Alone in the Dark (1982)

This write up is going to contain many SPOILERS so if you have not yet seen this film and are a fan of the horror genre, go see this movie as soon as you can because it is an amazingly solid horror/thriller with an awesome cast.  After you have seen it come back and see what I have to say about it.  If you just want to read about the movie then be my guest and read on. 

***BEGIN SPOILERS***

This is one of those films that I had very low expectations going in and when it was finished I was totally blown away by what I had just seen.  I absolutely love when that happens.  I knew nothing about this movie other than it stared some pretty great actors and it was some kind of early 80s horror flick.  There is so much going on in this movie and it all works.

The film starts out with Dr. Dan Potter, Dwight Shultz, landing a new job working at a mental institution know as The Haven.  This place is run by pot smoking Dr. Leo Bain, Donald Pleasence, a doctor with very unconventional ways of treating his patients, or voyagers as he calls them.  This story line on its own could have made for a very entertaining movie because all of the scenes in the hospital are fantastic and the patients are super crazy. 

The main focus however, is the gentlemen they house on the third floor of the facility.  This is the only floor that contains any sort of security system to prevent them from escaping.  Various characters mention at least four times that the system is run by electricity. If that isn’t foreshadowing a blackout or some kind of power failure then I don’t know what foreshadowing is. 

The four men on this floor are completely insane and have committed varying horrific crimes.  The leader of the group is Col. Frank Hawkes, played absolutely brilliantly by Jack Palance, he is a retired Vietnam vet and is extremely paranoid and schizophrenic not to mention terribly violent.  Then you have Byron “preacher” Sutcliff, Martin Landau, who suffers from extreme religious delusions and has a taste for setting fires to crowded churches.  Rounding out the group is a 400 pound child molester and a serial strangler known as the bleeder, he gets his nickname because every time he is about to kill someone he gets a bloody nose. 

These four guys get the idea in their paranoid heads that Dr. Dan Potter has killed the previous doctor that they all loved and of course the solution to this problem is to kill Dr. Potter and everyone else that happens to get in their way.  As luck would have it a city wide blackout occurs and allows the group of crazies to bypass the electronically run security system, giving them all the permission they need to start a murdering rampage.  The rest of the film is actually quite suspenseful as the group hunts down Dr. Potter and lays siege to his house.  There is even a scene where The Bleeder dons a white hockey mask in a sporting goods store and proceeds to kill someone while wearing it. Interestingly enough Friday the 13^th Part 3 was released that same year and is the first of the Fridays to contain Jason wearing a hockey mask. 

The main things to talk about in this movie are the performances the cast turns in. Jack Palance is on top of his game as Frank Hawkes and is scary as shit when he gets violent.  Martin Landau as the crazy Preacher is the creepiest and most unpredictable killer in the group.  He will be shouting scripture one second and laughing uncontrollably the next.  I think what I love about this group is that they are all older guys and for some reason that makes it way more believable and scary.  It’s not like most new horror movies where everyone is an extremely attractive teenager.  I actually believe these guys when they say they are going to raise me into the air and cut me in half.  Donald Pleasence as Dr. Bain is great as well.  He has so much compassion for his “voyagers” that even when they are clearly out of their minds and seconds away from killing him, he is still on their side.  It could possibly be all the pot he smokes throughout the movie or he just really loves those crazy bastards. 

When the crazies are laying siege to Dr. Potters house there a scenes that induced a fair amount of terror in me.  The family does a great job of acting like this is absolutely the most insane thing that has ever happened in their lives.  There is a great scene in which Dr. Potter’s wife is forced to wield a knife and stab one of the killers and she shows a great deal of hesitation, like she can’t believe that she actually has to stab this person to save her family.  These are the kind of scenes that make this film work.  Not like in most horror movies, that when the killing starts, everyone is very comfortable killing anyone that happens to be around. 

I am not going to spoil the ending so if you want to know how this one turns out you will have to go and discover this forgotten 80s gem for yourself.  But I will let you know that 80s punk band the Sic Fucks has a couple pretty awesome concert scenes in the movie and that’s just another reason to watch this immediately. 

Next I am going to follow director Jack Sholder to his 1987 action sci-fi flick The Hidden.  Hopefully he does just as good with that genre as he did with horror.