the audience applauded

Clever, believable, and super fun to watch. It totally has replay value.

Watch something else. There are very few redeeming qualities to this film.

it is the rare 'crazy' movie that actually has something to say.

Oh, Jeepers, watching this one might actually lower your I.Q. a bit. Ten years ago I rented this on VHS under the title "House of Terror", I expected a low-budget 70's horror film, I also expected a specific house along with a specific terror, what I would find would leave me speechless... until now.On the surface, it may appear that House of Terror's one and only counterpart, California AXE Massacre is the inferior product. That theory is soon challenged and eventually torn to shreds, the utter ineptness of this sleazy tale could be compared to that of a more humorous, less tragic mistake, the legendary Blood Freak, or even Blood Shack... well, then again, maybe it's not all that bad. Meet Eddie & Sandra, what an awkward pair, this guy thinks he can just up and kidnap some rich guys daughter for ransom and make some easy money, think again fella, this is Exploitation Country, he's gonna earn that money. You would think that Sandra's father would make some sort of trouble for Eddie but he doesn't seem too stressed about the whole thing, that would make too much sense anyway. Among other things, Everyone that our twosome encounter on their slow-paced journey around Charlotte, N.C either wants to hurt, rape, or kill them, kind of like in the Doom Generation, but without the third party to make things interesting. House of Terror flaunts a mean spirited theme from the beginning, Eddie now takes his young hostage to a nearby hotel where some bad guys posing as the hotel clerk & bellboy bust in, of course Sandra thinks shes been rescued, wrong, they're only there to rape her, so they do, while Eddie if forced to watch, we get the idea from his reaction that he's not all bad. Any alleged storyline is ditched at the hotel. At this point it seems this movie just stops caring what anyone thinks of it, 5 minutes of silence at a time being just one example, I guess everyone just ran out of ideas, but I really think this film is mostly about Friedel confusing the hell out of us. Certain facial expressions and phrases uttered just seem a little off to me. Finally, when things start to make sense, out pops Dr. Giggles ! Great, thats all we need. Why him why not the Blood Stalkers ? Hell, why not that 30 year old kid from Burial Ground ? I'll bet little Michael could've really spiced up this shin dig, Instead we get this early 90's garbage. Good thing this movie is for Adolph because no one else would know quite what to do with it. All sarcasm aside, I actually kinda dug House of Terror, it's what underground film-making is all about, making your movie the way YOU want, regardless of how pointless or unredeeming it might turn out, and so what if each viewing lower's your I.Q a bit. House of Terror also has that "Rare, unintentional dream-like quality" that money could never and will never buy. They should be playing little obscurities like this on TCM Underground, I mean, Russ Meyer is OK but if you wanna go underground, then do it right. Besides all that, Sandra is Kinda hot, plus, there are some pleasant N.C country locations too, looks like a pleasant place to film a little exploitation gem such as this. That santa claus guy was entertaining with his breakdown and whatnot. Any humor or B-charm that this film might possess is most likely unintentional and I wouldn't have it any other way. OK, so what were looking at here is unintentional humor, possibly unintentional confusion, plenty of silence & awkward moments, one whopper of a low-budget, and almost no closure, I get it, but come on !! Adolph deserves better.

I just rented a "Something Weird" Double Feature DVD.http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0140174/ Hitch Hike to Hell (1977) and Date with a Kidnapper. (SPOILERS) BAD BAD BAD. Horrible harsh lighting, static boring acting, lame still static camera-work. Phony acting except for the mother, the cop who was played by Russell Johnson ( The professor on Gilligans Island) and one of the victims mother. A Norman Bates type is mad that his sister ran away from home- so he murders runaway teens on the highway. I tried to find it so bad it was funny- just BAD.http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0077401/ Date with a Kidnapper (1976) Another Kidnap movie- but this one was WAY better. Clean color- VERY good camera work (nearly every shot was on a dolly). Eddie Matlock, a guy who looks like a cross between Ted Bundy and Gil Gerard (Buck Rogers) kidnaps a dorky college girl. He hides her in a sleazy motel- then 2 other unrelated gangsters come in and rape her.someone on IMDb said: "A woman living in a boarding house is kidnapped by a small-time criminal. Soon others in the gang try to take her away from him so they can get the ransom."I don't think I agree with that- I don't think they were part of the same gang. At one point Eddie Matlock says " I don't know you!"Some VERY cool shots. But it got bizarre when the two fall in love and wind up at a farmhouse owned by an insane ex cop who looks like Santa Claus. He comes after Eddie with a knife and he shoots Santa. Then we see Santa with a pitchfork in him (?). Then they just let 3 hoodlums take the ransom money (!)Did the 3 hoodlums kill them?Was the money traceable? Is that why they let the robbers have it? I didn't buy them falling in love- unmotivated.I agree that I like the direction- the little touches like the old man ignoring the screeches.PS- did they just abandon the mute girl at the farm?

You would never guess that "The Kidnapped Coed" clocks in at a mere 76 minutes. At times, it seemed like an eternity.I would like to state that I am definitely not someone who needs violent action or gratuitous nudity every few minutes in a movie. However, I do enjoy some dialogue every once in a while. The dramatic pauses in "Kidnapped Coed" are long enough that you could take a solid nap during one. It gets awfully boring sitting around for a full two minutes looking at the main characters and waiting for one of them to actually say something. With tighter editing, this film could have been cut down to about half an hour and none of the plot would have been lost."Kidnapped Coed" is about the following: Man kidnaps young woman. He holds her for ransom. Woman falls in love with kidnapper. They spend a lot of time doing absolutely nothing.The only positive thing I can really say about this little flick is that it has surprisingly good cinematography. A couple of the shots were very nicely set up. Too bad the rest of the film lacked that quality. 2/10

Don't go into KIDNAPPED COED expecting sleazy no-budget bad film ineptitude. Frederick R. Friedel's terse, bizarre, dream-like 76-minute kidnapping-gone-wrong programmer is something of a mini-exploitation-masterpiece. It plays more like an art film, with carefully-framed tracking shots and compositions, focused on building atmosphere and silence rather than action and dialogue, and all sorts of little touches that could only come from the hands of an accomplished auteur with imagination to spare, not a talentless hack. On the minus side, the ending kinda leaves you hanging and wanting for more, and Leslie Ann Rivers' co-ed character is less fleshed out or convincing than John Canon's mummy's boy kidnapper. Canon is like the poor man's Nic Nolte--lotsa facial tics and jittery acting, but it works. If KIDNAPPING COED treads creakingly familiar path, Friedel's innovative direction turns it into something else entirely and makes it worth treasuring as a hidden gem. Cinematographer Austin McKinney also shot Friedel's AXE, the trash classic THE LOVE BUTCHER and Jack Hill's PIT STOP.