Director: Bob Clark
Screenplay: Benjamin Clark (CSPWDT); Curt Siodmak & Lena Starling (DD); Jerry Sackheim (BC);
Cast: Valerio Mamchos, Alan Ormsby, Jeffrey Gillen, Anya Orsby, Jane Daly, Paul Cronin (CSPWDT); John Marley, Lynn Carlin, Richard Backus, Henderson Forsythe (DD); Olivia Hussey, Margot Kidder, John Saxon, Nick Macuso, Art Hindle (BC);
Year: 1972 (CSPWDT); 1972 (DD); 1974 (BC);
Running Time: 86.5 mins (CSPWDT); 88 mins (DD); 97 mins (BC)
Certificate: 18
This splendid 101 Films boxed set featuring the early horror films of director/writer Bob Clark serves as an excellent introduction to his genre output. It also reminds us that Clark was an under-rated pioneer of lower budget cinema, whose ideas and style have been copied many times over by a plethora of directors who later went on to make names for themselves in the industry; for example, John Carpenter.
Children Shouldn’t Play with Dead Things
My first exposure to this low budget horror was through a friend of mine, who was one of the first adopters of Laser Disc players. Clearly that didn’t work out too well for my mate, who had at least 50 discs, most of which were Italian horrors and’ video nasties’ and, therefore, quite sought after and valuable. On the night in question he also introduced me to the, err, classic Hong Kong Category III nasty, Run and Kill, which disturbed me for several days afterwards! Anyway, I digress. I have to admit I struggled to get into Children Shouldn’t play with dead things at the time, finding it quite amateurish, and annoying. However, the years have been kind to Bob Clark’s theatrical horror debut, and I have to say that I enjoyed it a lot more second time around.
The basic plot sees a troupe of stage actors, led by their boss, Alan (Alan Ormsby), boating it out to an island, one which houses a cemetery. Alan’s plan is to have some fun, primarily by digging up a corpse, and using some ritual magic to perform some kind of rite on said body, which will, he thinks, give him some powers, or something… Anyway, things don’t go according to plan and Alan’s disrespectful hijinks lead to the dead stumbling out of their graves and surrounding and attacking the party in the cottage that they’ve rented. Sound familiar? Yes, Clark does rip off The Night of the Living Dead somewhat, particularly during the final third of the film.
As one can expect from a micro-budget film, the acting tends to be a bit of a mixed bag, more at am-dram theatre level than respectable award-winning level, but mostly still quite engaging. Alan Ormsby plays his role with gusto and takes the word ‘annoying’ to another level. Overall, I think the women tend to fair better, with Alan’s real life wife (at the time), Anya Ormsby, proving adept at playing a spaced-out superstitious groupie, while Jane Daly, does what she can with a fairly under-written role as the newbie of the troupe.
Where Children does get things right is in its presentation of the living dead. The make-up, by Alan Ormsby (who organised all the VFX), is very good, if rather basic, and the scene where the dead clamber out of their graves is done really well, and is genuinely quite creepy. Unfortunately much of the soundtrack, as effective as it is at times, underwhelmed me, probably due to its experimental nature.
Children Shouldn’t Play with Dead Things is a mixed bag – it’s a bit of a mess with too many irritating characters, but when it does ‘steps up a gear’ it delivers well and I can see why it’s become something of a cult film over the intervening years.
Deathdream (aka The Night Walk or Dead of Night)
Out of the three films in the set, Deathdream was the one that I was most looking forward to seeing as I hadn’t yet seen it, despite owning an aging VHS tape of it, and having heard almost universal praise of it. Fortunately, for me, Deathdream turned out to be as good as I’d hoped it would be – maybe even better – making me glad that I’d volunteered to check out the Bob Clark set.
The story is a simple one and is basically a cautionary tale of ‘be careful what you wish for’ and bears more than a passing resemblance to the famous 1902 short story ‘The Monkey’s Paw’ by W.W. Jacobs. Beginning with a short scene set in a war zone, amid gunfire and explosions, a young soldier, Andy (Backus) is gunned down and later dies despite his comrades trying to save him.
The main part of the film starts at Andy’s parent’s house witnessing them receiving the news of the death of their son from a military friend of the family. Obviously father, mother and sister are all devastated by the sad news but mum takes it the hardest and struggles to accept that her son is gone. In fact, she then goes on to sit in her rocking chair, candle in hand, pleading with the powers that be to bring her son back home. This tactic strangely works and, low and behold, days later her son returns to them, but isn’t quite himself; he’s now pale and gaunt and seems to have changed, being surlier and mostly monosyllabic in his conversation.
