It's 'New Year's Evil!'

Happy Days star Roz Kelly stars in this early 1980s slasher film directed by Emmett Alston. Like so many horror films of the 1980s, this one is an attempt to cash in on the success of John Carpenter’s Halloween franchise.

Kelly is a punk rock mother hosting a New Year’s Eve party at a hip New Wave music club in downtown Los Angeles. Her teenage son comes to see her at the club with flowers, but she completely ignores him. A maniac killer, played by Kip Niven, calls Kelly at the club hotline to inform her that he will commit a murder every hour until 12 midnight as part of his New Year’s resolution. A club worker named Yvonne is the first victim to be killed in a bathtub in a club dressing room.

The second victim is a pretty blonde nurse at the local hospital. The killer predictably poses as a new hospital orderly who lures the nurse into a hospital room with champagne and proceeds to stab her to death after making out with her. Another nurse at the hospital discovers her body in a closet.

The killer continues to call Kelly at the music club in a disguised voice to inform her that he is committing murders. He even plays a taped recording over the phone of him stabbing the nurse at the hospital. Kelly is now forced to take his threats seriously. She asks the local police department for police protection.

By now the viewer has been exposed to lots of really bad punk rock performances, zebra striped T-shirts, and 1980s mullet hairstyles. Where are The Ramones, The Misfits and The Sex Pistols when we need them?

Feeling rejected by his mother, Kelly’s son sees his mother performing on television at the club with a punk band. In a fit of anger, he tears apart the roses he brought for her, and stretches one of her red nylon stalkings over his face as if he is about to become a killer himself. This is a particularly confusing scene because by now we already know who the killer is and what he looks like, so any attempt to suggest that the killer could be Kelly’s son seems unnecessary. The killer now shows up at another dance club in L.A. dressed in an obviously fake moustache and three-piece suit. He tells another pretty blonde girl at the bar that he is a business agent for many Hollywood actors in town. He convinces her to leave the club to attend a business party. She refuses to go alone with him, so she takes one of her club friends with her.

This spoils the plans of the killer to get her alone. The three drive in the killer’s Mercedes to a gas station, where the killer strangles one of the girls with a bag full of marijuana. He hides in a Dumpster to attack the second girl as she comes out of the gas station with a bottle of champagne. The killer stabs her to death. As the killer flees the scene, he is harassed at a stop light by a motorcycle gang. The killer speeds away from the motorcycle gang and hides out at a local drive-in theatre.

The movie screen advertises a film entitled Blood Feast as a feature playing at the theatre, but it is not Herschel Gordon Lewis’ schlock masterpiece from 1963, unfortunately. After stealing another car from a young couple making out at the drive-in, the killer shows up at the New Wave club, manages to club a police officer in the head at a back entrance, and puts his police uniform on, which conveniently fits him perfectly. Under police protection outside her dressing room, Kelly sits in front of a mirror putting on make-up as the killer suddenly appears in her room in a jogging outfit and a Halloween mask.

She sees him in the mirror, but is not frightened. He removes the mask, and reveals himself to be Richard Sullivan, her husband. She is not frightened by his presence because she has no idea he is the killer. As the couple gets into an elevator, it becomes evident to Kelly that her husband is the killer.

He holds a knife up to her and saying:“I’m fed up . . . You’re just like all the other women in my life. Women are manipulative, deceitful, immoral and very, very selfish!”

His reasoning for killing here seems very petty and unnecessary. Wouldn’t his actions make him “manipulative, deceitful, immoral and selfish?” If he was so fed up with his wife, why didn’t he just request a divorce from her? Why go through the troubles of killing several innocent women to get to her? In the post O.J. Simpson and Scott Peterson world we live in today, it seems highly unlikely that a man would go on a killing spree killing innocent victims just to prove a point with his wife.

However, I realize this film was made long before the O.J. Simpson ordeal of the1990s, and the Scott Peterson ordeal early in this decade. As the film comes to an end, Richard chains his wife to the bottom of the elevator and is chased by policemen who fire shots at him. He is chased to the top balcony of the building, where he puts the Halloween mask back on and jumps off the building, committing suicide. His son emotionally removes the mask from him.

