The Dark

I was handed this 'golden garbage' DVD for my birthday (Moe!) and all I can say is paybacks are a bitch. The Dark definitely belongs in the "Plan 9 from outer space" category. If you seek serious horror then avoid this like a Chris Tucker 'movie'. However, if failed attempts of the past make you howl with laughter than look no further than this turkey. Failing test screenings as a zombie movie it was reworked into an alien menace movie with hilarious results.

It all starts with an apology (or prologue if you prefer) that attempts to convince the audience that if electric eels can shock than who knows what's out in space(!?) This amounts to freeze framing the 'zombie movie' and superimposing laser bolts from the creature's eyes and an explosion onto the victim. That's great but the characters solving the crimes keep describing horrible mutilations (!?) I would say the acting is terrible but the lines they are given to say are horrendous. We never actually see a spaceship so 'it' apparently fell to earth on it's own. I'm dying to know how and why it's dressed like a mailman (or a factory worker in his coat sans the lunch box). The addition of a mysterious psychic (?) that shows up at inexplicable times means you know your in beer-cinema country.

Take it or leave it. I'm already stuck with my copy.

I'd first watched this in a cinema in Istanbul in the early 1980s. The Turkish title was GERÇEK YARATIK (The Real Creature) and an English-language title as ALIEN TERROR was tagged on to the Turkish posters. - and ALIEN had been released a while ago in Turkey as YARATIK (The Creature). So the publicity for this movie was suggesting that it was related to the much-publicized ALIEN and that it was actually the real stuff! I was just 13 or 14 years old at the time... (and there was no internet back then!) Naturally, I was pretty much disappointed when I went ahead to see it and realized it was basically an ordinary urban murder thriller until the last scene. Nevertheless, I've recently bought its DVD to rekindle childhood memories and watched it last night. Now watching it with a more open mind, zero expectations, I find it not half bad as most reviewers have it. First of all, the cinematography in night scenes is simply perfect, beginning with the opening scene. I think the problem most of the other reviewers face ("too dark") simply stems from bad transfers of previous VHS and/or TV prints. The DVD's brand new digital transfer from original materials is really a beauty. Plus, the soundtrack is also very effective, as even the most negative reviews acknowledge. So, overall, the nighttime attack scenes are really brilliantly crafted. Top-notch horror filmmaking there. Having said these, the movie is sadly not competent in other departments and is a mess overall. Richard Jaeckel, who was great in MAKO JAWS OF DEATH, looks very wooden here as the main cop protagonist. William Devane shows some charisma and has got what is called as a screen presence, but is out of tune with his character as a father who had lost his daughter as a savage murder victim. All the secondary characters, esp. the boss of the female reporter, play it for laughs. A few of the lines are intelligently sarcastic, but the demonstration scene (what is it by the way? a student demonstration?) is very offensive: a bunch of youths protest that the city police is busy harassing them rather than tracking the murderer and they act like stupid monkeys (jumping around, etc!) during the demonstration! The director must be a feeble-minded cop-loving right-winger who strongly resents student activists deep in his heart and used this as an opportunity to make fun of them... Anyway, the incoherence of the plot, which, as is widely known, stems from a reworking of the script, is already well-covered in all reviews. I am not very much troubled by that precise aspect and actually find it interesting that you can trace two versions of one story in one movie! As everyone who has read anything about the movie knows, the original scripts did not entail an alien! The DVD has an informative video interview as well as a commentary track with the director Cardos. I've watched the interview and listened to part of the commentary. Cardos explains that the original version entailed a freak-child (and not a zombie, as has been claimed). He also says that none of the footage Tobe Hooper shot before being replaced has made into the final edit of the movie.

Years ago while watching this picture on TV for the first time, I figured about half way through 'Hey, this ain't a sci-fi alien-on-the-rampage flick! It's an occult zombie movie hastily re-edited in a fever of post-production panic to cash in on the popularity of the same year's Alien'. Phew. What a literal thinker I was. Looking at IMDB's 'trivia' section, I see I was right. Wasn't I clever way back then? No. It really IS that obvious.

Disjointed, silly B movie. Not without some pleasures though. Keenan Wynn's fearful walk through a darkened underground car park worked for me, and there are a few unintended laughs here and there eg. William Devane's rather strange reaction to the sight of his dead daughter lying on a mortuary slab: he burps, and somewhat skittishly too. I wonder what Lee Strasberg would have thought of that. Perhaps William was expressing his heartfelt feelings toward the movie he found himself in. Actors get up to these tricks, you know.

And then there's Casey Kasem's police pathologist who is asked by a cop what colour the murderer's (still assumed to be human) skin is. Shaggy Kasem's reply of 'It's grey' is pleasantly creepy and recalls similar moments from Kolchak: The Night Stalker. In fact, Carl Kolchak's shadow looms large over this picture, even down to the unexpectedly spectacular denouement featuring a growling monster throwing cops bodily in all directions. VERY Kolchak.

Actually, damn it, I recommend this movie. It's enjoyable trash if you're in the right mood. But be warned - thanks to/in spite of post-production re-cutting (complete with inept Ed Wood type voice-over to fill in the plot holes) IT MAKES NO SENSE WHATSOEVER. Might be part of it's idiotic charm.

The first smartest being Texas Chainsaw Massacre. Contrary to what other commenters say, this was not supposed to be a quasi sci-fi horror entry until AFTER initial screenings were sour. Then the producers decided to cash in on the ALIEN bonanza by adding prologue and epilogue and the laser-beam eye blasts. Devane was excited thinking he'd be working with Hooper, but with Hooper's leaving, he barely walks through the motions, Cathy Lee is only a little better. Wynn and Jaekal do well to hold things together, and John Bloom is perfectly cast once again as the lumbering creature. The best thing to be said about this is that it looks, sounds and feels like a 1970s ABC TV movie of the week, and why not? Just look at who wrote it and what else he has written. If you watch it thinking that it should have been made for TV, it's more enjoyable because your expectations might not be too high, and it comes off as fairly average. Actually, replace Devane with Darren McGavin, Wynn with Simon Oakland, make KFVI a newspaper, keep Richard Jaekal as Kolchak's nemesis, add a lot of Kolchak wit and cut it down to 50 minutes, and it's a good Night Stalker teleplay. Of course, don't forget the funky horns that announce Kolchak on the go.

I first became aware of this film because of the William Devane factor. Unfortunately Devane's character is extremely "boorish". All is not lost however because of the eclectic cast. The story is a mish-mash of "Jack the Ripper" and sci fi, with neither angle very impressive. What I do like is the quite sharp and often darkly amusing dialog. Overall the acting is acceptable, with Jaquelyn Hyde giving a standout supporting performance as a "medium" who can predict where the monster will strike next. You might remember her as "Mrs. Blair" in Woody Allen's hilarious "Take the Money and Run". With Richard Jaeckel, Keenan Wynn, and Cathy Lee Crosby also contributing, "The Dark" is almost saved from being a "bomb", but not quite. - MERK