Yes, this review definitely contains some spoilers. But this movie is so inconsequential, there's not much here to even 'spoil'! Made in the wake of Halloween, and covers some of the same territory. Starts out fairly well, with a teenage girl abducted, and her parents seek the help of a retired Marine colonel who happens to have ESP and apparently has assisted police on past cases. Okay, ex-Marine... and perennial "tough guy" Cameron Mitchell... yeah, this could at least have possibilities. Aside from Cameron Mitchell's usual hammy performance, so far so good. Shades of the old 1972 TV series "The Sixth Sense" (which starred Gary Collins as the psychic investigator). Cameron Mitchell goes around the the kidnapped girl's room, touching things, and picking up vibes and visions and so forth. Again, not too bad... yet.
Mitchell senses the girl is dead, but then starts telling the distraught parents that he thinks the killer is a "demon" and spouting malarkey like "He's less than a man... but more than a man"... and this movie starts to sink. What are the parents to think of this nonsense? He provides the vengeance-seeking father with just enough clues for the father to seek out the killer (alone, BTW. Our heroic ESP ex-Marine is nowhere to be found by then). The father is of course killed, himself -- which Cameron Mitchell had warned him of, obviously to no avail. Then in the most pointless scene in the movie, Cameron Mitchell returns to the parents' house, babbling to the mother about "the time of the demon" is now beginning. The mother cuts him off, telling him she thinks he's a phony and a coward (and insinuating maybe he even killed her husband). Then she pulls out a gun and shoots poor Cameron dead! Exit Cameron Mitchell... Exit any coherence in the story-line.
At this point, the plot swings over to two women living together (I think the younger one is the niece of the older one, or something like that), who also work together at the same school. We then get treated to like 45 minutes of them, and their relationships with a couple of guys, which is boring in the extreme. We see a few "menacing" shots of the psycho killer outside the school, and at a store where one of them is shopping. These people are so blah that the audience never feels "engaged" in their lives, and consequently couldn't care less what happens to them. Okay, the producers DO throw in some topless scenes, I guess to try and maintain some interest level with the audience. Man, but talk about your "gratuitous" nudity...
Finally, just as we're getting to "know and care about" these women (lol), the killer strikes. (After nearly falling asleep, all I could think of was: "about damned time!"). First he dispatches the younger one and her boyfriend with ease. Then in typical slasher-movie fashion, this seemingly ultra-competent psycho can't finish off the last intended victim. She runs around the house for 15 minutes, alternately screaming or trying to hide, and always evading him. Meanwhile some old coot of a neighbor hears the ruckus, talks about it for awhile with his sleepy wife, but in the end does nothing about it. (More 'time filler'?). Our "heroine" manages to lay a clever trap for the psycho in the bathroom, spreading slippery shampoo and turning a water hose from the sink onto the floor. The killer breaks in, slips, and goes right onto the scissors she's holding. He falls into the bathtub and expires. The gal runs out of the house as her boyfriend shows up, and the end credits roll.
That's it??? We don't even get the "obligatory" twist ending? So this 'oh-so-menacing' killer was nothing but the standard psycho, and all Cameron Mitchell's talk of demons and the supernatural was just a red herring? As one IMDb reviewer noted, it's almost like they started off in one direction, then half-way thru the film they 'changed gears' entirely, and we end up with a whole different movie. Yet what they ended up with is a total bore-fest. Do yourself a favor and skip this one... it's really not worth an hour and a half of your time.
Mitchell senses the girl is dead, but then starts telling the distraught parents that he thinks the killer is a "demon" and spouting malarkey like "He's less than a man... but more than a man"... and this movie starts to sink. What are the parents to think of this nonsense? He provides the vengeance-seeking father with just enough clues for the father to seek out the killer (alone, BTW. Our heroic ESP ex-Marine is nowhere to be found by then). The father is of course killed, himself -- which Cameron Mitchell had warned him of, obviously to no avail. Then in the most pointless scene in the movie, Cameron Mitchell returns to the parents' house, babbling to the mother about "the time of the demon" is now beginning. The mother cuts him off, telling him she thinks he's a phony and a coward (and insinuating maybe he even killed her husband). Then she pulls out a gun and shoots poor Cameron dead! Exit Cameron Mitchell... Exit any coherence in the story-line.
At this point, the plot swings over to two women living together (I think the younger one is the niece of the older one, or something like that), who also work together at the same school. We then get treated to like 45 minutes of them, and their relationships with a couple of guys, which is boring in the extreme. We see a few "menacing" shots of the psycho killer outside the school, and at a store where one of them is shopping. These people are so blah that the audience never feels "engaged" in their lives, and consequently couldn't care less what happens to them. Okay, the producers DO throw in some topless scenes, I guess to try and maintain some interest level with the audience. Man, but talk about your "gratuitous" nudity...
Finally, just as we're getting to "know and care about" these women (lol), the killer strikes. (After nearly falling asleep, all I could think of was: "about damned time!"). First he dispatches the younger one and her boyfriend with ease. Then in typical slasher-movie fashion, this seemingly ultra-competent psycho can't finish off the last intended victim. She runs around the house for 15 minutes, alternately screaming or trying to hide, and always evading him. Meanwhile some old coot of a neighbor hears the ruckus, talks about it for awhile with his sleepy wife, but in the end does nothing about it. (More 'time filler'?). Our "heroine" manages to lay a clever trap for the psycho in the bathroom, spreading slippery shampoo and turning a water hose from the sink onto the floor. The killer breaks in, slips, and goes right onto the scissors she's holding. He falls into the bathtub and expires. The gal runs out of the house as her boyfriend shows up, and the end credits roll.
That's it??? We don't even get the "obligatory" twist ending? So this 'oh-so-menacing' killer was nothing but the standard psycho, and all Cameron Mitchell's talk of demons and the supernatural was just a red herring? As one IMDb reviewer noted, it's almost like they started off in one direction, then half-way thru the film they 'changed gears' entirely, and we end up with a whole different movie. Yet what they ended up with is a total bore-fest. Do yourself a favor and skip this one... it's really not worth an hour and a half of your time.