Tuesday, August 16, 2011

Night Fright: Terrible Movies #173


30 year old actors playing teenagers horse around where a spaceship recently crashed although we never see it. We're supposed to believe they are chasing one another through the forest, but they are just running back and forth in front of a static camera, and the cruddy editing is supposed to convince us otherwise. Suddenly the woman stops in close-up and screams because she's seen something terrifying, we still don't see it, and the credits roll. There's a lot of that sort of thing in this movie, where someone sees something but we don't, and I suppose it's to create a sense of suspense and dread, but it doesn't. Many scenes are shot at dusk rendering a stark look and causing the camera shadow to be seen, the night shots are so murky you can't see what's happening, the music doesn't seem to jive with the action onscreen, and sometimes there's a magical harp on the soundtrack that probably was used in many episodes of Bewitched. Here's a clip:



Sorry, someone replaced a terrible clip from Night Fright with the opening title sequence from Bewitched. I'm angry, thankful, and relieved. But you do get to hear the magical harp I was talking about, so there's that. I'm not sure why the filmmakers decided to use that particular sound in Night Fright, because I wouldn't call Night Fright "movie magic". Anyway, the kids all head to the forest in the dark to unconvincingly boogie to a transistor radio, because that's what middle-aged people pretending to be teenagers in the Sixties did and seemed like a sensible and groovy thing to do. About two months into this 75 minute movie we finally see the monster, and it's only a lumbering carpet sample with a gooey red skull for a head. Don't get excited, it's not as awesome as it sounds, and it's poorly lit and very brief. I watched it on Netflix, and you shouldn't. If you can't stop yourself, you can watch it below:

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