Thanks for the memories!

One of my all time favorites.

After playing with our expectations, this turns out to be a very different sort of film.

Exactly the movie you think it is, but not the movie you want it to be.

OH MAN, this movie was something. I'll preface this by saying that Nate actually chose this one. Considering how many horror movies I make him watch in the month of October (okay, who am I kidding, it never really ends), it seems only fair to let him choose which one we watch once in a while. If you pair a ridiculous and loosely sci-fi plot with the cinematic style of the 70s, Nate is going to be on board, so we dove right into The Dark, and… it was an adventure.Apparently Tobe Hooper was originally hired to direct this — he's actually listed as an uncredited director on IMDb — and it pains me to think of how much cooler it could have possibly been. When he signed on, the storyline was quite a bit different… but then he fell behind schedule and the producers fired him and brought on John "Bud" Cardos, who had previously done quite a bit of acting and working as a stuntman in addition to directing a few other feature films. The plot was changed pretty significantly towards the end of the shoot — in an effort to cash in on the recent success of Alien — and I think the entire film suffered as a result.There really isn't much more to the plot than there's a mysterious killer prowling the streets of Los Angeles and everyone is trying to either avoid getting killed or catch the killer or both.** SPOILERS! **So I actually loved the opening scene of this film. The initial crawl, actually, was awesome, too… but I wasn't prepared for how little any of that would really come into play (aside from the fact that they just wanted to cover their asses so they could show a vaguely otherwordly creature instead of just a dude killing people). The music was all whispers and chaotic piano punctuated with the clicking of heels on pavement… the lighting was so dark and contrasted that you could only see the occasional glimpse of blonde hair in a beam of light or shoes whisking along the ground… it was great.The creature itself — I'm not even sure what to refer to him as, or even that it IS for sure a "him", though they referred to it as The Mangler in the movie — is not much more than a less hairy werewolf in jeans. But wait, it can shoot lasers out of its eyes! Lasers that often don't seem like they're even coming from its eyes OR hitting its targets, but dammit, they are somehow still super effective! It growls and snarls a lot and it has superhuman strength (but don't they all?) but it limps along clumsily when it chases people. Ah, logic.The cops, Detective Mooney (Richard Jaeckel) and his donut-eating companion, Detective Jack Bresler (Biff Elliot), are awful. Like they literally do nothing but scowl and pick fights with random people until the end, when Mooney is ONLY in the right place at the right time because he's obsessed with Roy Warner (William Devane), a man he had once helped get put into prison.But it had some highlights, too. I loved the entire scene with "Sherm" (Keenan Wynn) and Zoe (Cathy Lee Crosby) in the parking garage, from him hilariously scaring her (twice) to his fevered sprinting from what he imagines may be the killer. At one point, Zoe asks him "you aren't afraid of the dark, are you?" and he responds with, "No, I'm afraid of what's in it". Awesome. I also loved seeing Casey Kasem as the police pathologist (I only wish he had played a more central role).It has all of the usual oversights of a crappy sci-fi B-movie. The effects are pretty terrible. The creature — The Mangler, the alien, the werewolf, whatever it is — has absolutely no backstory, explanation, or motive. Two characters watch The Mangler break through a wall of concrete blocks WITH ITS BARE HANDS and then not a minute later think they can hold it back with a locked wooden door. There are all kinds of mentions of The Mangler beheading and eviscerating its victims… but any time we see someone get killed, his laser eyes seem to just explode them. WHICH IS IT, WRITERS? Also, the thing is seemingly unaffected by countless bullets being fired at it, but ends up literally just going POOF! and exploding when touched by fire. Okay?Also, the very last scene shows a blind man — one who had been shown repeatedly throughout the film but never referenced directly — as a voice-over tells us that "only those who walk forever in darkness will have nothing to fear in the dark" and like DAMN that would be kind of a cool line if the movie itself wasn't such a disjointed mess. Come on, Tobe, come back around and do this thing for real.But despite all of that — every single bit — I STILL ENJOYED THIS MOVIE. This is the formula that can never be pinned down, friends. A movie can have everything it possibly should to be a quality movie and can be hated… and a movie can be a hot mess of bad effects and stale acting and a plot that is barely hanging together by some weak threads and it can be super fun. This firmly falls into the latter category. So, ya know, go give it a watch.

