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Dean Stockwell is the son of Satan and he seduces a wide-eyed college student
played by Sandra Dee. Stockwell is Wilbur Whateley and he has "haunting eyes
and an impish grin." They say that when Wilbur decides to start a family, "he
lures a cute coed to the mountains for a weekend of demonic rites and wrongs!" It also says that "their passion awakes an ancient evil determined
to destroy all humanity in this sinister scare-fest of satanic seduction!" Um,
I think whoever wrote this might be a worser writer than I is. 1970, 88 minutes, Widescreen, DVD
I've read a good portion of H.P. Lovecraft's writing in my time and for the
most part, I've found it enjoyable, in spite of the often times purple prose.
Once upon a time I even read The Dunwich Horror story that this movie is
purportedly based on. I say purportedly because I don't honestly recall much
of what went on in the story (nameless Old Ones attempting to invade this
dimension I assume - that seem to be part and parcel of Howard Phillips'
writings), but I don't recall ever sitting there thinking, "you know, this
would make a great movie with Dean Stockwell and Sandra Dee." I also don't
recall the story being so deadly dull. Lovecraft works have had a checkered
past in their translation to the big screen which I'm too lazy to recall for
you in any detail. Suffice it to say, this movie has its admirers, but they
probably also think that the wacky psychedelic scenes in this movie are some
form of art instead of the confusing, headache inducing mess they truly are. I
even stumbled across someone's rantings that compared this film to Rosemary's Baby. Heck, I'll give that to you. I thought Rosemary's Baby was the cinematic equivalent of Nyquil, too. If you want to watch one of those
devil baby movies, go rent The Omen. You've got the great Gregory Peck trying to stab a five year old boy. What
more do you need from a movie? Baboon attacks? Shoot, it's got that, too.
Unfortunately, I watched The Dunwich Horror, so that's what we're stuck with.  Things start off ominously enough when Professor Armitage, played by Eg Begley,
asks Sandra Dee to take the Necronomicon book back to the library. I try to be
fair and balanced (We report! You decide! Just like those right-wing boobs on
the Fox News Channel.) when giving you the lowdown on a film so I feel that it
is
only proper that I tell you about one of this film's good points. This
professor is played by Ed Begley, not Ed Begley, Jr. so you don't have to
worry about
some tall goof driving around in one of those midget electric cars
babbling endlessly about the benefits of a solar powered toilet. Okay, that
was the good news. The bad news rolls into the local coffee shop where Armitage
is holding court with the only two women on campus that are desperate enough
for a passing grade to hang out with him. The bad news is of course Dean
Stockwell, playing a player by the name of Wilbur Whateley. Before they hooked
up at the coffee shop, Dean and Ed had an encounter at the library. Somehow
Dean
had managed to do some Jedi mind trick on Sandra Dee so that she would let him
look at this super-rare book (I don't really see how rare this book is, since I
picked a copy of the Necronomicon up at a Walden's book store about 10 years
ago, for about $4.95. I was going to try summoning up a demon, but it required
that I fast for eleven days or something and I was living across the street
from a Taco Bell so that obviously wasn't going to happen.) Dean is looking at
this book and the professor comes up and gets his panties in a bunch because no
one is supposed to look at that precious book but him. He gets all excited
though when
Dean tells him that he is Wilbur Whateley, the great-grandson of some other
Whateley who got hisself lynched years ago over in Dunwich for trying to open
up the gates of hell or something. Later at the coffee shop, Whateley is still
trying to get Ed Begley to give up the book, but he won't do it. Soon though,
Sandra Dee and Wilbur are alone and Wilbur conveniently misses his bus back to
Dunwich, so it's up to Sandy to give this warlock a ride home. I'm assuming
it's because he's been giving her a work over with his scary eyes or something,
because there is no way a blonde chick like Sandy is going home with a dude
like Wilbur in the real world.  Wilbur is this skinny freak with a Mike Brady perm, bad sideburns, and a
mustache that looks like a wooly-bear caterpillar crawled onto his upper lip
and died. Stockwell plays the guy as being so soft-spoken, you wonder whether
he shouldn't be trying to hook up with Ed Begley instead of Sandra Dee. Later
in the movie, in scenes that require him to wear this dark cloak with a hood,
you can't help but think that this guy probably spent most of his college
career holed up in his dorm room with about four of his buddies, trying to
level up his orc character (How many more experience points do I need for Level
12?). In fact, Stockwell underplays this character so much, I felt like the
grandfather he lived with in this movie. "What's that sonny? Speak up! Can't
hear you! Something about summoning demons from between Sandra Dee's legs?
That can't be what I heard! You dang kids don't make no sense with your free
love!" So, they get back to Wilbur's place and it's about as spooky as trailers
come. There's animal skulls hanging on the outside of it, strange hanging
gourds and even an owl hanging out on the porch railing. So she goes right in
and it's pretty funky inside too, with a bunch of occult themed floors, and rugs
and mysterious transparent paperweights that Wilbur can move without touching
them.
He asks her to stay for tea (Whoa, slow down fella! She's no hussy!) and she
hangs out looking at those weird paperweights and I think that this is when
she sees some visions of crazy people running around half naked, and altars and
pretty much a whole jumbled mess of witchcraft imagery. I can't be for sure
when she sees these images because everytime these shots came on the screen,
with their vaselined lens and kooky colors and quick cutaways, I had my own
vision of my $10 bucks disappearing at Best Buy when I was conned (No doubt more
of Wilbur's Jedi tricks!) into purchasing this. It soon became evident that
these wild hallucinations would substitute for anything of any interest
transpiring, because other than these scenes you get a lot of Wilbur talking in
his prissy little monotone. Sandy goes to freshen up and Wilbur takes
this time to tamper with her car so that she'll have to spend the night (ahh, I
think we can all remember the first time we pulled that little stunt). He even
has time to drug her tea (geez, he was such a loser he had to GHB her, even
during the sexual revolution). All his scheming took quite awhile, but
she was in the bathroom the whole time, so I'm guessing that forty minute ride
from the coffee shop probably had her about ready to drop a load or something.
