Must See Streaming Movie of the Week: Mind Over Murder (1979)

Network: CBS
Original Airdate: October 23rd, 1979 

In 1979, the Golden Age of made for television horror movies was arguably in the rearview mirror, but that’s not to say that good genre TVMs weren’t on the horizon. We still had a few years to go until one of the ultimate small screen chillers, Don’t Go to Sleep (1982) traumatized anyone with a pizza cutter. And somewhere in between the classic ABC Movie of the Week and the  unexpected post-seventies classics like Sleep were some solid genre entries, many of which seemed to have fallen off the radar. Of course, incredible telefilms such as Salem’s Lot (1979), and 1981’s Dark Night of the Scarecrow are bona fide classics, but there’s plenty of little films that aired during this declining era that seem all but forgotten. Good but not great films like Night Cries (1978) and The Babysitter (1980) were finding their way to the networks, and Mind Over Murder actually falls somewhere closer to the greats, despite its relatively obscure status.

Deborah Raffin is Suzy, a model, dancer and a somewhat popular commercial actress known for her dancing hamburger spots! She’s also a touch psychic and things go all weird when she meets a friend for a drink and finds the world going hazy, eventually coming to a complete stop… except for one menacing figure who eyes her creepily from a bar stool. Mostly shrugging off the weirdness, Suzy has another “vision,” later that same night, this time while watching an egg slowly roll out of the fridge, smashing on the kitchen floor. The voices and rumbling sounds accompanying the cracking egg eventually leads her to believe she predicted the terrible plane crash that becomes front page news on the next day’s morning paper.

Her arguably adorable boyfriend (and live in mate) Jason (Bruce Davison) becomes far less loveable when he refuses to put any weight into Suzy’s creepy phantasms, even after she’s able to prove that the voices she heard during the infamous egg incident belong to the doomed crew in the cockpit. Luckily, she’s met Ben (David Ackroyd), a handsome flight investigator who sends her to Dr. Povey (Christopher Cary). His psychic research suggests that Suzy is somehow going to make a physical connection with whoever sabotaged the plane… and maybe he’s creepy and bald, just like the guy Suzy saw at the bar. What she doesn’t know is that the killer is as in tune to her as she is to him, and he’s getting closer to her each day.

Shot under the title Are You Alone Tonight, Mind Over Murder is weird. The psychic visions are off-putting and eerie, and Andrew Prine as the above referenced crazy guy is freaking terrifying. When a very sweaty and crazy-eyed Prine, listed in the credits as the “Bald Man” kidnaps Suzy and attempts to entice her by flexing his wiry and lean muscles (no joke), it’s strangely effective in its gross factor (and I never thought I find Mr. Prine icky). In fact, the kidnap scenes make up most of the last quarter of the film, and there are near rapes, punchings and other uncomfortable moments that could have very well derailed an effective thriller but work because the talented actors put you in a terrifying world without resorting to exploitation tactics.

Yes, as this is a TV movie, it is (thankfully) quite restrained, although it remains gripping throughout. The overall film is suspenseful and unsettling and written in a way that makes Suzy incredibly likeable and reasonable despite her outrageous situation. The late Raffin was always a strong leading lady, and she brings just as much sympathy to her character here as she did in Nightmare in Badham County, both of which feature the actress in really dark and seemingly impossible situations.

Ackroyd is fantastic as well, and makes a great love interest for Raffin. Their blossoming romance doesn’t deter from the psychic focus of the film, but it provides a nice break between all the bleak and peculiar. Also, Robert Englund shows up as Ackroyd’s workmate, making me wonder if The Bald Man vs. Freddy Kruger could ever be a thing. Ah, to dream!

Director Ivan Nagy also made the excellent but also difficult to watch A Gun in the House (1981), and the decent thriller Jane Doe (1983) before he moved into adult films with titles such as Trailer Trash Teri and Izzy Sleeze’s Casting Couch Cuties. Oh my! He was also associated with Heidi Fleiss and served time for bookmaking. His infamy might outlive his small screen merits, but he did turn in some solid little TVMs in his day. Mind Over Murder is one such film.

Mind Over Murder is currently streaming on Amazon Instant Video. Watch it!!! 

Scream, Pretty Peggy: The Art

I was hoping to have time for a proper review of Scream, Pretty Peggy, which originally aired on November 24th, 1973 as an ABC Movie of the Week. I recently re-watched it and loved it just as much as when I first saw it as a kid. I wrote a woefully negative review of it for another site and have come to regret every word (I was going through that weird sarcastic phase that strikes many who think they have to make fun of what they love... but I grew up and grew out of that crap!). I still want to give this film its proper due, and will, but for now let's celebrate Halloween with a classic of the genre.

