Census Bloodbath: Nomed Is Demon Spelled Backwards!

Year: 1983
Director: Michael Dugan
Cast: Marjoe Gortner, Bobbie Bresee, Norman Burton 
Run Time: 1 hour 36 minutes
MPAA Rating: R

The 1983 paranormal slasher Mausoleum was, according to legend, financed by the mob as a money laundering scheme. This isn't as uncommon as you might think, and it doesn't even necessarily spell doom for a production. Christmas Evil and The Texas Chain Saw Massacre were both financed by the mob and I couldn't think of a wider gulf in quality between two films. If nothing else, it gave an early gig to effects whiz and Friday the 13th Part VII director John Carl Buechler, so it wouldn't be a waste even if the entire film was a lit with a single penlight.

It wouldn't be the first slasher I've seen lit that way.

Alright, so the plot! Insofar as there is one. Susan Farrell (Bobbie Bresee) is born into a cursed family. The Nomed clan was cursed in the 1600's to have their firstborn daughter possessed by the demon who lives in the local mausoleum, and apparently in the intervening 300-odd years never thought to move. And also apparently the mausoleum has always been there and America was just built around it.

Anyway, the demon has chosen to possess her at age 30 for no apparent reason, and is turning her into a sexy vixen who seduces gardeners and delivery boys of all stripes before murdering them with her telekinetic demon powers, to the dismay of her husband Oliver (Marjoe Gortner) and longtime psychiatrist Dr. Simon Andrews (Norman Burton who you will recognize as Eric Binford's boss from Fade to Black, though he also played Felix Leiter in a small indie titled Diamonds Are Forever). And that's pretty much it!

Oh, also when she kills people her eyes turn green and space laser sounds play. And that's the movie!

What makes Mausoleum interesting is that it's really not that interesting. Filmmakers have combined the slasher and possession genres before to mixed results. For every Killer Party and Hello Mary Lou: Prom Night II, there's a... actually, I've got nothing, they're all awesome. It's such a weird swing from the start that the films have almost no choice but to be a bonkers good time. And it's not that Mausoleum is not that, it's just that it can't quite build a framework worth mounting all the gooey 80's nonsense on.

It's not like I come to the 80's slasher well for deep, trenchant character studies, but at least most of the time we get characters like "child psychology major who can work a pitchfork" or "girl who really likes sex and wears granny panties." You know, characters you can really sink your teeth into! Mausoleum makes it very clear that Susan is evil and possessed from the start, so it kind of forgets to make her have any sort of struggle with the evil burgeoning inside her. And the people she murders mostly crop up in one or two scenes before they're offed. The only characters she has any meaningful interactions with are her husband and doctor, who are two of the blandest nobodies who ever nobodied. So Mausoleum is a narrative that follows no one, which leaves it feeling more than a little aimless.

And while the demon/kill effects are fun, the scenes are paced with all the pep and zip of a funeral procession. Typically we hold on Susan's glowing eyes for 20 seconds, then cut to nothing happening, then back to Susan for another riveting 20, then back to nothing happening, then another 15 or 20 of Susan for flavor (maybe this time she's flexing her face like she's watching a "Cheekbones of Steel" exercise tape), then something cool happens. And quite literally nothing of note happens in the final 15 minute confrontation with the demon itself, which takes place in at least two different locations that three different characters shuffle their way between.

Capital stuff, my friends, absolutely capital!

But those effects though! They're certainly not the best that the 80's or even John Carl Buechler had to offer, but they're certainly better than they have any right to be in a film this transparently interested in showing a sexy lady wandering around rather than frightening an audience. They've got that textured, wrinkly, tactile feel that Buechler always imbued into his work, and there's a hell of a lot of them. Typically a low budget demonic film will save all its effects budget for the grand finale, but we're catching glimpses of Susan's gargoyle-esque demon face from the word "go," and while the kills aren't all that unique, they're well-rendered and know that we've come to see gross shit happen to mean people.

Actually, technically speaking, most of the film displays more skill than you might think. The score is orchestral and lush, and the generic scene of whispered voices calling out to Susan is presented in a churchlike harmonic vocal that is actually quite beautiful to experience. And the lighting and cinematography certainly have their moments, most notably in an early scene where the demon's shadow looms over young Susan, but also giving surprisingly classy grace notes to the kills like a shattering wine glass, or a dropped sheaf of papers fluttering in slow motion through the air.