The film ends with a shot of Kelly being wheeled into an ambulance. The driver of the ambulance is wearing Richard’s Halloween mask, and the paramedic on the passenger side lies dead on the floor of the ambulance. Could the killer now be Kelly’s son?

NEW YEAR’S EVIL follows in the long line-up of so many 1980s slasher/horror films. Like Silent Night, Deadly Night, My Bloody Valentine, Christmas Evil, Don’t Open ‘Til Christmas, April Fool’s Day, Mother’s Day, and so many others, NEW YEAR’S EVIL is an attempt to use a holiday title to cash in on the slasher craze of the 1980s.

-- Steve D. Stones

The Other Wizard of Oz

By Doug Gibson

Ever heard of Larry Semon? That's all right. Few have. He was a silent movie comic. His physical comedy and sad sack face made him very popular in one-reelers, but his character had a tough time creating pathos with viewers. He needed to be seen in small doses.

Semon had ambition, though, and in the mid 1920s he worked with the son of the late L. Frank Baum, to bring Baum's Wizard of Oz series to the big screen. The 1925 film (versions range from 72 to 81 minutes) is a curio. A huge flop at the box office -- it more or less ruined Semon's career -- it is nevertheless fascinating. It's a so-bad-it's-interesting ego trip from a star who desperately needed a director other than himself. Still, there are moments -- particularly at the beginning of the film -- that feature talented slapstick comedy. Yet, in this film are Semon, of course, big fat slapstick veteran Frank Alexander, a very young Oliver Hardy and Semon's very pretty wife, Dorothy Dwan.

Here's the film in a few paragraphs: We start in Oz, where Prince Kynd (Bryant Washburn) and the citizens are upset with corrupt leaders, including Prime Minister Kruel. The bad leaders consult the Wizard, a con man, who suggests they bring the lost Princess Dorothy back. We cut now to Kansas, where the womanly Dorothy (Dwan) lives with Aunt Em, (Mary Carr) a limp dishrag of a woman, and Uncle Henry (Alexander) a big, fat domestic abuser. He literally punches anyone he meets.

Competing for Dorothy's love are farmhands Semon and Hardy. There is a black farmhand named Snowball. Be advised the film is very racist and the character, played by actor Spencer Bell, is billed as "G. Howe Black." (Later in the film, Semon's character lets loose with a tasteless racist jab at Bell's character) Ths racism was unfortunately the norm for those times.

The film meanders on coherently while the characters are in Kansas. It's cliche-ridden, but there are talented, physical slapstick gags with Semon, Hardy and Alexander. There's a funny bit with bees, and another with a swing. But once the main characters are blown to Oz in a shack it loses all sense. The first nonsensical twist is having Aunt Em -- who is in the wind-guided shack -- disappear when they arrive. It gets worse: Semon turns into the Scarecrow, Hardy the Tin Man and Bell the cowardly lion, but they really aren't these characters. They are disguises. Alexander briefly turns into a good guy, then reverts to being a bad guy. Incomprehensibly, Hardy's Tin Man turns bad too.

Finally, Dwan's Dorothy more or less disappears from the film, becomes betrothed to Prince Kynd, and wants to see Semon's Scarecrow done away with, too! In fact, the film degenerates into a series of bad slapstick gags designed to showcase Semon trying to outwit the Oz folk who want to capture him. The Wizard (Charles Murray) is still hanging around. By then it's really no longer Baum's Wizard of Oz. It's just an overlong, badly paced Semon slapstick show.

As I mentioned, the film bombed. Semon's career was almost ruined. He puttered around in films for a few more years, then died young. Many believe stress over his bankruptcy contributed to his death. For a long time this film was considered obscure and very hard to find. Lately, though it has popped up on DVD, either as an extra to the 1939 The Wizard of Oz, or as the feature attraction in a DVD of silent versions of Baum's Oz tales (there are several as far back as 1910). It has also been shown recently on Turner Classic Movies. In fact, it was last on Dec. 26.

I will say one good thing about the silent Wizard of Oz. Semon's Scarecrow very much resembles in looks and mannerisms of Ray Bolger's much-lauded Scarecrow in the later classic. It seems clear that Bolger did borrow from Semon's portrayal and also managed to bring the empathy to the character that Semon could not achieve. Cult movies fans should note that many of Semon's silent shorts can be purchased today via brick-and-mortar and online stores.