After Andy kills the family pet it soon becomes obvious to anyone with half a brain that he’s changed and very dangerous. It’s not long after that he claims his first human victim, saying: “I died for you, now you can do the same…” As with the story that the film is based on, Deathdream doesn’t end on a happy note, and is stronger for it.
Deathdream deals in death and political metaphors and, as a result, is very nihilistic in nature. Very much an anti-Vietnam film, Deathdream is a twisted morality tale; namely be careful what you path you choose as there are always unforeseen consequences to any action.
As one would expect from a low budget film, Deathdream is far from perfect with a few technical issues including with the sound mix; for example, the sound FX when the dog whimpers doesn’t quite match with the visuals. However, the story works, the dialogue and acting is very naturalistic (John Marley is particularly good as the dad) and the sound track, by Carl Zittrer, nicely underscores the, at times, creepy and unnerving visuals.
Black Christmas
Now recognised as a classic ‘slasher’ film, Black Christmas is probably the film that Bob Clark is best known for, apart from, perhaps, the ground-breaking sex comedy Porkys. The story is a simple one, whereby a group of university students are menaced by an unseen stalker who kills them off one-by-one until the final girl, Jez (Olivia Hussey), has to face her nemesis alone. Only, it’s not quite that simple, since our final girl is also having issues with her mercurial boyfriend, Peter (played well by Keir Dullea), due to the fact that she’s pregnant, but doesn’t want to be, and he wants for them to keep the child and become a family.
One of the strongest, creepiest elements to Black Christmas is the phone calls that the killer makes to the dorm the girls are housed in. Clearly unhinged he switches voices, thus demonstrating multiple personalities, and is very offensive with the language he uses. The ‘C’ word crops up a time or two, for example. This nicely sets up the tension and delineates the different characters. Margot Kidder’s, for example, is brash and during a call she drunkenly insults the killer, whereas another, quieter female berates her for winding the nut-job up.
Black Christmas is nicely shot with some stylish and innovative camerawork on display including a very giallo-ish murder involving a glass unicorn, lit in a very Dario Argento-ish manner. There’s also a very early use of a kind of proto-type steady-cam as the killer climbs up a wall lattice to get into the building right at the beginning of the film. The sound design is also excellent, especially in how the nuisance calls have been constructed, using four of five different voices to enhance the killer’s craziness.
Bob Clark was obviously a director who was ahead of the curve and made his low budgets an asset, forcing him to continually come up with innovative ways to cheat shots or improve his film in a range of ways. And in Black Christmas we’re treated to many ‘tricks’ to keep things rolling smoothly and fresh. If I have one minor gripe, it’s with some of the dialogue that is a tad offensive, especially when Margot’s character says: “You can’t rape a townie; I know a professional virgin when I see one!” Other than that I think the film is psycho-on-the-loose perfection, and has rarely been equalled. Plus, any film with the late, great actor John Saxon in it automatically gets an extra star from me!
Special Features
101 Films have really gone to town with this release and there are plenty of special features to accompany each of the films.
Children Shouldn’t Play with Dead Things
Audio commentary with Alan Ormsby, Jane Daly and Anya Ormsby with moderation by David Gregory (Recorded June 2007) – Alan probably has the most to say here, but the girls also chip in with some cool anecdotes. Alan and Bob Clark go back a long way, having initially met at college.
Interview with Alan Ormsby (33 mins) – The sound’s not great on this one, since it was done online, but, again, Alan is good company and explains what a fun shoot it was for him, even though he had to learn quite a lot of lines. Apparently Bob had himself credited as Benjamin Clark for this film as he didn’t want to be labelled as a horror director.
Memories of Bob (10 mins) – A variety of film-related talking heads talk about the man and his films in an endearing way. Apparently he used to play semi-pro football and the budget for Children was only around $11K (about $1,000 for each shooting day). Everyone says Bob was a very determined character and very knowledgeable.
Confessions of a grave digger (9 mins) – An interview with Ken Goch, who helped create the graveyard set-piece, and was half the film’s art department. He and another guy dug all 32 pits for the living dead to rise from. Apparently, he got paid 65 dollars a week on the production, and got pulled over by the cops when travelling from location while smoking a spliff. He later became 1st AD on Deathdream and Deranged.
Grindhouse Q & A (11.5 mins) – A fun question and answer session at a double bill screening of Children and Deathdream. We learn that Bob wrote the script in ten days and Christopher Walken was also considered for the Andy role. It’s good to see the film’s composer also on the panel, explaining how his electronic equipment was a bit ropey and that he struggled to get the same sounds from it twice!