Really the only true failure here is the screenplay (which also includes one of the most egregious Token Black Comic Relief Characters in a decade that wasn't exactly experiencing a deficit of those). And maybe the acting, but it's not like having Meryl Streep or Jack Nicholson in here could have brought this bland screenplay to life. Also, I maybe have a bone to pick with the production design, which quietly posits that Oliver and Susan are maybe the richest people on the planet because their lavish three-story modern home makes the Guggenheim look like a particularly spicy public restroom. 

But it all comes out in the wash. At the end of the day, I enjoyed the time I spent with Mausoleum, even if it wasn't quite the hidden gem I wanted it to be.

Killer: Nomed
Final Girl: Susan Walker Farrell (Bobbie Bresee)
Best Kill: An art dealer in a mall is levitated out into the open air pavilion and gloriously impaled on a particularly stylish fountain.

Sign of the Times: The dance club Oliver and Susan go to reeks of cigarette smoke and white people disco.
Scariest Moment: Even though Oliver fully knows his wife is possessed by a demon, he still has her cook and clean for him, no problem. Because the patriarchy!
Weirdest Moment: When devising a grocery list, neither Susan nor her maid can spell "guava" so they decide to get cantaloupe instead. As if that's easier to spell.
Champion Dialogue: "I'm not in the habit of seeing my patients light up."
Body Count: 7

1. Man is force-choked and his head smokes.
2. Drunk Lech Who Looks Like a Silver Fox Version of Jim Henson explodes in a car.
3. Ben is stabbed with a trowel.
4. Cora is levitated and telekinetically ripped in half.
5. Delivery Man has his face telekinetically crushed.
6. Art Dealer is dropped three stories and impaled on a fountain.
7. Oliver has his rib cage crushed in a deadly hug.

TL;DR: Mausoleum is amusing enough, but its languorous pace and lack of interesting characters make it a blander affair than it has any reason to be.
Rating: 6/10
Word Count: 1239

Census Bloodbath: Reel Life

Year: 1980

Director: Vernon Zimmerman

Cast: Dennis Christopher, Tim Thomerson, Gwynne Gilford

Run Time: 1 hour 42 minutes

MPAA Rating: R

That poster though! I swear, I am just so jealous of what movie theater walls must have looked like in the 80's. They got display after display of these inspired poster designs and we get a row of poorly photoshopped Jennifer Lawrences. It's just not fair. Although, perhaps I'd be more bothered by it if the movie was any good.

Fade to Black was one of the late 1980 proto-slashers made in that bitter spot right between the time where knowledge of the slasher rules would hit its high water mark and the decades-long run of Psycho riffs was just winding down. As a result, FtB is the best of neither world - it is a lackluster psychological thriller and a goreless slog of a slasher.

Although admittedly, it has some thrillingly weird costume choices.

Fade to Black tells the story of Eric Binford (Dennis Christopher), a motivationless young man who is obsessed with movies and movie trivia. Despite the best efforts of his shrill, wheelchair-bound Aunt Stella (Eve Brent) and his testy boss with a heart condition (Norman Burton), he doesn't want to do anything but sit in the dark with his film projector. That is, until he meets an Australian wannabe actress who looks just like Marilyn Monroe (Linda Kerridge).

This triggers something in him that causes his mind to slowly fracture until he is convinced his life is a movie, causing him to act out against the people who caused him trouble like his aunt, his boss, his nasty coworker Richie (Mickey Rourke. I know, right?), a movie executive who stole his idea (Morgan Paull), and some random hooker (Anita Converse).

He goes around killing these nuisances in his life by imitating films like Dracula, The Mummy, Hopalong Cassidy, and Kiss of Death. All the while, a young policewoman named Officer Anne (Gwynne Gilford, of the abysmal Beware! The Blob) and a psychiatrist named Dr. Moriarty (Tim Thomerson) have plots that are mostly unrelated to Eric for some reason.

When instead the whole film should really just be Eric doing quick changes.

