L'idolo

This is an interesting little time capsule from the early 1970's. I watched it because the video box claimed it was similar to River's Edge (1987), one of my favorite movies. It turned out to be the fictionalized story of a real-life serial killer nicknamed the "Pied Piper of Tucson" who partially inspired the famous Joyce Carol Oates short story "Where Are You Going? Where Have You Been?" (which in turn inspired the movie Smooth Talk with Laura Dern and Treat Williams). While it is a long way from being a classic, it does capture the restlessness and malaise of the period, and like River's Edge is a pretty honest, if extreme, story of wayward youth. As other reviews have noted, the movie contains some surprising nude scenes, especially considering the female lead looks to be pretty underage. (I wouldn't be surprised if these scenes were trimmed when the movie went to video since times are a little less permissive than they used to be). The characters are pretty good, although the Skipper Todd character doesn't really seem to be too much of a genius when he dumb says things like, "But wasn't Herman Melville a fag?", and Robert Lyon doesn't really have the charisma to play a young Charlie Manson type. Still it's nice to see a movie that despite its extreme subject matter honestly portrays the period, and it wasn't all that idealized peace and love crap some aging Baby Boomers would have you believe.

Director Barry Shear here delivers a truly unique and mesmerizing but also sadly unknown and unloved character study about one of the US' most unfathomable serial killers. The film revolves on the mid-60's Arizonian killer Charles Schmid Jr; nicknamed The Pied Piper of Tucson. Schmid was more or less like a crossbreed between Ted Bundy and Charles Manson. Similar to Ted Bundy because he was a good looking, charismatic and eloquent local boy who didn't have the slightest problem luring naive young girls (hence the nickname) and similar to Charles Manson because of the boundary-free hippie setting and because Schmid also had a great influence on his docile friends and involved them in his murderous schemes. Maybe I'm slightly biased, because I'm a big sucker for horror/thriller movies that are based on real-life serial killer cases, but "The Todd Killings" is a genuinely astounding film from many versatile viewpoints. Although the names of the characters were changed to protect the victims (and the guilty!), the script remains very true to the facts as they occurred. It's also a brutally honest film in terms of period setting and atmosphere. "The Todd Killings" shockingly illustrates that the mid-60's weren't all about peace and free love. The clichéd American Dream image of handsome teenagers with all the required capacities to succeed in life gets totally shattered here, because they merely just think about taking LSD and having sex. Robert F. Lyons gives a stunning performance as the unhinged killer protagonist Skipper Todd. He hates and mocks elderly folks, toys around with all the local high school girls that pitiably twirl around him and spends most of his days parading around in shorts at the swimming pool. Skipper eventually falls in love with a sincere girl (the stunningly ravishing Belinda Montgomery) but can't deal with the fact that she disapproves his derailed life-style. "The Todd Killings" is very raw and depressing, with sober cinematography and downbeat set pieces. The film is extremely low budget and doesn't contain a single moment of bloody violence, but the nihilistic ambiance is nevertheless horrifying and the (admittedly gratuitous) sequences of underage nudity form unpleasant confrontations with the wayward world of the 60's. One year after this, Barry Shear directed his most famous film; the stupendous Blaxploitation themed cop-thriller "Across 110th Street". They are two completely different movies proving Shear was a very gifted but sadly underrated filmmaker.

Robert F. Lyons is a young man living in a suburban town in California. He leads an aimles life, supported by his mother, Barbara Bel Geddes. He's very popular with the boys and girls his own age, a leader, dominating the boys, sleeping with all the girls. Everyone calls him "Skipper." But girls have been disappearing, because he's been killing them.

It's based on the case of Charles Schmid of Tucson, and it's a depressing film, full of anomie and anxiety over the Viet Nam War, with the older woman listening to lectures about MOBY DICK. There's an air of the breakdown of society. It's a thoroughly unpleasant movie, which looks deliberate to me Lyons is excellent as the distant and sociopathic lead. With With Richard Thomas, Holly Near, James Broderick, Fay Spain, Gloria Grahame, and Edward Asner.

Based loosely on real life killer, Charles Schmidt (sp?), the Pied Piper of Tucson, 'The Todd Killings' is a marvelous, underrated gem.

There is much to love about this movie. The cast are terrific. Most notable are the lead performances; Robert F. Lyons is truly outstanding, infusing his character with a giddy mix of indifference and charm. He manages to seduce the girls, impress the guys and squirm his way through a police interrogation with absolute ease.

Praise must go to the gorgeous Belinda Montgomery (Doogie Howser's mom). She looks thoroughly enticing and gives a soft, natural performance that looks like it was bathed in 70's sunshine.

Adding to the pleasure is the location shooting, making full use of what appears to be a small, sleepy Northern California town. One notable highlight being Skipper and Billy at a Jack in the Box restaurant - complete with an old-school JB clown logo and the menu displaying stupidly low prices (35 cents for a hamburger).

But this is no mere exploitation flick. The filmmakers have taken care with every detail and it shows. The relationship between Skipper and his Mom is perfectly addressed while she nobly attempts to defend him in the face of an angry mother accusing Skipper of hiding information on her daughter's whereabouts. Their two worlds are miles apart.

There is much to go on about here, but in the end, I simply can't recommend this film highly enough. This is the real deal.

Intelligent psycho drama inspired by "real life case histories", or rather, the story of an actual thrill killer named Charles Schmid Jr., a.k.a. "The Pied Piper of Tucson". A character who prefigured guys like Ted Bundy and Charles Manson, he is here named Skipper Todd, and is played by Robert F. Lyons. Skipper is a shiftless yet undeniably charismatic 23 year old man. The youths of the town of Darlington are completely enamoured of Skipper; he's one of those guys where the girls want to be with him and the boys want to *be* him. However, Skippers' outwards demeanour masks a dark side. And some of his associates are all too willing to help him cover up his crimes.

All things considered, I can see how some people would find this film off putting. It is a sleazy story, to be sure, but it's compelling in a very sobering way. It does have some pertinent things to say about the way that people can find themselves drawn in by the force of someones' personality, for good or bad. Skipper is a mostly cool, unflappable type who makes it through police interrogations without flinching. His mom (portrayed by Barbara Bel Geddes) largely puts up with a lot of his aimlessness, and his new acquaintance Billy Roy (a pre-'Waltons' Richard Thomas) regards him with awe.

Well photographed in Panavision by Harold E. Stine, with a powerful score by Leonard Rosenman, "The Todd Killings" serves as a rather picturesque depiction of rural California in the early 1970s. Performances are all right on the money, with a large number of familiar faces on hand: Belinda Montgomery, Sherry Miles, Holly Near, James Broderick, Gloria Grahame, Fay Spain, Edward Asner, Michael Conrad, William Lucking, Meg Foster, George Murdock, Harry Lauter, Eddie Firestone, Eve Brent, Jack Riley, and an uncredited Geoffrey Lewis.

The opening sequence is a grabber, and producer / director Barry Shear prefers to just plunge us into the action, saving all of the acting and technical credits for the final few minutes. Close-ups are used to good effect, and Shear gives us an honest, unflattering account of these turbulent times in American history and a memorable antagonist who's very much up front about his contempt towards the world in general.

Seven out of 10.