Tonight I watched a cult classic entitled "Spider Baby" (1964). I had never heard of it until it turned up in a library search for Lon Chaney Jr, one of my favorite horror stars. It's October, so I need horror, and I figured I'd give the movie a try, even though it's title made it sound like one of those really bad exploitation flicks that someone like Roger Corman would have made in the early '60s. I didn't have high hopes when I put the disc into the player this evening, but almost as soon as the title sequence began my expectations rose. It had an inventive look right from the start and as the movie progressed, I was pleasantly surprised at how good it was.
"Spider Baby" is a horror comedy, but the comedy is implicit rather than explicit. There are no intended laughs, but instead the cast play their roles with an exaggerated sincerity and over the top weirdness that gives a wink to the audience, to let us in on the straight faced but subtle joke. The people in the movie are cannibals.
Lon Chaney Jr. (older and rubber faced) is the caretaker of three retarded children who live with him in a spooky old mansion that looks like the Psycho House at Universal Studios. It isn't, but it may be even creepier. I should mention, because of these PC times, that I am using the word "retarded" to describe the children in the film because that is the term used in the movie. To be clear, it was also a clinical term at the time. The children are in their mid-to-late teens, and they suffer from a malady that causes their brains to regress to a sub-human level, or pre-human, so that they think and act like savages.
The script centers around the most dangerous of the children : Virginia, who imagines herself to be a spider. She is played to great effect by a teenaged actress named Jill Banner, who unfortunately had a short life but made her mark in this film. Virginia has a sister named Elizabeth (sorry, SB!), a nervous waif with a giant bouffant hairdo. Elizabeth is the lesser of two nitwits and so is held in charge of her sister Virginia when Lon Chaney is not at home. Virginia is not easy to babysit, though, nor is the sisters' older brother, a silent, bald headed goon played by the legendary Sid Haig in one of his first horror roles. His character "Ralph" is a true nutcase and looks like the real thing. Imagine Zippy The Pinhead with a few less brain cells and you're on the right track.
The old house in which the siblings live with Chaney is such an authentic backdrop that it raises the caliber of this film all by itself. The house has a scary facade, but the interior (dressed in the manner of 1930s Universal Horror) should have won a special award for art direction on a budget. The entire film was made for 60,000 dollars, and to have an interior set that looks this good for that value is a testament to the creativity of the whole team but especially the set designer. The camera work is as good as you would find on a major Universal Horror film, making the most of the house interior, and it's basement, secret passageways, etc.
The plot involves outsiders coming to create conflict, a traditional horror scenario used in "Dracula" and "Frankenstein" and so many other movies. Here, we have the aunt and uncle of the crazy children. They have hired a lawyer, who is also en route to the house with his secretary, to take custody of the children from Lon Chaney, who is not a blood relation. He was only the chauffeur to the children's late father, to whom he made a pledge - to care for them to the end. The aunt and uncle don't care about the kids, what they want is the money from the estate. Little do they know what they are in for. :)
"Spider Baby" is not an out-and-out classic. The plot meanders at times, and the director seems to struggle to steer the film, but the camerawork is big league, as is the art direction. Those two factors, plus the chemistry of the cast (every actor is perfect), are more than enough to recommend the movie as a must-see as far as independent art films go. I am not talking about standard "indie" films here, which usually have backing and a budget, but rather a total DIY approach.
Director Jack Hill made this film for next to nothing, sixty thousand bucks. He was a UCLA film school graduate and a colleague of Francis Ford Coppola. His talent is clear in "Spider Baby", which might have been third or fourth rate in the hands of a lesser filmmaker. But he never could have pulled it off without his cast, his cameraman and his art director.
"Spider Baby" may not be high art, but it is one hell of a Halloween movie, and it shows what you can do, even with little money, when you have a motivated and creative group of people. ///
Highly recommended for it's uniqueness. Two Big Thumbs Up!
No other news today, except that I finished the Paul Tremblay book "Cabin At The End Of The World", which I found because it was recommended by Stephen King.
Tremblay is an excellent writer, with a poetic command of language. He wrote a book that was tight enough to wind you in it's coil. He didn't let up for a second, which kept you turning the pages.
Having said that, it's not a book for the squeamish. Tremblay may be a fan of "The Walking Dead", for there are scenes in the book that reminded me why I quit watching that show. These scenes are so horrific that I nearly put the book down as well. In the end, I persevered because the writing was so good, but I don't think I would recommend the book to any but the most hardened horror fans.
See you in the morning. xoxoxoxoxoxoxoxoxoxoxoxo :):)
No comments:
Post a Comment