Jeffrey Elliot's (Ted Bessell) gruesome and haunting sculptures were created by Don Chandler, and set the tone for this small but undeniably eerie telefilm. But it's not just his look inside a madman's mind that makes Peggy such a visual treat. Most of the whackadoodle artwork that fills Jeffery's house is crazy in the most wonderful of ways. I tried to get the best stills for your Halloween pleasure! Enjoy and have a great day filled with candy and small screen scares!

Happy Horror at 37,000 Feet Day! Here are Ten of my Favorite OMG TV Movie Moments! (MAJOR SPOILERS)

Yes, the day has finally arrived! You can pick up your copy of Horror at 37,000 Feet on DVD here! And, since I dubbed the whole event an official Made for TV Mayhem Holiday, I thought I’d celebrate with some of my favorite OMG TV Movie Moments!

Horror is one of the first scary movies I was able to watch, and through the years, after a lot of these wonderful TV movies stopped re-airing, I never forgot Horror's freaky deaky ending. It wasn’t just jaw dropping in its unexpectedness, it…. Well, I don’t want to ruin the end, but it made me think about the impact, if you will, of that landing!

TV movies are cool that way.

They might not be able to get all gory and sexy, but they often pushed the envelope while playing within the rules. As a kid who didn’t have access to the big screen scares, I found my love of genre films in my very own living room, and Horror was one of the first to indoctrinate me into the wonderful world of the unknown. I salute you, Mr. 37,000 Feet!

Here's  my list (Reader Beware: there are definitely a few spoilers):

 How Awful about Allan (ABC, 9/22/1970) - Blind Guy Drives a Car:

Why is a blind guy driving? I dunno, but he sucks at it.

A Taste of Evil (ABC, 10/12/1971)
Home for the Holidays (ABC, 11/28/1972)
No Place to Hide (CBS, 3/4/1981)
The Ending(s):

Three different films with one director and one distinct ending. If you’ve seen any of these, you know how the others play out. But don’t be fooled, despite the signature #MoxeyTwist, all three films are excellent and stand on their own two creepy feet! Of the three, I have probably watched No Place to Hide the most, but that might come from my girl crush for the adorable Kathleen Beller. Two of the films (Taste and Hide) were written by the great Jimmy Sangster, while Joseph Stefano (yes, the screenwriter of Psycho) lends his impressive skills to Holidays. If you want to see how director John Llewellyn Moxey uses other similar elements in Taste and the ultra-awesome The Strange and Deadly Occurrence, you can read my comparison/contrast review here.

Don’t Be Afraid of the Dark (ABC, 10/10/73) - The Ending: 
There are plenty of hair raising moments in Dark, but it’s the gut-punch of a downbeat ending that made this movie one of the most traumatic of my childhood. Poor Sally. (Check out my week long tribute to Dark here)

Legend of Lizzie Borden - The Murders (ABC, 2/10/1975):

Lizzie Borden took an axe 
And gave her mother forty whacks.
When she saw what she had done,
She gave her father forty-one. 

Need I say more?

Trilogy of Terror (ABC, 3/4/1975) - The Ending:

I think I’ve mentioned this before, but I remember one bright and lovely Saturday afternoon when I came in the house for lunch. My parents’ eyes were transfixed on the television screen. From the doorway, I could only see their expressions and had no idea what they were watching. I slowly walked over to our living room table and turned towards the television. What I saw was beyond words. All I knew was that some tiny little creature was chasing a woman around her apartment. Instant fear! I was not prepared for the ending, which featured a very primitive looking Karen Black exposing a grotesque maw full of sharp, rotting teeth. Egads. The stuff of nightmares.

 Night Terror (NBC, 2/7/1977) - Cop Shot By Creepy Man in Front of Helpless Housewife:

Taking a long road trip, Valerie Harper runs into all kinds of freaky trouble when she accidentally witnesses Richard Romanus killing a police officer. This triggers (no pun intended) a taut chase across the desolate desert. A bone chilling start to a great TVM!

