I agree. I really have to wonder, just what audience was this film made for? If it was indeed intended to be a horror movie, why give it such a deceptively innocent-sounding title and art cover? That's like if John Carpenter had made his classic 1978 horror film HALLOWEEN and then called it something like,"Mr. Trick-Or-Treater Visits His Home Town" and then had posters showing a bunch of smiling, happy trick-or-treating kids without any indication that this would be a horror film.
If it was actually intended to be a fantasy film for all ages...why put so much horror in it? Aside from the stuff you already mentioned, we also get an old lady who unwittingly summons an evil spirit which then kills her, a visit from Satan looking and sounding every bit as menacing as he ever has on film, and a man drawing blood from a helpless woman with his razor-sharp finger nail. Did the filmmaker, Kenneth Berton, really think this would be fine, harmless entertainment for the kiddies? Let me just say I'm glad, and not at all surprised, that he never made another film after this.
The MST3000 version is a must-see for anyone who's a fan of the show, but the film itself is total trash. (Though I must say I did really enjoy seeing what ultimately happens to Jonathan Cooper, the jerk critic.)
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Dextrousleftie
15 years ago
Yes, but even that was creepy and horrible, since technically that woman had slept with her own son! And she had to raise her jerk of a husband too. Ick!!! The Freudian overtones there...this movie is very much a horror film. I lvoed the part in MST3K where Mike got those innocent looking Ernest Borgnine children's books that turned out to be full of blood and gore, then the only one that had a scary title was about mice getting sweaters and living happily ever after. Laughed until I nearly spit over that one.
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