Benutzerrezensionen

Evil alien Jerzy Colsowicz (John Huston) is searching for 8-year-old Katy Collins in Atlanta who has mysterious powers. He and his bald headed children are opposed by a Jesus Christ figure. Raymond Armstead (Lance Henriksen) is the rich owner of the Atlanta basketball franchise. He is part of a conspiracy trying to gain control of the little girl by marrying her mother Barbara and having another child with her. Katy gets a gun as a gift from Jerzy and carelessly shots her mother paralyzing her. They bring in housekeeper Jane Phillips (Shelley Winters). Det. Jake Durham (Glenn Ford) is investigating Katy and the shooting.

The opening has a Christ-like figure doing an exposition to a bunch of bald-headed kids about an intergalactic battle of good and evil. Then John Huston walks in. That's some crazy drugs these people are taking. I'm tempted to claim this is a B-movie but the A-list cast belies its first rate intentions. The writing is a mess. Giulio Paradisi's directing is a mishmash of styles and ideas. I admire the spirit of abandon of this movie. It has a healthy dose of horror with a child and her superpowers like The Omen. The sci-fi motif is campy. This is weirdly fascinating despite it loopy story. It's definitely not a good movie but I kept watching anyways.

The plot, as I hopefully understand it, is that Satan (or Sateen, as this film calls him) fathers children with supernatural powers. One of these children is 8 year-old Katy, who has telekinetic powers and a heavy Southern drawl. An intergalactic traveler called The Visitor must battle the child for the fate of the universe....or something like that. There's also some stuff about an evil hawk, some bald aliens, and a crazy-eyed Jesus with a bad blonde wig.

Nonsensical Italian-made claptrap that combines '70s fascinations with the occult and aliens. It's an awful movie that rips off many better movies, made watchable by some striking imagery and interesting casting. John Huston, Lance Henriksen, Sam Peckinpah, Mel Ferrer, Shelly Winters, and Glenn Ford are all in this. That says more about the state of their respective careers at the time than it does about the quality of this production. Incoherent but good for some laughs. Dig that terribly out of place soundtrack, too.

Affluent handsome doctor Raymond : Lance Henriksen and a powerful businessmen : Mel Ferrer, among others , conspire with grisly devil worshippers to conceive a devil child from a gorgeous divorced woman called Barbara : Joanne Nail . As the soul of a pre-teen : Paige Connor who has dangerous telekinetic powers becomes the prize in a violent fighting between two great forces , on a hand : God : Franco Nero assisted by Jerzy : John Huston and on the other hand , a nasty devil : Lance Henriksen along with hoodlums.

This is a strange film with suspense, thrills, chills, intrigue, demonic children and fantastic happenings. The picture takes parts here and there of famous films , as it catches scraps from The Exorcist by William Friedkin, The Omen by Richard Donner, The fury by Brian De Palma, Encounters of the third phase by Steven Spielberg and even The Birds by Alfred Hitchcock. The main amusement and excitement result to be the discovery about the images in which the movie is ripped off. The flick has a lot of absurd and embarrassing scenes and several thrilling set-pieces don't make sense. Support cast is frankly excellent with brief appearances of known actors and directors as Franco Nero, John Huston, Shelley Winters, and Glenn Ford as a detective who is attacked by birds at a thrilling scene. And filmmaker Sam Peckinpah who had problem remembering his lines and only worked a day.

Rare and anticlimatic musical score by Franco Micalizzi. Atmospheric but mediocre cinematography by Ennio Guarneri. The movie was produced by Samuel Z Arkoff from American International, though uncredited, and by Ovidio G Assonitis . Ovidio wrote, produced and directed a lot of B films, some of them were successful, such as Tentacles, Piranha 2, Choke Canyon, Lambada, Sonny boy, Out of control and Beyond the door.

The motion picture was lousily directed by Giulio Paradisi who uses the pseudonym Michael J Paradise. He has directed a few films such as Spaghetti story, Adventure in Montecarlo, Tesoro mio, and Ragazzi di Borgate. And he was a director assistant to Federico Fellini in classy titles as Fellini 8 1/2 and La dolce vita. Rating 4 /1o, inferior fantasy, Science fiction movie.

This oddball midnight movie is getting a re-release and eventual DVD courtesy of the Alamo Drafthouse.

It's about an evil little girl, who is so evil that John Huston and his pacifist army of intergalactic bald yoga practitioners arrive from space to stop her. Meanwhile Lance Henriksen is the evil boyfriend of her clueless, innocent mother, who sold his soul to the satanic forces nurturing her in a Faustian bargain for...a basketball coach position.