Tales from the Crypt Christmas

By Steve Stones

Long before HBO created their Tales From The Crypt TV series in the late
1980s and early 1990s, Amicus Studios (an adjunct of Hammer Studios) in
England created a full-length feature film in 1972 based on the William
Gaines, Al Feldstein and Johnny Craig E.C. comic books of the 1950s. For
this article, I will focus on comparing one segment of the full-length
feature film with an HBO TV episode in 1989 entitled: “All Through The
House.”

Tales From The Crypt (1972)

A group of tourists is taken to a crypt in an old England cemetery. A
tour guide tells them that religious martyrs of Henry VIII are buried
there. Five members of the group get lost and wander into an empty
crypt. The crypt keeper intentionally traps them inside but informs them
that he has a purpose. He then asks actress Joan Collins what her plans
are after she leaves the crypt.

Next, we see a young and beautiful Collins murdering her husband on
Christmas Eve with a fire poker as he is reading the evening newspaper.
She wants to collect on his life insurance policy. As she says goodnight
to her daughter and quickly tries to clean up the blood on the floor
from the murder, she hears on the radio that a killer has escaped from a
local sanitarium and may be dressed in a Santa suit to disguise his
identity. He is to be considered very dangerous.

Collins hears a knock at the door and realizes it must be the escaped
killer. She attempts to close all the blinds in the house as he peaks
through the windows in a Santa suit. She thinks of calling the police,
but realizes she cannot call them because the corpse of her husband lies
on the living room floor. She pushes his body down the basement stairs
to try and make it look as if he died of a fall.

Returning upstairs, she sees the door to her daughter’s bedroom open.
She discovers her daughter is gone. Suddenly, from behind a curtain
downstairs she hears her daughter say “He’s here Mommy! Santa is here!”
Sure enough, it is the escaped killer in a Santa suit holding hands with
her daughter. Collins runs for the fire poker, but the killer gets to
her quickly and chokes her as she grabs for the poker in front of the
fireplace.

Tales From The Crypt: “And All Through The House” HBO TV episode (1989)

This episode opens with actress Mary Ellen Trainor reaching for a fire
poker in front of a fireplace on Christmas Eve. Her husband asks for the
poker so he can stir the fire. “Let me have it!” he says. Trainor whacks
him over the head with the poker and says “Merry Christmas you son of a
b*tch!”

She quickly sits her murdered husband back up in his chair and removes
the poker from his head as her daughter comes down the stairs to say
Santa will be there soon. Her daughter refers to the murdered man as
Joseph, even though she is not aware he is dead. It’s obvious he is her
stepfather.

Trainor escorts her daughter back to her bedroom and opens her window
slightly because of the heat in the room. Her daughter asks her “What do
you want for Christmas Mommy?” “I already got it sweetheart,” says
Trainor.

Trainor calls someone on the phone to say she has killed her husband and
that everything, including some money, is now theirs. She then drags her
dead husband outside into the cold snow to throw him down a well as a
news report on the radio informs listeners that a killer from a local
mental ward has escaped in a Santa suit. Just as she is about to throw
her husband down the water well, he grabs her. He is not dead yet.
Trainor hits him one more time over the head, this time killing him for
good.

The escaped killer in a Santa suit surprises her with an axe. She runs back into the house to call the police but realizes her murdered husband is still lying dead on the front lawn.


The phone rings as the killer throws a tire swing through the living
room window and once again attacks Trainor. She hits him in the head
with the axe then answers the phone. The voice on the phone warns her of
the escaped killer in a Santa suit, and tells her that police will be in
her area in twenty minutes. The Santa killer lies unconscious and spread
out in the snow on her front yard.

This gives Trainor the plan to make it look as if the Santa killer is
the person who killed her husband. She goes back outside to plunge the
axe into the chest of her husband’s corpse a few times as the wind blows
her front door shut, locking her out of the house.

To get back into the house, Trainor looks for some keys in her husband’s
pocket. She finds them and goes back into the house to call the police
to blame the murder of her husband on the Santa killer. The person on
the phone tells her to find something to protect herself with, such as a
gun.

