feature is a rather more subtle affair centering around strange goings-on in the retirement home the main character has inherited following her mother’s death. These eldritch occurrences seem to have been foreshadowed by similar happenings related in her mother’s diary decades earlier. Are things not what they seem? How DO things seem? WHO can one trust, et cetera. This picture appears never to have had a domestic theatrical release, and the fine lead actress appears never to have had a further career. An understated, somewhat ethereal affair, its scares and the tension it creates are earned by never overplaying its hand and always retaining some rooting in reality. As I said, it’s a good one.
This is a weird one, the kind of movie they really don’t make anymore. Kind of an American giallo, it also pays homage in a way to Don’t Look Back by Nicolas Roeg, complete with the signature rain slicker. (I have never seen Don’t Look Back, but am well aware of its tropes.) A familial study in more than one way – WHAT is her sister’s problem? WHERE is daddy? – the fun really begins when Brooke Shields is murdered during her First Holy Communion (oh, all right, the character she plays is). So what’s up with that priest, anyway? The SHOCKING reveal in this one mostly works, especially because at least one important ambiguity remains unexplained; also, some of the criminal acts in the film seem to arise mainly from malevolence or ill nature, not particularly to further serve the plot. There’s even a John Waters aspect to parts of this feature. Creepy and effective.
Purportedly a “horror comedy,” this offering could’ve used more of either, or both. Readymade for the bygone era of the “prize movie” – or Elvira, Mistress of the Night – Nightmare mostly plays it low-key, and is made with enough panache to avoid becoming fodder for MST3K types (or RiffTrax, if we wanna be up-to-date). The major problem it has is it doesn’t offer enough scares OR laughs for either aspect to become clear; it is also held back by its limited scope. The premise – famous vampire actor is marquee guest at horror convention, and actual vampire – probably works better if expanded beyond a focus on the same small set of characters. It may have been more effective in its own era, albeit merely with cult appeal – and turns out the writer/director, John Stanley, hosted a late-nite television program called Creature Features for eight years. Well, whaddya know. 
If you try, you can find the claim that this chunk of tripe was a precursor to the slasher craze or some such nonsense. What it IS is a convoluted bit of inanity that doesn’t make much sense and doesn’t really bother to try.
Ya know, I could swear I saw a capsule review of this one that claimed it was at LEAST as good as Halloween, a true forgotten classic of the genre and … yeah, no. Not really. Kinda dating itself in that not a whole lot of action takes place – killings or anything else – Unhinged is mostly an atmospheric study of some creepy people in an old house in the middle of nowhere, where three young women wind up secluded after a suspicious auto accident. (At least, I gather it was to be perceived as suspicious, in the fine cinematic tradition, but I couldn’t actually tell what caused it.) The SHOCKING TWIST ending in this one is not all that shocking, and neither is it all that plausible, even for a movie of this sort. This information probably should not come as any sort of surprise to you. 
SPACE RATS From Outer Space 