Which leads to the early and highly memorable slo-mo basketball set-piece, easily one of the most unique choices of setting for a horror film sequence I've ever seen!

The atmosphere of this weird, weird film alternates between genuinely and oddly poetic (mostly thanks to the music), pure B-movie cheese, and unintentional hilarity. It's one of the strangest films I've ever seen, but that's not a bad thing in this case. If you give yourself over to its strange charms, this is some kind of consciousness-expanding experience.

Will you like it? There are folks who seek out these sorts of bizarre, unique B-movies. You know who you are. At the very least, you should this film an object of curiosity.

Somehow, and for some reason, John Huston, Glenn Ford, Franco Nero (as Jesus Christ), Shelley Winters, Lance Henriksen, Sam Peckinpah, Mel Ferrer and Kareem Abdul-Jabbar are all in this movie.

I am relieved to know that other people found The Visitor as confusing as we did. Over the years, whenever my husband and I have had some reason to mention this movie, we always call it "That weird movie with Jesus in a turtleneck." We spent hours afterwards trying to understand the plot; we never got as far as even trying to understand the meaning.

We went to see because it had such a good cast. The previews suggested it had a supernatural theme, which appealed to us. It was a mistake. We should have stayed home and rotated the mattresses.

I can watch really bad movies without a shudder. I even rather like very bad movies. But The Visitor is in a class by itself. It made absolutely no sense - none. I have read that part of the problem is bad editing. I would hope so. I hate to think that so many fine actors would waste their time on this mess as it is.

An evil force called Zatteen fertilizes many women from Earth with his seed before being eliminated, and their children inherit and perpetuate his power. Barbara Collins (Joanne Nail) is the last woman on Earth with this gift, and her daughter Katy Collins (Paige Connor) has an evil telekinetic power. A battle between good and evil forces settles on Earth. "The Visitor" has a very promising story and a great cast, with names such as John Huston, Glenn Ford, Shelley Winters, Sam Peckinpah and Lance Henriksen. I bought this unknown VHS expecting a great movie. However, the screenplay and the direction are horrible and completely confused, and it is impossible to understand many parts of the story. The characters are also horribly developed, and in the end, this movie is a complete mess. My vote is three.

Title (Brazil): "Herdeiros da Morte" ("Inheritors of the Death")

Weird movie, but it appealed to me. It does have plot elements and maybe even scenes that are derivative of other movies, but it puts them in such a strange blend that it comes out pretty original.

The movie opens with an old man on a barren otherworldly surface. It goes from him to a man with his girlfriend and her daughter at a basketball game. He's the team's owner. The editing and music in the scene are odd. The music throughout the movie tends to be incongruously more energetic and dramatic that the scene itself or its context. The young girl lowers her glasses to look one of the players right in the eye. He manages a dunk in the last second, and the ball evidently explodes in fire or light as he does so.

The old man from the opening (I believe he is The Visitor) shows up in an airport carrying a passport where he is met by a man with a shaved head. He's taken to the roof of a skyscraper where there are lots of people wearing identical outfits all with shaved heads carrying up large gray boxes. Later, there are white screens on the roof, behind which people's shadows move.

The basketball team owner has boardroom meetings with mysterious men who are unhappy with him. He is to get married to his girlfriend and have a son, but he is not having much luck with that.

The little girl has a birthday party. She sees the old man there, but maybe he isn't really there. When she opens a box that should contain a toy peacock that talks in a creepy voice (we saw it being bought earlier), it instead has a handgun. She takes it out happily, and throws it on a table, where it goes off, shooting her mother. Her mother is rehabilitated as much as she can be, which is inter-cut with the girl doing gymnastics routines.

The girl's eyes sometimes seem to have a white light in the irises, and she seems to have power over birds. There is a memorable scene with a policeman (who she swears at like a sailor) on a highway when he encounters a bird.

Many more weird scenes follow! The end leaves things a bit of a mystery, to say the least. If your usual horror fare is a remake or the latest installment in a seemingly endless series, best to avoid this one.

