Census Bloodbath: Drown By The Seashore

 

Year:
1982
Director:
Peter Medak
Cast:
Patrick Duffy, Cindy Pickett, Lawrence Pressman
Run Time:
1 hour 32 minutes

Plot: Cry for the Strangers follows psychiatrist Brad Russell (Patrick Duffy) moving to the small seaside town of Clarks Harbor with his wife Elaine (Cindy Pickett, Ferris Bueller's mom!) for some peace and quiet while he writes his book. Unfortunately, he finds neither peace nor quiet in the storm-ravaged area. Every time the wind picks up, somebody who wasn't born in the town (a "stranger," some might say) dies under mysterious circumstances. Who is the culprit? Is it a human being? A series of dreadful accidents? Or the indigenous American ghosts who haunt the nearby beach? Speaking of, the ghosts seem to have a special interest in possessing Robby Palmer (Shawn Carson of The Funhouse), a young boy who is a former patient of Dr. Russell's.

Analysis: Just getting through the opening credits of Cry for the Strangers gave me whiplash. First, there was the disappointment of learning that it was a TV movie (for CBS, to be precise). TV movie slashers can be good (Dark Night of the Scarecrow, Fantasies, Deadly Lessons), but more often than not they are bloodless, plodding affairs. So imagine my shock when I learned that this particular movie was directed by Peter Medak, just two years off from helming the exquisitely atmospheric haunted house movie The Changeling.

The man who made the single scariest seance scene in horror cinema does have a few tricks up his sleeve here, even on a TV movie budget. There are plenty of ambitious shots, including the camera constantly spinning around a central axis and a pretty fun mirror shot introducing a scene in the local tavern. He also knows what to do whenever the tension of the movie grows to a crescendo, giving the spine-tingling moments room to breathe, then wanging you on the head with a surprise jump cut.

He also imbues the movie with a solid sense of place. It helps that they used real locations on the coast of the Pacific Northwest, but there's also a strong sense of community threaded throughout, especially in the body discovery scenes.

Unfortunately, Cry for the Strangers is also boring as fuck. I could have done with about 12 fewer scenes of somebody walking across a quiet beach, shouting somebody's name (usually Robby - that fool did love to wander off onto the beach over and over and over again). There's "slow boil" and then there's "under heavy sedation," and this movie is in the latter camp.

It's also deathly dull as a slasher movie. Indeed, if it weren't for the fact that (SPOILER ALERT) it is revealed that there is an actual human being perpetrating the killings, I was going to kick this movie off my Census Bloodbath list completely. I wasn't shocked that the kills in this TV movie almost entirely took place offscreen, but not once does an edged weapon come into the equation even a little bit. And the movie is so dead set on being a (generic, racist) ghost story that the slasher elements recede into the background most of the time.

All in all, it's a bit of a whiff for ol' Peter Medak. But looking at his filmography, it honestly seems like The Changeling might have been more of a fluke than anything else.

Killer: Chief Whalen (Brian Keith)

Final Girl: Dr. Brad Russell (Patrick Duffy) & Co.

Best Kill: The opening scene is kind of clunkily paced, but the closing gag - young Whalen finding his grandparents' bodies buried in the sand on the beach - boosts up the eeriness something fierce.

Sign of the Times: Fisherman/body count padder Chip wears a red headband at all times, day or night.

Scariest Moment: The newly widowed Miriam arrives on Brad and Elaine's porch out of nowhere, with a dire warning.

Weirdest Moment: When Chief Whalen drops off Brad and Elaine at their new home, he lets them know they won't be able to turn on the power for a few days. Excuse me, what?

Champion Dialogue: “Robby! Robby! ROBBY!"

Body Count: 8

1. Grandma and
2. Grandpa are buried up to their necks in sand and drowned offscreen.
3. Pete is found dead in his fishing net.
4. Miriam is hanged offscreen.
5. Max is killed offscreen in a boat explosion.
6. Chip is drowned offscreen.
7. Riley dies offscreen. 
8. Chief Whalen is shot.

TL;DR: Cry for the Strangers is appropriately atmospheric at times, but it's also dead boring.

Rating: 4/10