When she finally gets out of the toilet (Do not go in there!) she runs smack
dab into the scary old grandfather. Wilbur and he argue and you can tell
granddad isn't too thrilled about trying to seduce a blonde coed to bring back
the ancient gods (he tried and failed in the past), but Wilbur tells him to go
back upstairs or he won't be allowed to watch Wheel of Fortune for a week. Once she discovers her car doesn't work and that she's really tired from all
the drugs in her tea, Sandra agrees to stay on at Wilbur's place. He directs
her to a room and tells her there are some clothes in the closet that she can
use to sleep in. He pulls out this sheer black nightgown and says that she can
use that. Now that sounds pretty ballsy and pretty cool, but we know from
watching the opening prologue that this is the same nightgown his mamma wore
when he was born and when his twin was born. That would explain the blood
and placenta on the nightie. Twin? He had a twin? Of course he did! What do
you think is kept locked up in that room where the door constantly rattles like
something inhuman and with ten snake-like heads is trying to break out? Yes,
this is one of those movies where the monster is kept under lock and key, not
so much to build up suspense (because really, you know you're either going to
see a really fake monster or not see it all), but because the budget is so weak
that there isn't any monster to speak of. They try to get around this when it
does break out (Oh did I spoil that?) by having us see very quick glimpses of
it and by using some stupid color tricks with the camera. Is there someone I
can sue? I think my seizures were caused by this movie and not my fetal
alcohol syndrome. Now, we're getting ahead of ourselves here, but the movie is
so dull that I just want to race ahead to where something happens, anything
happens, just so as I don't have to watch Dean starring at Sandra Dee with his
not disguised at all bedroom eyes! When she sleeps over at his place she has
some weird dreams, but I had dozed off a bit, plum tuckered out from all this
action (maybe I should replay the powerful "getting gas at Dunwich" scene) and
was having my own dreams. I was dreaming that I had purchased The Man From Planet X instead of this movie. Now, I have no idea if The Man From Planet X is any good, but it has some cool cover art and seemed to be about this little
alien with a fish bowl on his head, which seemed much more interesting than
watching sweaty-faced Dean Stockwell put both hands to his temples and mutter
nonsense words to himself. That's another suck thing about this movie.
Anytime your movie's climax involves a wimpy looking guy in a robe muttering
made
up words from some fake satanic bible, you are in deep guano. Baby talk has
it's place, but not in a scary movie. I think one of the Evil Dead movies
straightened all this out with the klatuu,veratiu, necktu (I ain't looking up
the spellings either, so all you Bruce Campbell slaves can save your e-mails)
scene.  This movie follows the formula for these types of stupid movies to the letter:
dumb girl taken in by hunky bad guy (well, I guess it doesn't follow it
completely) has friends come to investigate, some die, some don't and end up
saving her. In this case you've got Armitage and Sandra Dee's girlfriend.
They go to town and unearth a bunch of poppycock about how Wilbur was born and
that his twin was stillborn (Riiiiight!) and that his mamma is now in the
looney bin and Wilbur doesn't even go and visit her. Then you've got Sandra
Dee's girlfriend busting into Wilbur's house demanding to see Sandy. The
grandfather tells her to get lost so she goes upstairs and lets Wilbur's
brother loose, getting herself killed in the process. At some point, Wilbur
pushes gramps down the stairs and then tries to have a satanic funeral in the
local cemetery (the locals are not amused). What was the point of that scene?
Then we have the extraordinary fight scene between a library security guard
and Wilbur when he goes to check out the Necronomicon after hours with his five
finger discount. Wilbur gets his ass kicked all over by this guy (Some
warlock!), but lucks out in the end when the rent-a-cop trips and falls on a
spear that Wilbur happened to be holding up. I've been to a few libraries
(performing community service, not for books) and I don't ever recall there
being any spears lying around, but I guess that's what makes this movie
fiction, right? At some point Wilbur has Sandy up on the altar at these old
satanic ruins outside of town (like the locals wouldn't tear that down) and
there's visions and stuff and I guess he knocks boots with her, but who can
really say what's happening, then he starts trying to summon the old ones, with
his dumb book and goo-goo ga-ga incantations and Armitage shows up and says
something else in mumbo-jumboease and Wilbur catches on fire or something and
Sandy is saved, even though we see a fetus inside of her! Shock ending! Shock
ending! The horror at Dunwich is really just beginning! Ugh, thanks for that,
you hacks. This is a movie that doesn't aim for much and manages to miss even
that.
Story is basically a dude trying to get laid and then using his old lady as a
vehicle to bring back demons from another dimension. Can't see how that didn't
work. The tricky camera shots and hippie-dancing montages age about as well as
Stockwell's perm. Armitage is such a pompous ass (well, he is a college
professor) that you wish he had been stillborn. Sandra Dee, doesn't do
anything in this movie except come under the spell of Wilbur, thus depriving us
of knowing whether she was ever worth worrying about. The best thing about
this movie is the poster art from its original release back in 1970, a demonic
head menacing a beautiful young thing. I can't imagine why they didn't use an
image of Dean-o looking like he had migraine. There's probably a pretty
compelling movie in the H.P. Lovecraft story. At least we now know there's a
really dull one as well.
Reviews © 2004
MonsterHunter
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