chiller blog

Posted Sep 8, 09 02:13 PM

Last Stop: Train Wreck

Joan Crawford in Trog.

There’s something verrrry..."dirty" about that sentence. Like serving a full-body merlot with a 10 lb. block of government surplus cheddar - the kind sitting at the frost-burned corner of a high school cafeteria freezer.

Joan Crawford in Trog.

The only question is who's left the most depressed.

Crawford, Academy Award winner for Mildred Pierce and hard-driven studio star for decades, needed to work in the twilight of her resume. As an anthropologist who's found the missing link - actually a bare-chested actor wearing the top of one of the ape suits left over from 2001: A Space Odyssey - to say she gives a competent, straight-faced performance is the highest praise possible.

DP-turned-director Freddie Francis (who beautifully lensed Glory, The Elephant Man and Cape Fear) struggles against bankrupt production values - meaning this sadly realized monster-amuck tale has simply no chance of being convincing. Frame by frame, fake cave set by plastic stalagmite, the "illusion" is D.O.A. It's a cinematographer-turned-director entry whose reputation is notoriously on par with Godfather DP Gordon Willis crafting the Talia Shire-stalked-by-a-lesbian thriller, Windows.

I'm not the fan collectible type of fan, but I win by losing. Any tumble from grace is brutal to watch - you instinctively root for those talented people who've given you film memories. But to still see the work (no, STRUGGLE) in any obvious lost cause is reaffirming when "admire" and "respect" are no longer the right words. If you've ever seen the execrable Dreamcatcher and Morgan Freeman's confidence-shot sadness seeping through his delivery, you know exactly what I mean.

Laurence Olivier’s worst performance - Inchon - came late in his career. His legacy survived, as did Crawford's - Mommie Dearest notwithstanding. But swan songs can be painful, especially in undistinguished horror. When tight budgets are shared between unproven productions and need-to-work actors (usually to maintain SAG insurance requirement minimums), the results can be cringe-inducing.

Dean Jagger - gravelly-voiced and chew-the-scenery - won an Oscar for Twelve O’ Clock High. But as he neared retirement, good roles grew scarce. A fun foray into the John Sayles-penned Jaws spoof Alligator may have convinced him to take Evil Town (1987), a badly-titled tip-off to a scientist-creates-zombies plot that even Netflix doesn't carry.

Dorothy Lamour - sidekick of the Hope and Crosby road pictures - broke a long screen absence to work with George Kennedy in the lukewarm drive-in sequel, Creepshow 2. Their bloody, ill-toned deaths seem entirely at odds and undeserving of their veteran stature.

Ditto with Donald Pleasance. His career got a surge with the independent masterpiece Halloween (1978). But contractual obligations to return to the covered well drew significantly lesser results. His final domestic theatrical release, Halloween: The Curse of Michael Myers (1995), is a pale slasher soap opera imitation of the original. Mr. Pleasance’s face - bearing make-up "burn" scars - and his voice - creaking through pained, faint whispers - isn't the last image I want by which to remember this gentleman of an actor.

But some swan songs, thankfully, end on sweeter notes.

Joan Bennett's last trip to the movie theater helped cement her as an Italian horror icon in America. Following a class-it-up turn in Dark Shadows, Suspiria cast her as the bloodlessly good Madame Blanc whose conservatory shielded a light-starved secret.

Melvyn Douglas and Douglas Fairbanks, Jr. ended their film careers in the company of Fred Astaire, John Houseman, and Patricia Neal on the set of Ghost Story (although the casting office was the uneven film's indisputable triumph).

And Janet Leigh shared her final theatrical release in the company of daughter Jamie Lee Curtis in the clever Halloween: H20 Clever, indeed. Leigh's final scene involves a word of advice to her daughter, after which Janet drives off in her picture car - a double of the vehicle her character steered in Psycho.