A Vacation in Hell (ABC, 5/21/1979) - Love Interest Goes Down The Tubes, err, A Waterfall:  

A Vacation in Hell is one whacky movie. I love it for so many reasons, one being that it throws you for a loop every so often. If it isn’t Maureen McCormick dancing provocatively for a Vaseline smeared camera lens, then it’s a twist or turn you weren’t expecting. Losing hopeless but adorable Michael Brandon part way through the film was a shocker! And I love the film for going there (and there and there too. Seriously, this film is insane).

The Possessed (NBC, 5/1/1977) - Diana Scarwid is Flammable:

Underneath the ivy and school girl uniforms, The Possessed is really all about sexual repression. So, it doesn’t seem all that strange that a young student finds herself engulfed in the fires of suppressed passion (literally). It’s all the more sexual and telling that only a young Harrison Ford can extinguish her flames!

Amityville: The Evil Escapes (NBC, 5/12/1989) - Garbage-Disposal-Fu:

OK, OK, OK. Amityville: The Evil Escapes isn’t exactly the scariest movie ever made. In fact, most of the time it is pretty darn silly. But if you will allow me to go back to 1989, when I was a teenager and this was a new horror movie. I’m sure you can image that my excitement clouded any and all problems with the film. And if nothing else, Amityville keeps with the theme of 80s excessiveness in its gleeful over the top moments. Case in point, when the high school jock comes to help the family with their garbage disposal problem, he learns the hard way that good guys don't win. I did not see Amityville again until 2013, and was not surprised that I remembered every single moment of this scene. It still makes me shriek! I hope this kid has another career goal, because I think the football team is just about to drop him!

High Desert Kill (USA, 5/1/1989) - This: 
 

My list went well over ten, and I'm sure I'd be happy to swap some titles with others on any given day. Honorable mentions go to:
 
The Norliss Tapes (NBC, 2/21/1973): Frankenstein/Hulk creature rips off a car door!
Scream, Pretty Peggy (ABC, 11/24/1973): The killer's reveal!
Satan's Triangle (ABC, 1/14/1975): The ending! 
Dead of Night (NBC, 3/29/1977): Bobby!
This House Possessed (ABC, 2/6/1981): Blood shower, anyone?
Don't Go to Sleep (ABC,12/10/1982): The ending!
Nightmare at Bitter Creek (CBS, 5/24/1988): Joanna Cassidy gets her vengeful groove-on! 
... and so many more!

What are some of your favorite small screen OMG moments?

Last Bride of Salem (1974)

Network: ABC
Original Air Date: May 8th, 1974

This Toronto lensed shot on video thriller originally aired under the ABC Afternoon Playbreak moniker all the way back in 1974. The Playbreak series, which ran from October 31st, 1973 – February 13th, 1975, was a cycle of 90 minute stand alone episodes that would air once a month, preempting the daytime soap programming, and there were about 4 to 5 episodes per season. The afternoon movie format proved to be popular and many of the Playbreaks won Emmys, including The Last Bride of Salem which garnered an award for TV stalwart Bradford Dillman.

It’s a little sad and strange that Playbreak hasn’t been documented better, it wasn’t until I attempted to research this film that I discovered the series. Luckily, Bride has a bit of cult following and after watching it I can certainly see why. It’s eerie, claustrophobic and well paced. I should also add the score would make any giallo fan's mouth water. There are some decent Goblin-like grooves to be found lurking inside this story of modern witchery!

Bradford Dillman is Matt Clifton, an up and coming artist and doting family man who is offered a chance to stay at a worn-down but large and serene farmhouse so he can create… ahrt! Matt packs up his wife, Jennifer (Lois Nettleton) and daughter Kelly (Joni Bick) and they head out to the serene countryside; only things aren’t quite as tranquil as they had hoped. Jennifer is sure something nefarious is happening to her husband and child, but could it really be an aged old curse taking over their bodies, and preparing Jennifer to become a child bride to Satan? Yikes!

  
Bride harkens back to the exceptional SOV British series Thriller, which also featured stand alone horror tales. Like Bride, Thriller relied heavily on the less is more tactic of terror. Fairly traditional to the medium during this era, the SOV style really work as far as I’m concerned. Maybe it’s because I’ve been heavily influenced by the look and approach of soaps, but there’s something creepy and effective about straight faced video horror (at least from that period). It works here, because of that particular video polish and because of the strong acting, and just because it’s an eerie story played out just right. In fact, director Tom Donovan and writer Rita Lakin were no strangers to serial world – he directed such shows as Ryan’s Hope and General Hospital and she wrote for the nighttime shows Flamingo Road and Dynasty! Lakin also adapted Death Takes a Holiday into the made for television format and it still remains one of the most haunting and beautiful romance films of that medium. So often this format is considered subpar and certainly the use of video doesn’t help it earn any respect, and that’s a miserable fate for a subgenre so needlessly pushed aside.