What do Jesus Christ, a foul-mouthed 8-year-old girl with malicious powers, a flock of evil birds and the owner of the Atlanta basketball team have in common? This riddle sounds like the set-up for a lame joke, and that happens to be also the best way to describe "The Visitor": a lame, bad, drawn-out and overlong joke! The biggest mystery to unravel here is WHY so many terrific and experienced actors got lured into signing up to star in this cinematic mess! The cast includes John Huston, Sam Peckinpah (both prominent directors themselves), Lance Henriksen, Glenn Ford, Mel Ferrer, Franco Nero and Shelley Winters. The plot is impossible to summarize, mainly because there are too many story lines and it really doesn't make the slightest bit of sense as a wholesome. The whole thing reverts back to the ancient battle between good and evil, fought out on earth. No less than Jesus Christ is giving us insight (if you can call it that) in the situation, and then he sends out an elderly angel to Atlanta, because that's where the final earthly descendant of the evil sorcerer Zathaar lives. The visiting angel's mission (I think) is to prevent that the woman, named Barbara, bares another child and he drastically succeeds. Then he still has to bring back her other daughter, the sinister Katy, back to the heavens. And there are birds. Lots and lots of birds. "The Visitor" is truly bizarre, but not in a positive way. Many of the action sequences and murderous accidents are clearly inspired by "The Omen" and perhaps the whole concept is even derived from that classic, as well as from "Rosemary's Baby". That would make this film the most ambitiously complex and admirably disguised rip-off ever made, but still a failure nevertheless. There are two notably powerful sequences, one involving an awkward during the young girl's birthday party and the other being the painful death-ride of the investigating police officer. "The Visitor" is an unbearably pretentious film, ridiculously plotted and remarkably boring considering the overload of story elements. The screenplay often feels incomplete and very incoherent. The fantasy elements are beyond lame and the special effects wouldn't even impress a 4-year-old. The cover-image displayed here on the website looks creepy and intriguing, but sadly like in too many cases, it's utterly irrelevant. Trust the rating and user-comments in this particular case: you do not want to see this junk

Whatever one thinks of the movie itself, it cannot be denied that BEYOND THE DOOR (1974) was a highly successful property and when THE OMEN (1976; my own personal favorite of the three major diabolism films of that era) came along, it was almost a given that Ovidio G. Assonitis (aka Oliver Hellman) would contemplate something similar for the Italian market. However, he was anticipated in this by director Alberto De Martino's HOLOCAUST 2000 aka THE CHOSEN (as it was originally released in the U.S.) and RAIN OF FIRE (under which title it has recently been released on R1 DVD) – whereas Assonitis had, with his own BEYOND THE DOOR (1974), preceded De Martino's THE ANTICHRIST (1974) virtually by a couple of weeks! Even so, Assonitis went ahead with his project and, not to be outdone, he concocted a truly bizarre but fascinating mélange of horror and sci-fi that also throws in for good measure elements from THE BIRDS (1963), ROSEMARY'S BABY (1968), THE EXORCIST (1973), GOD TOLD ME TO (1976), CLOSE ENCOUNTERS OF THE THIRD KIND (1977) and even DAMIEN: OMEN II (1978)! The cherry on the cake, however, was the fact that he somehow managed to rope in a stellar cast of Hollywood notables to give life to his ungodly premise: John Huston (in the enigmatic title role), Glenn Ford (as an ill-fated police detective), Mel Ferrer (as a sinister surgeon and chairman of a mysterious conglomerate), Shelley Winters (thankfully less obnoxious than usual as a maid-protector), Lance Henriksen (as the Faustian father who apparently sells his soul – and wife – merely to become a successful basketball coach!), Sam Peckinpah (remarkably restrained, glimpsed only in profile and in semi-darkness to boot, as an abortionist – but, apparently, he was drunk and cocaine-addled on the set!) and even an uncredited Franco Nero (as, ostensibly, Jesus Christ and a blond one at that)!! Despite his surprisingly brief time on screen, Ford comes off best from among his colleagues and I particularly enjoyed his altercations with the demonic and foul-mouthed child (the excellent Paige Conner – with gleaming eyes and, obviously doubled, turning occasionally into a faceless 'monster' – who, going effortlessly from sweet to sinister, undoubtedly delivers one of the best child performances in this type of film); another good turn is given by Joanne Nail as her long-suffering mother who, among other things, is left half-paralyzed and wheelchair-bound after a gunshot wound accidentally fired by her own daughter; is abducted and artificially impregnated by an 'alien' bunch inside a truck parked down a darkened tunnel; eventually, her offspring contrives to push the woman straight into a large aquarium in slo-mo (just as Winters has finished assuring her that no harm will come to her while she is around)! It would be virtually impossible to describe the decidedly mystifying plot in a few words, so I will just concentrate on a series of images that remained with me since my viewing of the film: the pre-credits sequence in which a cassock-wearing Huston, seemingly in Heaven or at least another planet, prepares to face up to his enemy; the opening scene set in a basketball court in which the leading player of Henriksen's opponents (Kareem Abdul-Jabbar) is literally 'exploded' by Conner's gaze prior to his netting the winning ball!; Conners showing her deadly ice-skating abilities by sending several leering male kids to their doom; the setting-up of Huston's rooftop base by an army of bald-headed acolytes; the surreal chasing of Conner by the latter in Peckinpah's dilapidated clinic; Ford's eye-gouging by Conner's pet falcon and subsequent fiery demise; babysitter Huston dueling with his charge-quarry Conner via a now-primitive video-game; later still, her attempt to do the old man in by literally dropping a stairway on top of him (flattening a shop in the process) a' la THE OMEN's unforgettable falling glass-plate; followed shortly by their showdown inside a hall of mirrors (borrowed, no doubt, from Orson Welles THE LADY FROM SHANGHAI {1948}); the landing of the spaceship in downtown Atlanta; the climactic – and apparently elliptical –'cleansing' attack of a flock of pigeons (standing in for the proverbial doves); the epilogue in which the monk-like Huston brings a seemingly reformed bald-headed Conner in Nero's celestial abode of equally head-shaven children. Strangely enough, it is never explained why the villainous sect need a boy 'heir' when Conner is clearly being such a good {sic} ambassador of Evil on Earth (incidentally, obscure director Paradisi walked off the film which was subsequently completed by producer Assonitis) but, luckily, Franco Micalizzi's alternately funky and eerie score and the occasionally striking visuals smooth over such inconsistencies. In fact, it would be very easy to bash STRIDULUM (whatever that means, it is how THE VISITOR is known – if at all – on its home-ground given that it has never been shown on TV in my neck of the woods) as a desperately derivative and incoherent mess but, frankly, I found it far too enjoyable and weird to be dismissed. For the record, I watched an acceptable (albeit full-frame) VHS-sourced copy of the 90-minute English-language U.S. theatrical version but, since most of the cast is American anyway, this is the right way to watch it; still, apparently, the Italian edition is slightly longer and features an alternate version of the scenes featuring Peckinpah! Although an Italian DVD edition is currently available, as a result of this surprisingly satisfactory first viewing – emulating a similar experience I had in a previous Halloween Challenge with the equally maligned William Castle production, BUG (1975) – I am now looking forward to that long-rumored, fully-loaded R1 DVD from Code Red that promises to offer the longest ever available version (108 minutes) of this unique gem!

