Tag Archives: Gloria Grahame

Retrospective: The Nesting (1981)

30 Friday Apr 2021

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While 1981 proved to be a huge year in the name of horror, projecting some classic or cult films in the genre, The Nesting had not even clipped this reviewers radar.
You could argue that a prime reason for this was down to it being quickly shafted into the video nasties category in the UK upon its release, subjecting the film into obscurity.
However, I found upon watching the film which is currently available on Tubi, that obscure depiction may be a correct label to have been assigned to it. Not because of its graphic nature, but more for the curious tale that is told by writer/director Armand Weston.
The story centres on Lauren Cochran (Robin Groves), a novelist who suffers from agoraphobia. So, on the advice from her doctor, moves to the country and rents out an old mansion, which she is strangely drawn towards, in the hopes that it will overcome her ailment.
The oddity doesn’t reside there however, as a series of bizarre events occur once Lauren arrives, including the encounter she has with the mansion’s owner, Colonel Lebrun (John Carradine – House of Frankenstein) suffers a stroke the moment he lies eyes on her.

Compounding her troubles further, Lauren starts to experience some deeply unsettling dreams of women lounging around the house. It is when one of these women appears to her during the day, that Lauren’s world starts spiralling, throwing her into confusion over what is real or not. Is she losing her mind or is there more to her visions than they seem?

Not content on resting on her laurels, Lauren turns sleuth to uncover the secrets of the mansion, butin doing so, starts to unearth some unsavoury characters, and may send her over the brink of sanity.

The problem I have with The Nesting is that it struggles to be a certain kind of movie but it struggles under the weight of its premise. Agorophobia is a ripe subject that has potential to inflict a deep horror, drawn from the troubles that the human mind can produce. It’s a subject that has been done before and since, Repulsion and Copycat to name but a few.

It’s a muddled script that gets too clouded and surreal to follow, and with some tighter direction, could have been a better film. As such, it may continue to wallow in anonymity as a result.

  • Saul Muerte

Retrospective: Blood and Lace (1971)

16 Tuesday Mar 2021

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Before the slasher craze would strike in the 80s and both Voorhees and Myers would don their respective masks…

Before even Halloween or Black Christmas would sew the seeds of what was to come in the world of celluloid horror, Blood and Lace would grace all the hallmarks of what typifies the sub-genre.

Initially considered to be too gratuitous for the cinema audience by the MPA (Motion Picture Association) Blood and Lace would find a home as a regular slot at drive-in theatres, where it would garner a following.

As the film opens, we’re greeted with the now familiar trope of the killers POV as they stalk through a house and centre in on the intended victims lying in bed, being clobbered by the weapon of choice; a hammer, and then setting the house on fire.
The sole survivor, the woman’s daughter, Ellie (Melody Patterson) is then sent off to an orphanage to be raised by the crazed Mrs. Deere (Gloria Grahame) and her odd-job man, Tom (Len Lesser). This is where the level of sinister and fuckdom begins as Mrs. Deere is a crackpot, who keeps her dead husband on freeze, believing that it will keep him alive. She is also fuelled by money, working the children in her care to the bone, and for those who she pushed beyond the limits, keeps in the freezer in order to keep up the head count and receive her welfare checks.
Tom is no saint either, with eyes on the young females that come through the orphanage to satiate his sexual lusts. In fact, it’s hard to actually find anyone to like in this movie, as our lead protagonist, Ellie is suitably off-kilter and hard to connect to for obvious reasons when the full scope of the story is revealed. We also have a lingering, sexual predator in Detective Carruthers (Vic Taybuck), who has a curious interest in Ellie, that reveals itself in a couple of ways in the films climax, pushing the boundaries of taste and decency.
This twist in the storyline isn’t necessarily a shock moment, as you can sense it coming from a mile out, but the fact that it still travels there, leaves you feeling completely disturbed.
A sign of a movie leaving its sticky residue on the mind of its viewer and potentially where it still resonates when viewed today, despite its slow methodological pace, cheap budget, and standard script.

  • Saul Muerte