The Oracle

I put this in a few days before Christmas and, to my surprise, it is set during the Xmas and New Year's holidays. So I officially have a new entry into my holiday themed horror flicks! Jennifer (Caroline Capers Powers) and husband Ray (Roger Neil) move into a new apartment once inhabited by a psychic medium. Naturally, Jennifer locates a trinket that communicates with the dead and they take her up on the offer. She is contacted by one William Graham, an industrialist who committed suicide some weeks earlier. Jennifer has visions of the true culprits, but no one believes her!

Filmed entirely in NYC, this Roberta Findlay cheapie really doesn't have much going for it. Still, I was entertained for all of the wrong reasons. There is lots of goofy gore and bad acting on display. Lead Powers is attractive and a decent actress, but never made another film (how does that happen?). The real reasons to see this flick are the DVD extras on the Media Blasters release. There is a hilarious half hour interview with Findlay about the film where she covers everything about the film from casting the big lesbian to her love of Jack Daniels to the South's love of horror films ("It's the only good thing about it!"). There is also a audio commentary where Findlay pulls no punches. I love listening to her talk.

What is interesting is that this film came out a year before the more celebrated (and admittedly better) WITCHBOARD. They basically are the exact same film and it makes me wonder if Kevin Tenney saw this and thought, "I can do that a lot better."

A woman is forced into investigating the death of a murdered man after messing with the former tentant's writing device that is used to contact the dead. Sometimes exciting and scary horror pic with some well done scenes, is ultimately too slow moving and dull to maintain interest throughout despite good premise. Rated R; Violence, Profanity, and Adult Themes.

.When a young couple move into an apartment, they find a box that belonged to the deceased former tenant. Inside is an ornate planchette, a ceramic hand which holds a quill pen and can communicate with the dead. After using it at a dinner party, the wife (Caroline Capers Powers) becomes psychically linked to a series of murders being committed by an obese killer. There's also an effort by the husband (Roger Neil) to get rid of the planchette, which keeps returning, though usually after facilitating the gruesome death of whoever was unlucky enough to come into contact with it.

This is better than most of the dreck Findlay and her husband made back in the 60's and 70's, when they were two of the most successful sexploitation filmmakers on the NY scene. Michael Findlay was killed in a freak helicopter accident in 1977, and Roberta continued to make movies, mostly hardcore porn, before moving into more legitimate filmmaking like this movie. It's still not a good film at all, really, but it has enough goofy plot twists and chintzy special effects to make it worth seeing once for bad movie fans. Yet I can't just lie to you and give it an average rating.

A young woman, Jennifer (Caroline Capers Powers), comes into possession of a spiritualist's planchette, and makes contact with the ghost of a murdered man.

The Oracle is one of director Roberta Findlay's more bearable films, but that's still not saying a great deal given how dire her filmography is as a whole: it's still got a formulaic plot loaded with trite genre clichés that frequently feels like the product of grade school children; it's still directed with zero finesse by a woman who graduated from porn; it still boasts amateurish performances by a cast of unknowns; and it still features laughable special effects. However, it's the sheer ineptitude on display that makes the film easier to digest, the unintentionally hilarious aspects preventing it from being a total snooze-fest like the majority of Findlay's movies.

Caroline Capers Powers is absolutely dreadful, and it's no wonder that this was her only film (she's probably still hiding in embarrassment): Powers spends the entire film screaming hysterically, but never convincingly. Fortunately, she's a good looking gal, so we can be a little forgiving; not so for everyone else, who are as equally untalented but not so easy on the eye. Pam La Testa as hired killer Farkas is the biggest offender (and I mean that literally-she's enormous!): every minute she is on screen is a masterclass in bad casting and wooden acting. Roger Neil, as Jennifer's husband Ray, gives Pam a run for her money though, his lack of acting prowess and porn-star moustache suggesting that he would be better cast in some of Findlay's 'other' movies.

As for the film's most memorable moments, try these for size...

Farkas, pretending to be a bloke, picks up a prostitute, and hacks her up with a knife. This is the one genuinely nasty moment in a film that is primarily schlock. It begins on the streets of seedy '80s New York, establishing a sleazy, gritty tone that, unfortunately, is later discarded in favour of cheesy z-grade horror hokum.

Apartment building superintendent Pappas (Chris Maria De Koron) is attacked by imaginary critters that look like the rubbery finger puppet monsters that I used to play with as a kid. In an attempt to get rid of them, he stabs himself in the arm and the chest (I think I just lost mine).

Unseen forces terrify Jennifer, trashing her apartment, giving Powers yet another opportunity to fail spectacularly at acting terrified.

Believing that a wealthy man has been murdered, Jennifer goes to the dead man's wife with her story instead of telling the police. Someone this stupid almost deserves to die.

As Ray attempts to dispose of the planchette in an incinerator, a pair of rubbery monster hands grab his head and tear it off. Inept gore, but it's too silly not to enjoy.

Farkas pursues Jennifer with axe in hand. Somehow, she manages to keep up with the young woman, despite being three times her weight. Cornering Jennifer, the killer swings her weapon, somehow planting the axe in a cardboard box instead of her intended victim. Her lack of accuracy will be the death of her.

Menaced by the ghost of her victim (a hilariously bad puppet creation), Farkas swings her axe again, this time striking a barrel of toxic waste! The corrosive contents spray into the killer's face, reducing it to a molten mess of gooey flesh and bone. The gore is, once again, bargain basement, but impressively messy.

The ridiculous ending sees the murdered man's wife trapped in her car by her husband's vengeful spirit, and being choked to death by exhaust fumes. Jennifer stops screaming hysterically and takes up being a spiritualist full time.

4.5/10, rounded up to 5 for IMDb. It's garbage, but there's fun to be had.

"The Oracle" isn't exactly what you'd call a masterpiece of horror, but it definitely surpassed my expectations and I can't deny having enjoyed it immensely. This movie is like a prototype of super-cheesy 80's horror, with silly plot lines and gooey special effects throughout the entire playtime. As long as you're an undemanding fan of the genre, it'll be pretty difficult NOT to enjoy it, actually. Quite a couple of low-budget 80's horror movies revolved on possession and spiritual media, and even though none of them are able to scare the crap out of you, they always deliver at least some bloody murders and/or atmospheric scenery. The ghostly medium in "The Oracle" is an ancient stone hand carrying the restless soul of a murdered businessman and possessing the life of a newlywed girl that moved in to the apartment where the eerie device was kept. The ghost forces Jennifer to seek contact with his widow as well as his murderers, but also eliminates everyone that tries to help the young woman getting rid of …The Hand. It's very good and original idea of the script to not only follow Jennifer but also the killers right from the beginning. Early in the film, we witness how a genuinely uncanny battleaxe (Pam La Testa) sadistically hacks up a prostitute. We have no idea who she (he?) is at that point, and it's only much later before Jennifer identifies her as one of the killers during a vision. I wouldn't go so far to call this idea intelligent, but it's certainly more creative than I'm used seeing of independent 80's splatter. The massacre of the prostitute is pretty graphic and disturbing, yet the other kills are delightfully cheesy. One guy stabs himself to death because he imagines monsters crawling over his skin, another victim is assaulted by a floating skull and another bloke even has his head clean torn off by a pair of green-clawed hands! It's rather peculiar to notice that Roberta Findlay directed this flick and even in the same year she also made "Tenement: Game of Survival". That movie is completely opposite in tone to "The Oracle", as it's raw and sickening exploitation centering on gang wars, rape & revenge, drug issues and urban decay. I guess Roberta just was a versatile filmmaker...