How's this for an opening? A photographer walks a deserted beach taking National Geographic like shots of seagulls and the like. He comes across a beautiful girl who resembles a 1950's pin-up. She offers to pose for him and the photos he takes become more and more erotic. She suddenly exposes her breasts and propositions him. His excitement is short lived as he's surrounded by variously garbed townspeople who then begin taking pictures of him. He is then savagely beaten, wrapped to a post with fish netting, and doused with gasoline, all while the object of his lust smiles approvingly. "Welcome to Potter's Bluff," one of them says as another lights a match and sets him afire. The townspeople then circle around him and watch as he burns. If this mortifying display was not enough, the victim later appears as a happy member of the malicious mob.
What the bejeezus is going on in the coastal "no bigger than a stamp" Lovecrafty town of Potter's Bluff? It's up to Sheriff Dan Gillis (JAMES FARENTINO) to figure it out. Could his darling wife Janet (MELODY ANDERSON) be in on it? She's taken an interest in the occult recently and what's with the roll of film she asked him to develop? Local mortician JACK ALBERTSON definitely knows more than he's letting on, but what possible explanation could there be for such fantastically gruesome goings on? You may have to suspend your disbelief for this one, but the pay off is worth it. Grafting traditional mystery elements with pod people social panic, this gore-iffic triumph of atmosphere, with its way ahead of its time shocker ending, is never afraid to go for broke. If you enjoyed MESSIAH OF EVIL, DAGON or even the RESIDENT EVIL 4 game, you should definitely add Potter's Bluff to your travel itinerary.
INDELIBLE SCENE(S):
- The aforementioned opening is hard to top
- Nurse hypodermic-needle-in-the-eye miraculously surpasses the above mentioned
- A badly dubbed family of three with car trouble meets the locals
- A pre-BLAIR WITCH, pre-Paris Hilton, gritty black and white home movie reveals somebody's not so wholesome
- When the age old question, "Fish sticks or stroganoff?" is answered with a bullet to your chest, it's time to bury yourself
- "You can't kill me. You can only make me dead."
- "Let me fix that."
This movie is amazing. The opening scene is very upsetting and therefore quite impressive. That image of the bandaged victim with only his mouth and one eye exposed is so disturbing – in the scene he recognizes his attacker and tried to scream for help. Sadly, the most memorable and striking moments in the film take place in the first 20 minutes.
Also, this movie was written by your hero and mine, Dan O'Bannon – the man who gave us Return Of The Living Dead.