The concept is stellar - Norman Bates Goes to the Movies. But the film itself is a dull parade of underlit scenes barely linked by the thinnest gossamer wisp of a plot. The attempt to marry a "descent into madness" psychological horror film with the nascent Body Count genre results in an overheated mess. The kill scenes are too numerous to allow for much exploration of Binford's character and they're too goreless to provoke the splatter hounds. 'Tis the struggle of being a slasher in the first year of the genre's existence.

It obviously can't be blamed for not following the rules of the genre well enough. But that doesn't change the fact that it's not a particularly good example of whatever genre it might want to be. It's just too cheap. The night scenes are too dark, the quiet scenes are lousy with white noise, and the acting is uninspired.

Although the makeup department was on the ball.

Perhaps the worst performer is Linda Kerridge as Marilyn O'Connor. The actress only appeared in 9 movies in her entire career and its easy to see why. She's a so-so Marilyn impersonator, but when she's called upon to do anything else, she stiffens like an old man's knee before a storm. Though to give her the benefit of the doubt, I suppose it doesn't help that her character isn't even a person, but rather a collection of dead brain cells molded into the shape of a woman.

That is the only explanation for any of her actions, which would make even the stupidest of Dumb Horror Movie Characters cringe. First off, she finds it charming when Eric stares at her intensely  across the diner, scoots across nine stools to be near her, and roughly quizzes her on Marilyn trivia while doing an impersonation of The Creature from the Black Lagoon. Somehow this leads her to ask him for a ride to work, even though her friend, the equally dumb but more acerbically witty Stacy (Marcie Barkin) is sitting right across the booth from her.

She thinks a secret admirer card reading "You'll Always Be Mine" is sweet, she shows up to a mysterious modeling gig at an abandoned building in the middle of the night, and even willingly takes a pill that Eric hands to her! I swear, for being Australian, this chick has the survival instinct of a walnut. Sharni Vinson could teach her a thing or two.

It's a miracle she doesn't die, although it's not for lack of trying.

Binford and his eventual nemesis Dr. Moriarty are both given similarly forgettable performances, again fueled by a script with a looser grip on the field of psychology than the horoscope in the back of US Weekly. In fact, the shrink attempts to cure Binford of his psychosis by yelling "YOU'RE OUT OF YOUR F*CKING MIND!" Surprisingly enough, this doesn't work.

The only performance of any merit in the entire film is Mickey Rourke as Richie, imbuing the character with a kind of rough-and-tumble teenage charisma that is the only explanation for this vaguely erotic fan art I found on the internet.

He looks a little like Louis Tomlinson from One Direction and I'm not sure how I feel about that.

All in all, Fade to Black was dumb enough to be a vapidly entertaining slasher flick, but it doesn't bring enough to the table to be any good at all and it's too dull to deserve a rewatch despite several memorable "so bad it's good" moments.

Killer: Eric Binford (Dennis Christopher)

Final Girl: Marilyn O'Connor (Linda Kerridge), although she certainly isn't an active agent of her own survival.

Best Kill: Eric kills a hooker in full black and white Bela Lugosi makeup.

Sign of the Times: When asked movie trivia questions, people can't just Google the answers.

Scariest Moment: The lurking fear that anybody in the world could be as unfathomably dumb as Marilyn O'Connor.

Weirdest Moment: Moriarty's impromptu harmonica solo in his office - which immediately cuts to a hot and sweaty sex scene with Officer Anne.

Champion Dialogue: "I'm trying to hitch a ride on my back."

Body Count: 6; including the killer.

1. Aunt Stella is pushed down a flight of stairs like in Kiss of Death.
2. Snobby Hooker's neck is impaled on a fence post and her blood is sucked like in Dracula.
3. Richie is shot in a standoff like in Hopalong Cassidy.
4. Mr. Berger suffers a heart attack because Eric scares him while dressed as The Mummy. 
5. Gary is shot in a barber shop like in White Heat.
6. Eric is shot to death on the roof of Grauman's Chinese Theater, reenacting a scene from White Heat. 

TL;DR: Fade to Black has a killer concept but a lackluster atmosphere.

Rating: 5/10

Word Count: 1160