"The Visitor" holds a rare distinction: of the thousands of films I've seen as a paying moviegoer and paid critic, it is probably the one at the VERY bottom of the barrel. Compared to this, "Plan 9 from Outer Space" and other Ed Wood movies come across as masterpieces of celluloid art. A weird Italian-American ripoff of the horror/sci-fi cycle of the '70s (from "Omen" to "Close Encounters"), this movie looks as though it was made by a hallucinating crew that tossed the old script and started with a new one every day. There is virtually no continuity - and most of the big Hollywood names apparently working for scale and by the day (Shelley Winters, John Huston, Glenn Ford, Sam Peckingpah, etc.) stagger very briefly about looking hung over and very confused. For years, I thought my dim recollections of this movie were a bad dream; but IMDb proves I actually DID sit through this, ah, epic. The most vivid memory I have of it, for some reason, is Shelley Winters doing a perky rendition of "Shortn'ng Bread." Nelson Eddy must have spun in his grave - and if was dead yet, that probably killed him!

I understand how some (perhaps most) viewers found The Visitor an incoherent mess, but it may be due to poor editing since its U.S. release in 1979 which, evidently, was also released theatrically to international audiences. However, I am only speculating, but I do know the original Italian version is longer. That version may help to fill in the gaps and possibly extends some of the more emotional scenes in the film which have been severely cut. As I was watching The Visitor, I was disappointed at how abruptly some of these scenes concluded. I wanted and expected a deeper connection to the material and the characters. Regardless of these setbacks, the movie is unquestionably unique on many levels, and I didn't find it difficult to follow. Perhaps because it IS so outlandish, I enjoyed fitting the pieces together. There was never a dull moment with so many things happening throughout the course of the story line. The atmosphere was classic 70s style, and the acting was not bad at all despite (again) the poor editing.

