I picked up a VHS copy of NORMAN J. WARREN's TERROR a bunch o' years ago and for some reason, I never gave it a spin. The other night I finally decided to dust it off and give it a looksee and just when it was starting to get good, the darn thing konked out and went on the fritz! I know that sounds tragic but don't worry, there is a happy ending because that very same movie is contained on a compilation DVD I own from MILL CREEK called GOREHOUSE GREATS!
So I put the DVD in and instantly realized that I should have been watching it in the first place because the picture was all of the sudden sharp and lovely. Anyway, I just want to congratulate myself for learning the obvious lesson that sometimes VHS looks like crap and can't be trusted even though I know I'm destined to forget that lesson within a few days.
Also let me say that TERROR (1978) is not such a great movie. I think it's about a witch's curse that ruins things for random people and there's some possession business taking place but mostly I had little idea what was going on (although maybe I should blame my cough medicine for that). I'm going to give it the benefit of the doubt anyway because I was never bored and it looked pretty. The general vibe is agreeable and the death scenes stand out. It's like there's about a half dozen really cool horror vignettes that, taken in separately, really work but when they're strung together as a whole, they turn into a muddled mess. In fact, it left me thinking that if you just ripped out the annoyingly foggy plot, you'd be left with one awesome trailer and so I Googled that notion and yep, I was right, the trailer is fantastic…
But this is Sunday Streaming so I'm leaving you with the whole movie. Like I said, it doesn't all make sense or gel together but if you enjoy late-seventies supernatural horror mixed with some slasher elements, it's well worth checking out. There's a stalking scene mid-way through (featuring the guy who played Chewy McWookie in STAR WARS) that doesn't exactly pan out but is pretty nifty while it lasts and the climax, which apparently was inspired by the splashy, fluorescent visuals in SUSPIRIA is at least kind to your peepers even if it ends up feeling kind of detached and incidental. Oh, and there's some funny bits in this flick too involving the making of a trashy movie and wait, wasn't there a flying car too? Hmmm, maybe I liked it even better than I think I did. Yep, I guess so. It's kinda the perfect thing to watch from bed when you are high on cold medicine.
