Ruby

Piper Laurie follows her success in Carrie with another supernatural horror, Ruby, in which she plays gangster's moll Ruby Claire, who, sixteen years after witnessing the cold-blooded shooting of Nicky (Sal Vecchio), the father of her unborn child, finds herself menaced by his vengeful spirit. Believing that he was betrayed by his lover, Nicky's ghost proceeds to bump off the ex-gangsters now employed at her drive-in theatre, using his mute daughter Leslie (Janit Baldwin) as a conduit, before finally confronting Ruby herself.

Opening with the wonderfully dreamlike murder of Nicky in a bayou, Curtis Harrington's Ruby is not without atmosphere and style, the director making effective use of his rundown drive-in location and its eerie, foggy swampland surroundings. Sadly, despite the creepy ambiance, several creative kills (ala The Omen)—hanging by film stock, impalement to movie screen, death by drinks vending machine—plus a couple of fun possession scenes clearly inspired by The Exorcist, the overly talky nature of the script prevents the film from being a complete success, the dull dialogue frequently bringing the action to a standstill.

About a year after Brian DE palma's;Carrie,A low budget independent horror film came out called ruby(aka;blood ruby)starring Carrie co-star piper Laurie,who ill always know as Cathrine Martel of twin peaks. this was made by dimension pictures,who also gave us kingdom of the spiders with bill shatner.its a creepy little flick about a gangsters moll(Laurie)who runs a drive in theater,with her gangster associates. who gunned down her lover.well you can probably imagine the rest. well ruby's daughter(played by janit Baldwin)gets possessed by the ghost of Niki(ruby's dead lover)and bodies start piling up.Stuart Whitman plays ruby's new lover,who was one of the gunners,but does'nt seem like the type.anyway its sort of exorcist meets JD's revenge. with creepy music and sound effects.also starring;roger Davis from TV's dark shadows.and there's an interesting movie playing at ruby's drive -in.the 1958 classic;attack of the 50 foot woman,starring Allison Hayes. Curtis Harrington directed this little gem from 1977.harringtom who also directed the 1961 night tide with a young Dennis hopper,kudos to piper Laurie who i think played the part of ruby so well.and beautiful big eyed janit Baldwin(who was in gator bait with the late Claudia Jennings)as ruby's mute possessed daughter.awesome movie,check it out. 8 out of 10.recommended

One of those quick-and-dirty kind of killer B's made by small independents to cash in on box office smashes, RUBY tried to ride the coattails of Piper Laurie's Oscar-nominated turn in CARRIE, to which this movie owes more than just a nod of acknowledgment, along with THE EXORCIST and Brian De Palma's own CARRIE follow-up, THE FURY.

Laurie collaborates with cult-film favorite Curtis Harrington, (NIGHT TIDE, THE DEAD DON'T DIE) to try and lend credibility to the unique if unsteady story of a faded gun moll, just getting by living at a decrepit drive-in with her teenage daughter (Janit Baldwin, a good candidate for a game of "whatever happened to...?") Seems Mama Ruby had a little more to do with her gangster hubby's demise than she let on, but no worries...Daddy's little girl is going to get to the bottom of things in a way that CARRIE would definitely approve of...

This is a tough one to find on late night TV, and tougher still if you're looking for the original Harrington edit, which had been butchered and diluted over the years by different ham-handed distributors and program directors. Not a classic by any means, but for creepshow completists, Laurie is like a female Vincent Price...her performances are worth catching even in the most Gawd-awful dreck. And though RUBY is hardly a gem, it's not quite THAT bad, either.

I did not know this Curtis Harrington's film, and I have seen all the others he did. Such a shame.... This one is a real tribute to the fifties drive in movie theaters. And I guess Piper Laurie was chosen for her performance one year earlier in Brian De Palma's CARRIE, another horror yarn, and this time at a bigger, larger scale. A pure masterpiece, where she also was the mother of a "possessed" daughter. But this one, directed by a very gifted Curtis Harrington - some kind of William Castle's heir - is very enjoyable, gritty, riveting, and offers us a very good ending, which seemd to be in total opposition to the director's will. For once, the will of a producer over a director satisfies me !!!!

After a setup that kills her husband, Ruby a gangster wife has to raise her daughter alone, or maybe not. She have her ganglike family to support her. Then people start getting dying around her. Is it ghost, a crazed murderer, or could be; he dead husband seeking revenge.