The Visitor is an Omen copy to a degree, but instead of demonic forces at work, the film centers on an evil alien force. This alien force is actually an escaped prisoner named Zatteen, who finds refuge on Earth many years in the past after fleeing from a deadly battle in space. Before his eventual death, he impregnates a number of women, passing along his mutated genes and allowing his future offspring to possess telekinetic powers. Since Zatteen had evil intentions and only wanted to kill and destroy others, his children are of the same breed. In order to carry out his catastrophic deeds, a cohort of wealthy men led by Dr. Walker (Mel Ferrer) is assembled to ensure his plan of world domination succeeds. This mission is challenged when only one woman on the planet in the present day bears the ability to fertilize Zatteen's seed, and her name is Barbara Collins (Joanne Nail). Barbara has already given birth to Katie (Paige Conner), a now eight year–old daughter who shows us she is no angel with some of the wicked things she says and does. The cohort wants Barbara to give birth to a son so he can become the new Zatteen of his generation. This task of impregnating Barbara is given to Raymond Armstead (Lance Henriksen), who must convince her to marry him despite the fact she is unwilling to commit to marriage. Barbara, of course, does not realize she has the special gift of carrying Zatteen's seed in her womb, but she knows intuitively that something is wrong with Katie. That sets up the premise of The Visitor. Of course, there are birds that attack on command, a watchful babysitter (Shelley Winters), a police detective on Katie's trail (Glenn Ford), a mysterious butler, a Jesus–like character who tells tales of the evil Zatteen to a group of young bald–headed children, and the good–guy visitor himself (John Huston), who congregates his disciples on the roof of a large skyscraper. The first fifteen minutes of the film unravels the basis of the plot, but as the viewer, it's important to listen to the dialogue. A lot happens quickly.

Whether you like the film or find it a mess, to say it's not an entertaining effort would seem unfair. The only thing that really was annoying to me was part of the soundtrack dealing with the discotheque music. It was way over the top and out of place for this type of picture. I'm sure it fit the times and some people enjoyed it, but if the movie is to be taken seriously on any level, then that music has to go. If the movie was intended as hype – which doesn't appear to be the case – then the histrionic melody is warranted. On the other hand, the moody, ambient music was excellent, and the ending was solid. Give this cult classic a shot and be prepared to go on a strange journey of plot twists and turns. Watch it on a rainy day when you have the time or are feeling ambiguous and/or disconnected from the world. We all have those days sometimes. That's when The Visitor will leave you a little numb, confused, and scratching your head... but in a good way.

I believe in given movies a chance and I am glad a did with this movie. After the birthday scene, I was hooked. Yeah its bizarre,low budget,okay sound effects but suspenseful,fun,wild,and interesting who can ask for more. Also, it has a great cast and decent plot or whatever you want to call it. The tone of the movie was nice and loved the 70s style in movies when done right. I learned early on after watching this movie to try not to figure it out or believe me it will drive you LOONEY, just enjoy the ride even though you don't know where it will take you. I know this kind of movie might not be for everyone but just give it a chance could become a treat like it did for me while your up late at night and cant go to sleep.

If there was a plot to this movie, I have no clue what it was. Seemed to me that there was not an iota of continuity to this film. Maybe I am just not esoteric enough for this one. View it if you must, but be forewarned, it will be time spent you will never be able to reclaim in your life.

Back in 1956 the movie world was shocked by The Bad Seed with Patty McCormack's role as a truly evil and amoral child. It took 23 years to find a cure for one of these bad seeds in The Visitor.

In The Visitor the bad girl is played by Paige Connor who also has telekinesis powers now. But folks far far away are taking note. John Huston has arrived from a kind of rehab camp for bad children and he means to take her away. But there are forces on earth who want to keep her here doing all kinds of evil deeds.

The Visitor is quite the mess of a film not wanting to get classified as fantasy, horror or science fiction. Some prominent names do some roles her and have all the satisfied look as people whose paychecks have cleared.

John Huston must know how his father Walter must have felt when he was doing The Outlaw for Howard Hughes. John as an actor had this great voice and when he was doing claptrap he could make it sound like The Bard.

See claptrap raised to glory.

Possibly the worst film I have ever seen, "The Visitor" has many disconnected plot elements that never seem to go anywhere or make any sense. Guys wandering the desert, giant green clouds billowing up from nowhere, spirals of birds whirling indoors...as a series of unconnected images, I suppose the movie may have value, but as a story it is completely worthless. I saw this theatrically on its initial release and hated it; I tried to watch it again a decade later. I thought, "It couldn't really be as bad as I remember," but it was and I fell asleep as it dragged on. Totally awful.