As a kid I really enjoyed this movie a lot, for reasons that completely escape me now. I watched it later in my adult life and I just saw a very uneven film that seems to make no sense. I would find out that the film is that way for a reason and the reason is the film was supposed to be a film about a sort of zombie that is roaming and killing people in Los Angeles; however, due to the science fiction craze during this time they decided instead to try and make it an alien. Not sure when this decision was made, but it was done somewhere midstream or later! Still, while I did not enjoy quite as much as I did as a kid, there is still some interesting things going on and the cast is full of people you have seen before, but probably do not know their name. Well, I knew Casey Kasem's name as he has a very bit part in the movie as I am guessing some sort of forensic expert. Other than that, I could not tell you who was who, only that I was sure I had seen a good deal of them in other things. The film also has a television quality to it as it almost does not seem like a film and considering it was rated R, it is rather tame too. Not too much gore in it and no skin to speak of.The story has a killer on the streets of Los Angeles who only kills at night and only takes out one victim per night. This, for reasons unknown, sends the city into a panic even though I am guessing the freeways take out more people than this killer. Well the father of the first victim wants action and he kind of wanders around not really doing anything besides flirting and eating take out. The cops, well they are all over the place trying to stop the killer because the citizens are going insane with every death. I mean, it kills like three people and everyone acts like it is taking out a thousand people a night. A psychic seems able to predict this fiendish creatures moves, but will anyone listen to her in time to stop the creature as it grows stronger with every kill! So I would say that a good portion of the film was done before they decided to turn their zombie into a laser eyed alien. For one, it would have made sense for the psychic to have some sort of connection with it if it was a zombie or something else that was from the spirit realm, but not an alien. A lot of the shots early in the film when it unleashes its eye lasers looks like it was added in and was an afterthought, while you can tell the shoot out at the end the alien slant was firmly in place. I think the zombie one would have been fine, though that shoot out at the end was the highlight of the film. It just did not make sense for it to be an alien and most of the scenes it is obvious that it was going to be a walking corpse deal.So the film had its moments, but overall it was just a bit too much of a mess to be considered good or even okay. This film could be looked upon as a reason you should never switch what you are making while your making it. The film also could have used more of the monster, because at times it literally disappeared from the picture and you would almost forget you were watching something with a monster and just think it was an old cop television show or something. That car chase for example, just really did not seem to fit in with the whole crazed zombie or alien theme. It's worth a look though if you were like me and seen it in your youth and you want to revisit it. The return trip was not as good for me, but it had a few good moments to it.

Disjointed. Suspense that proves to be wasted. Maybe with a bigger budget...but then again probably not. The citizens of Santa Monica, California are fearful of the dark of night. A series of decapitation murders has Detective Dave Mooney(Richard Jaeckel)baffled and under watchful eyes. Roy Warner(William Devane), a writer of bloody crime novels, is the father of one of the first victims. He also has history with Mooney; it was the detective that sent him to prison. Warner wants answers; so does TV reporter Zoe Owens(Cathy Lee Crosby). A police pathologist(Casey Kasem)finds "The Mangler" to be gray and of supernatural origin. The finale is weak and leaves you wondering why you sat that long for almost nothing. Also in the cast: Keenan Wynn, Jacquelyn Hyde and John Bloom.

It feels like watching a blending of the two 70's TV episodes of Kolchak: The Night Stalker-- "Zombie" & "They Have Been, They Are, They Will Be..." --but, without the integral character of Kolchak present to hold it all together.Adding to that feeling are the casting of both actors Keenan Wynn "Spanish Moss Murders" & Cathy Lee Crosby "The Youth Killers"--and the lumbering giant, John Bloom, (named "The Dark" in the closing credits) who is definitely straight from the "Richard Kiel School of Monsters"!The producer's post production "re-edit" which changed the monster's origin and identity defies all logic, but interestingly, the results are uniquely off-beat and quite creepy. The same can't be said for the film's plot, which suffers from the re-edit to the point of being idiotic and pointless--An alien comes to earth and begins tearing off a human head nightly, starting with writer Steve Dupree's (William Davane) only daughter. Next, a dig-a-ling gypsy woman with ESP called De Renzey (Jacquelyn Hyde), informs the baffled cops that she has had a premonition that a aspiring young actor whom she met at a crowded yacht party will be one of the night killer's next victims, and that all they have to do is find the actor, and he will lead them to the killer. Easy enough. There's only one problem, she doesn't know the unknown actors name!!!Then, ambitious news anchorwoman, Zoe Owens, (Cathy Lee Crosby) chases the night killer story, leading her to Dupree and De Rensy.Zoe finds out about De Renzy's premonition, and after a "quicky" in Dupree's pad, they decide to go out and start combing the crowded nightclubs of the city together, aimlessly looking for an actor that not only do they not have a name for, but they don't even know what he looks like! The clueless cops fall in, and decide to tail Zoe & Dupree, just in case their random searching leads them to the killer, and after their chance discovery of the unsuspecting actor leaving a nightclub parking lot, it turns into a high speed car chase that conveniently ends in a pile up (leading everyone) right where the killer is hiding out!?!The cornered creature unleashes deadly laser beams from it's eyes, frying dozens of cops as they blast him with lead! Unarmed Dupree rescues Zoe from the alien's clutches, lighting him up with a torch, and "Poof" the alien goes up in a puff of smoke faster than the bandages of the Unversal Pictures Mummy! (That's all it takes to kill a homicidal alien?!? Who knew???)But, what I can't figure out is, why did this film get an R rating? There is virtually no on screen gore, profanity or nudity--it could have easily been a a 70's Network TV Movie of the Week. Possibly all of the R rated violence was excised when they edited in the "alien" angle and they didn't resubmit the movie for another rating?It would be interesting to see the original "Zombie themed" cut of the film. It probably would be much better--still, crazy as it sounds, I kinda like it the way it is!The Daaaaaaaarkkkkkkknessssssss!!!-Uncle Gilbert