How did this do at the box office?

I recall when it was first released, I was planning on seeing it. But 2 weeks later....it was gone.

It came and when without much notice at all.




"PEOPLE WILL THINK"....
"WHAT I TELL THEM TO THINK".

I remember seeing the commercial for this movie when I was 9 & I totally wanted to see it!!! It came on cable a year or two later & my parents wouldn't let me see it & I was so pissed!!! (Esp. since they let my weirdo little sister watch "Stripes," how lame is that!) I finally saw it a few years later & it wasn't exactly what I thought it would be but I still thought it was pretty cool. I'd totally watch it again if given the chance.

i think this was a kick ass movie and it left me feeling depressed. i love gloomy movies and this is way underated. all i know is that my dad was gonna go see it the first week it opened but then they went to see another film. i think the prey.

I just rented this flick out the other day, and I kind of liked it---the idea of this Binford guy dressing up as a character from every movie to go after his victims---that was an ingenious idea in itself, and also it concentrating on having interesting characters as well as a lead character who was obviously seriously dysfunctional and lacking in any real social skills when it came to dealing with people--particularly women, for that matter. I read about it years ago, but I barely remember it myself (I was too young to see it or any other slasher flicks when it came out,anyway---except for THE FOG, which my aunt took me to see). I think I recall seeing a huge ad for it in the local newspaper. I didn't particularly care for the masturbation scene either (there's nothing wrong with the act itself, I'd just rather not see it in a film,that's all---that's WAY too up close & personal for me!).

Me having been a film geek myself since childhood, I'm kind of surprised that this flick hasn't developed more of a cult following considering the subject matter, and the fact that the Internet has made it a hell of a lot easier to be a film geek, period. It was also a trip to see a then-unknown (and younger) Mickey Roarke as one of the punks intimidating Eric---I didn't know he'd ever done another horror flick besides ANGEL HEART. I didn't think Linda Kerridge looked like MM at all, but she did look very nice, regardless. FTB also seemed to be pretty obscure compared to other films that came out around the same time, such as THE CHILDREN,FRIDAY THE 13th,THE HOWLING,and many others. Nice to see that a lot of people do remember it, though!

I'm thinking that if Eric had just moved the hell out of his aunt's house, that would've saved him a lot of stress,since she didn't even seem to like him very much to begin with, and was always dogging him out all the time. Also if someone could have reached out, told him he had issues,and to get a grip on reality, that might have helped, but, he was too far gone for that, after a certain point. Dennis Christopher was odd-looking but kinda cute, though, and certainly made for a very untraditional leading man, which was refreshing to see. I like actors whose looks are a break from the usual Hollywood mold anyway---they all seem to look like clones of each other nowadays, unless you watch foreign and indie films (or foreign indies, as the case may be).

All in all, I found this to be a pretty good film, even though some of the characters were obvious stereotypes, like the always-pissed off aunt and Eric's boss (I liked the way Eric stalked him as the Mummy--that was genuinely creepy,especially being in a dark factory on a late night.

I remember cutting out of high school as a sophmore in 1980 to catch this when it opened. I remember a few very freaky TV spots of the "half-n-half" face paint and also one that went something like "twinkle twinkle movie star, eric knows just where you are, try to run try to hide, you'll never get out of this alive???" or something like that. This last one was a close up pan of Christopher in his half-n-half vampire get-up holding a barrell of popcorm and a large soda. As the camera pans in the popcorn kind of explodes and the soda bursts. Guess it made quite an impression. This is one of those great missed chance movies.... the death scenes are spectacular, Christopher's performance is so claustrophobically wrenching it's painful to watch..... but the rest of it is pretty awful. The "screen violence = violence" tripe gets very annoying and those two "lead" actors....Thomerson and whatever her name is.... are unbelievably untalented. Fun to see Mickey Rourke, though, and Linda Kerridge channels Ms. Monroe rather creepily at times. It would really suck to be Vernon Zimmerman.

One of Mickey Rourkes first screen roles.
Its not a great film though.

I remember wanting to see this film when it came out in theatres; I was 17. Dennis Christopher was still hot from the previous year's BREAKING AWAY, and horror films were boxoffice gold. I recall that Siskel & Ebert gave the film a mixed review, so I thought that it couldn't be that bad based on the genre. I remember Christopher was applauded for his multiple movie icon roles, and Linda Kerridge earned a few headlines as she was a dead ringer for Marilyn Monroe. Like an earlier poster noted, however, it came and went in theatres in just a couple of weeks. This was considered a "big budget" film for its producer/distributor, American Cinema Releasing; the film's failure started its rapid decline into oblivion, just like Compass Int'l, Filmways, Crown Int'l, New World, New Horizons, Trimark, and AIP.