Cemetery Mary – music video (4 mins) – The band in question are The Dead Things who dress a bit like Skid Row.
Dead girls don’t say much (4 mins) – The Dead Things again, but this time live on stage, replete with exotic dancers and lots of pyrotechnics
Trailer (3.13 mins) – Features lots of cool back-lit shots of the dead stumbling through the graveyard, with a PG certificate
Photo gallery – Unfortunately I couldn’t forward this on
Death Dream
Audio commentary with Travis Crawford and Bill Ackerman – They discuss the three horror films of Bob Clark and explain that in the opening war scene for Deathdream another actor plays Andy since the original actor, Richard Badcus, wasn’t available for the reshoots.
Dreaming of Death (72 mins) – A brand-new feature length documentary on the work of director Bob Clark, with plenty of interviews with the likes of Paul Zaza (composer) Chris Alexander and Simon FitzJohn. We learn plenty about Clark’s early life (born in New Orleans) and about his films. For example, Children came out as a supporting feature to Oliver Reed’s Blue Blood and Deathdream was an 8-week shoot and shared sets with Clark’s own Deranged.
Theatrical trailer (3.48 mins) – Emphasises the story, and is a bit too long
Black Christmas
Audio commentary with Bob Clark – Clark makes for interesting company as he goes into quite a bit of detail as he navigates us through the film. Apparently they had to reinforce the trellis the killer climbs up to take the weight of the cameraman and his kit. After Black Christmas he made a point of not featuring any drinking or smoking in his films. As a viewer I think they should have turned the soundtrack down so we can hear Clark more clearly.
Commentary with actors John Saxon and Keir Dullea – Another good value commentary; apparently John was sent the script, which he liked a lot, but initially another actor got the role, but then was let go, him being too senile to remember his lines, hence Saxon was called up at short notice and learned his lines on the flight over to Toronto where they were shooting. Dullea agreed to do the role after he’d seen his co-star in Romeo and Juliet, and thought the dialogue was ahead of its time.
Audio commentary with actor Nick Mancuso – This must be one of the strangest commentaries I’ve listened to since Nick seems to be doing much of the commentary in character, as the killer, as he munches away on some snacks and sounds rather pervy! It’s quite funny though, especially when he comes up with lines like: “I did make an appointment for therapy on Monday.”
Film and Furs: Remembering Black Christmas with Art Hindle (26 mins) – This is an interview that’s carried over from the Shout Factory disc. Art is good company and very knowledgeable about the film. He enjoyed the shoot and had a lot of respect for Clark, who sounds like he was a polymath. Art was happy to wear his old fur coat since the shoot was very cold.
Victims and Virgins: Remembering Black Christmas with Lynne Griffin (26.5 mins) – Lynne recalls her career, usually auditioning for bad girls that die first. She thinks that she was picked since she could hold her breath for a long time, a handy talent for her role in Black Christmas as the victim of a suffocation murder.
Black Christmas Legacy (40.5 mins) – A cool mini documentary that features many of the key players from the film, including Margot Kidder, Bob Clark and Lynne Griffin. Funnily enough, Clark had already decided that if he did do a sequel it would be called Halloween and be about babysitters!
40th Anniversary reunion panel: Fan Expo Canada 2014 (18 mins) – Actor Nick Mancuso is on-board for this one; appearing a lot more normal than he makes out he is in his commentary! The panel talk about how five voices were blended for the killer on the phone calls and Mancuso stood on his head so his voice was naturally compressed. They also discuss how the story is quite progressive, in its tackling abortion and other female issues.
TV and Radio Spots – Three different spots
12 Days of Black Christmas Featurette (20 mins) – John Saxon narrates a short documentary about the film, 32 years later. Apparently the original script was rejected by Hollywood before Bob took it on to make some changes.
Black Christmas Revisited Featurette (36.5 mins) – Lynne and Art host a revisit, from the original location. Much less formal than many of the other extras, this is fun and informative. They talk about the original actor, Edmund O’ Brien suffering from Alzimer’s which was very sad, but his replacement, in the capable form of John Saxon, worked really well for the film.
Midnight Screening Q&A with Bob Clark, John Saxon, and Carl Zittrer (20.5 mins) – The remake of Black Christmas is discussed here and John Saxon looks quite frail and confused, which is sad to see. Apparently Saxon’s favourite genre to work in was drama and the shoot was approx. 9/10 weeks with a budget of $400K.
Image Gallery – 68 production stills and a collection of posters
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