And, here’s an oddball piece of trivia: You will spot John Candy as a background character. He appears in a couple of scenes, but the one I remember him in is the ritual scene. I jokingly said, “Hey, it’s John Candy,” and it was!

Best Month Ever: September, 1973!

When the Movie of the Week was on a serious roll, audiences had to make some very complex and potentially heartbreaking decisions. I mean, Is it The Brady Girls Get Married or This House Possessed (answer: If you are me, This House Possessed, although I'm a huge Brady Brides fan). And those choices were actually at the tail end of the golden era (and in time for more households with VCRs), so imagine what it must have been like when people had to choose between Frankenstein and The Night Strangler (OAD 1/16/1973), Pray for the Wildcats and The Questor Tapes (OAD 1/23/1974), The Dead Don't Die and Satan's Triangle (OAD 1/14/1975) or The Dark Side of Innocence and Shark Kill (OAD 5/20/1976)? O.M.G. The mind boggles, right? Thank goodness, The Powers That Be saw fit to make the sure that the tele-films that aired during the week of September 16th - 22nd of 1973 only had a bit of overlap. Three new films debuted, two on the same night no less, but at least they ran at different times, so fans of small screen genre fare could enjoy the incredible premieres of Dying Room Only, Terror on the Beach and Satan's School for Girls. Sometimes, I do believe in a higher power!

I recently stumbled across full page ads for all three films in one of my old trusty and dusty TV Guides. Little squeals were heard throughout the house. I am posting them below, along with snippets of Judith Crist's reviews: 

Of the three movies, Judith seems to enjoy Dying Room the most. She said, "Although Richard Matheson's script too often mistakes mere attenuation for suspense, there are a few goosebumps in this one, courtesy of the always commanding Miss Leachman and the creepy Psycho-type setting."

OK, OK, so there is some overlap between Dying Room and Terror on the Beach, but hopefully you would have been situated somewhere between your couch and your TV's channel dial! I like, but don't love Terror, although it does feature some fun moments and it pairs the great Dennis Weaver with the gorgeous Susan Dey as part of a family beset by a bunch of bad dudes. OK, I need to give this one a rewatch. The synopsis is just too B-movie enticing.

Judith was less positive about Terror saying that the "quickie-flick offers staunch performances by the always watchable Dennis Weaver, Estelle Parsons, and Kristoffer Tabori. Otherwise, it's typical horror-in-everyday-life harsh." OK, not too harsh, she does give her props!

And if somewhat-realistic horror/terror/suspense ain't your bag, you could have found your groovy and supernatural mojo the next night with Satan's School for Girls! Of course, Satan's School is a classic of the genre, and one of the first titles I sought out when I decided to revisit the early gems of the genre. I'm a Roy Thinnes softie, but there's lots to love, including putting both Cheryl Ladd and Kate Jackson in their first project together, and casting the awesome Lloyd Bochner as the nervous red-herring professor. And hey, is that Pamela Franklin being cute as button? So, what else is new?

Judith didn't care for this one, but she agreed about Pamela's effervescent presence, writing, "Miss Franklin is, as always, lovely and talented, but even she can't save this stale supernatural stuff-and-nonsense - set in Salem, natch."

In general, Judith was rather kind with all of these movies, and that just makes picking a favorite that much harder! Which one do you love the most?

Hammer House of Horror: The House that Bled to Death (1980)

This post is part of the Hammer Halloween Blogathon hosted by the Classic Film & TV Café. Click here to view the complete blogathon schedule.

Network: ITV
Original Air Date: October 11th, 1980

Hammer is synonymous with horror. Ain’t no two ways about it! Sure they got their feet wet in 1934 with the comedy The Public Life of Henry the Ninth, but that only goes to show what a long and incredible history Hammer Films has enjoyed. They found their true mojo in horror films and produced their most memorable content in the 1960s and 70s. Great actors, tight bodices and gothic chills ensured that their output would be loved then and loved now. But like all good things, Hammer theatrical films came to an end in 1976 after their release of To the Devil a Daughter. And like all incredible things, as of late they’ve enjoyed a bit of resurgence.

Woman in Black, anyone?