Kathy Collins is no ordinary eight year old girl.Indeed,she is unique,carrying within her the power of Sateen,an inter-spacial force of immense magnitude.Katy's primary mission on Earth is to carry these genes forward,a task accomplished by convincing her mother Barbara to bear a similarly endowed male child with whom Kathy would eventually mate."The Visitor" makes no sense.It plays like insane mix of such occult films as "Rosemary's Baby","The Exorcist" and "The Omen" but also a tribute to such sci-fi classics as "Close Encounters of the Third Kind".There are so many disconnected plot elements for example aliens wandering through the desert,giant green clouds billowing up from nowhere or the sky turning the color of blood,but the action is fast paced and some surreal images are quite psychedelic.6 out of 10.

Why else would he and the rest of the big name stars in this travesty of cinema ever agree to be a part of it. I saw it in the theatre way back when. The lousyness of this film has only been surpassed in my mind by Saturn 3 (another film with great stars, Kirk Douglas and Harvey Keitel, but horrible story; perhaps Kirk did it because he could be cuddly with Farrah). The visitor makes no sense, is shot in a shoddy manner, and the production quality looks like super 8. I am sure the actors and actresses who participated are embarrassed and rue the day they ever agreed to do this picture. If their agents convinced them to do it, they should have fired them. Avoid at all costs! Don't encourage the makers of this garbage to make more films like it.

Despite all the reviews claiming otherwise, this movie isn't at all hard to understand. Yes, the editing is crazy, and the plot takes a lot of very strange turns, but it's pretty clear what's happening in the movie: it's just very bizarre. If you like weird stuff, you might like this film. Then again, you might not. I wanted to turn it off several times, but curiosity kept me watching. The worst part of it was I got a distinct feeling that the little girl was intentionally sexualized in certain scenes. It wasn't blatant, but there were several moments when I was uncomfortable with how the camera and the script seemed to be ogling her.

I am...to reference another viewer's shocked remarks at how one could say anything defamatory about this film...appalled at just the opposite. This film is in a word quite ludicrous. The film opens with John Huston in another world needing to come down and bring back a child. We then meet the kid and her mother and the man who wants to marry her. Yes, there is a lot of religious allegory here. Just because allegory is used does not make this profound or deep. It isn't. It has a story with many, many flaws. Lack of coherence being the biggest. Characters are never fully explained. Motivation for characters are never fully explained. Scenes cut from one to another with virtually no transition. The editor for this film must have been either blind or drunk. It is so choppy and incoherent at times as to suggest that several men directed it. Ovidio Assonitis, you might remember the brain behind such great films like Beyond the Door(Chi Sei) and Piranha II: The Spawning, wrote this Italian rubbish whilst another gets "credit" for directing it. I will concede that had more effort been given to fleshing out the story and had the producers picked a real editor and had a real score been made for the film rather than that awful 70s-like soundtrack used and had some more realistic special effects other than blue screens and the like been used - then, yes, this might have been somewhat decent. But you know what? They didn't. What we have here is a weird, highly implausible, very incoherent picture with a cast of famous actors looking quite foolish. John Huston looks quite grandfatherly as the man/angel(?) coming to Earth to find this child. Huston looks lethargic and weary. After having seen this film, he had every right to look and feel that way. Maybe they should have asked him for some advice with direction. Hey, Sam Peckinpah has a small role too. With all that experience why not ask? What could it have hurt? The young actress playing the bratty child is Paige Conner, and she does quite well as an annoying kid you want to see flee the screen as soon as possible. She emits profanity, a trademark Assonitis used with other child actors in Chi Sei with equal ability, with ease to Glenn Ford in what can only be termed as a throw-away role. Shelley Winters is here as some important person. God only knows who. She sings "momma's gonna make shortening bread" about ten times and slaps the kid in the face. Mel Ferrer and Lance Henrikson play heavys. Johanne Nail plays the mother, and she goes through so much that in any other film she would have been dead after the first reel. In here she is shot, paralyzed, pushed into a gigantic fish tank, pulled and then dropped down stairs, and is choked with wire. Oh, and by the way, she manages to be impregnated and have an abortion too. What a woman! Nail, to her credit, is pretty good as she does manage to keep a straight face throughout. Pity, I wasn't able to. Many scenes stand out as being quite absurd. My favorites are: the girl skating on ice like a maniacal Dorothy Hamil and the bird scene where death from above takes the form of pigeons with a vengeance. A totally ridiculous film in every sense. And yes, Franco Nero does indeed have a cameo at the end as some kind of Christ figure. Ooh! That was awfully clever huh? Phew!