While trying to find one of Joseph’s guns in an upstairs closet, Trainor
accidentally locks herself in the closet. She sees the Santa killer
climbing up a ladder to her daughter’s room through the closet window.
She kicks open the door and runs to find her daughter in her room. She
is not there.

Trainor runs down the stairs to see her daughter standing in the living
room holding hands with the Santa killer. “See, I told you Santa would
come Mommy, and he didn’t even need to come down the chimney!” Trainor
screams as the Santa says “Naughty or nice?” holding the bloody axe.

Both of these Tales From The Crypt episodes seem to work quite well and
have many similarities. However, the 1989 version is better produced.
The Santa killer in the 1989 episode is much more convincing as a killer
because he appears to be more rough and menacing. The Santa in the 1972 version looks like a regular Santa standing on a street corner ringing a
bell.

The 1989 episode also has a more sinister and foreboding feeling to it
because the interior scenes inside the house are very dark, unlike the
1972 version where the interiors are well lit. The Joan Collins
character in the 1972 version also never has to go outside or fight with
the Santa killer, unlike Trainor’s character in the 1989 version who
fights with the Santa out in the cold.

Collins pushes her husband’s corpse down the basement stairs, whereas
Trainor drags her husband out into the snow to throw him into a well.
This is the biggest difference of the two episodes.

The 1989 episode is also a real treat because it has the classic opening
of the Crypt Keeper introducing the episode in a Santa suit. The crypt
keeper in the 1972 version is a middle-aged British man dressed as
though he is part of the Jedi council in Star Wars.

Let the Crypt Keeper guide you through some of your holiday
entertainment this Christmas Season boys and ghouls! He’ll deck the
halls with murder and mayhem!

The creaky wonderful 1935 Scrooge

Scrooge, 1935, 78 minutes, B&W, British. Directed by Henry Edwards. Starring Sir. Seymour Hicks as Ebenezer Scrooge, Donald Calthrop as Bob Cratchit, Robert Cochran as Fred, Mary Glynne as Belle and Phillip Frost as Tiny Tim. Rating: Seven stars out of 10.

This very creaky British version of Dickens' A Christmas Tale can't hold a candle to the 1951, 1984 and 1999 versions, but it's better than the 1938 Hollywood adaptation. It stars Hicks as Scrooge. The British actor had the part down pat. He had played Scrooge for decades on the British stage.

Nevertheless, he plays Scrooge as a crochety old crank, which is one of your reviewer's pet peeves. I prefer Scrooge to be played as a smug, self satisfied superior sort, such as Sims, Scott and Stewart portrayed Dickens' miser in other adaptations. The result is that Scrooge's experience is a startling comeuppance for him. Like Saul of Tarsus, he's literally brought to his senses and scared straight through divine interference. But with an old crochety Scrooge, all he goes through seems like a scolding that a child would take from an elder.

But still, this is a must-see version for fans. The London sets are simply marvelous. You can feel Victorian England in this film better than any other version. Also, a pleasant surprise is Calthrop as Bob Cratchit. He is the only Bob Cratchit that's able to stand up to Scrooge. Indeed, early in the film, he mutters of Scrooge's miserliness when denied coal for the fire. The other actors are adequate for their roles. One chilling scene has Tiny Tim (Frost) laying dead on a bed for Scrooge to see during the third spirit visit.

There are some odd twists to the film. Not much is told about Scrooge's childhood, and a really strange scene is with Marley's ghost. To the audience he is invisible, though it's clear Scrooge can see him. There is a scene early in the film, inserted for some reason, of Queen Victoria receiving a Christmas toast from London's leading citizens. The final scene where a changed Scrooge fools Cratchit and gives him a raise has the pair taking the day off, rather than having some smoking Christmas bishop to drink.

Scrooge, quite an expressionist film, is a curio of early British filmmaking and certainly worth a rental for the holidays. For decades this film was literally out of circulation, but with the advent of video it enjoyed a comeback and can now usually be found on TV each holiday season and can be purchased. It can also be seen for free on the Web. Go to is www.imdb.com (Internet Movie Database) page to watch the film. Enjoy the film; watch it above!

-- Doug Gibson