In between Daughter and Woman (now there's a metaphorical transition), Hammer Films produced two television series, Hammer House of Horror (1980) and Hammer House of Mystery and Suspense (1984). I am most familiar with the latter production because the Mystery and Suspense episodes were feature length and some ran in America in the 90s under the moniker Fox Mystery Theater. However, unbeknownst to me, I was actually somewhat familiar with House of Horror, because many of the episodes found their way onto VHS under the heading of Thriller Video, and they featured bumpers hosted by none other than Elvira.

 
I worked at a video store in the early 1990s and the Thriller Videos were fairly popular rentals, probably because of Elvira and the short running lengths of the films (what’s to lose, right). I did not rent them at the time because I was Miss Dark and Mysterious (I am Amanda By Night you know), and I spent most of my time renting crazy flicks like Make Them Die Slowly (and regretting it!). As an aside, Thriller Video also released Slowly, but Elvira didn’t want to be associated with it, so she was excused from hosting duties on that video. I can’t say I blame her. But I digress… I remember that I was a bit obsessed with the Thriller Video box for Carpathian Eagle because it looked so deliciously groovy. Regrettably, I still have not seen it, but now I know I married my husband for a reason. He has several of these videos and we’ve been digging them out of our boxes of VHS (of which we have many).

He actually had just stumbled across his copy of The House that Bled to Death when I asked to be a part of this blogathon. It was all kinds of kismet and stuff. I was really excited to finally sit down with one of these Hammer TV episodes to see what all the fuss was about.

 
OK, OK, fuss may be a bit of an overstatement. Both series have always garnered mixed reviews and even the fabulous tome A History of Horrors: The Rise and Fall of the House of Hammer said this of both shows:

The premier incarnation of Hammer House thrashed about in the treacherous waters of an ITV network slot that seemed to come and go with an unnerving suddenness. With its faddish affection for punning titles, the series veered between a committee concept of classic Hammer Horror – Guardian of the Abyss, Children of the Full Moon – and a hodgepodge of derivative shockers that ere more akin to reject episodes from an Amicus portmanteau production – Silent Scream, A Visitor From the Grave (from a script by John Elder), Rude Awakening. Two of them were genuinely frightening; the rest were frightful. Style and content were overhauled during shooting when it was realized that a problem would arise with the American networks over the explicit nudity and the less-than-explicit gore, and the watering down that resulted diluted the second batch of shows to such an extent that they became indistinguishable from any other TV Mystery Movie of the Week.

Wait, did I just see a diss on the Movie of the Week? Tsk, tsk.

Granted, with the exception of the current batch of basic and pay cable programming, which has the ease of lax FCC rules, television will always play second fiddle to theatrical releases with regards to sex and violence. Don’t get me wrong, I dig both, but I also love being creeped out, and sometimes it’s OK to fade out before a love scene. It’s worth noting that some of the most popular American horror films at the moment are ghost stories that actually avoid excessive violence and are practically absent of sexy sex (you can read about how TV movies influenced Insidious here), so maybe it’s time to reassess the Hammer shows?

Despite some critical disdain, The Hammer House of Horror episode The House That Bled to Death has attained a cult status, thanks to the infamous party scene featuring a pipe that spews blood (thinking back, this may have been the inspiration for the blood shower scene in This House Possessed). Although toned down for the small screen, the scene is still quite bloody and definitely disturbed. And the story itself is pretty dark stuff. In short, I loved it.

The premise is simple and sweet: A charming young family moves into a ramshackle house with a morbid history. The last tenant took a small sword to his wife and did away with her but good. Now it seems the ghosts of the past are still lingering around the Peters family, slowly driving them insane. After a dead cat, randomly freaky appearances of knitting needles, body parts in the fridge and the aforementioned bloody, er, birthday party, a convoluted but clever twist occurs and, on top of that, one more twist brings the film to a close.

 
It’s almost impossible to say anything else about this movie since it would seem everything is either haunted house – which has already been discussed – or a twist, which should not be discussed so you can either be pleased or miffed by the end results. Although I thought the twist was interesting and unique it did not make the film for me. What works best about The House That Bled to Death is the buildup, which is done rather well, and left me wanting more.

Honestly, that's the sign of good TV. The House that Bled to Death would have been pretty fantastic at a TV movie running length. The dilapidated house and all of its contents have the makings for a creepy good time!

As of this writing, the mister has located our copy of Carpathian Eagle, so guess what’s just hit the top of my To Watch pile?

A couple of years ago I reviewed the Hammer House of Mystery and Suspense episode titled Mark of the Devil with the scrumptious Dirk Benedict. You can read my review here.