The Demon

The Demon is a South African Halloween clone about a motiveless serial killer who suffocates his victims with clear plastic bags. To be honest, it's a pretty shoddy effort in many ways but it's definitely not without merits either. In some respects one of this movie's chief problems is also inadvertently one of its strengths. The issue in question is how confusingly structured it all is. Characters are linked together only via the killer, and he is, to put it mildly, very vaguely defined himself. So the film has a very disjointed feel to it. While I can't see this as having been intentional, it does have a strange dream-like effect where we have this weird pale-faced amorphous figure appearing at various times with no fathomable reason. The Demon himself is a decent villain, as he has a good air of mystery about him, partly due to the fact that he is given absolutely no history or motivation. He is masked like Michael Myers in a white faceless mask although this mask does seem to appear and disappear between shots which must surely qualify as a pretty monumental goof. His killing method is bloodless but unusual enough for some credit. Although quite honestly even if there were buckets of the red stuff you would be doing well to even notice seeing as the lighting in this production is terrible. Too many scenes are played in almost total darkness, so you only have an impression of what's going on. Fortunately, we are able to make out the finale which is a lengthy scene involving the Demon chasing a topless girl around a house – it's clichéd but this sort of stuff never really gets old. The only name actor is Cameron Mitchell who plays a psychic colonel who is helping track down the killer. But he only ultimately has a bit part in the film and exits the picture in a very memorably sudden and unexpected way.

Despite it's shortcomings I did quite enjoy this one. It may have been poorly put together but it did have some tense scenes, and some interesting moments. It's worth a look if you enjoy trashy horror flicks.

(**1/2 out of *****) Very strange and disjointed film (though, I'll admit, I think I dozed once or twice during crucial scenes) about a sub-human serial killer who uses razor-tipped gloves and plastic bags to kill people. The soundtrack is very loud and erratic and people are always screaming, which makes sleeping straight through this often-dull movie pretty difficult. It ends rather abruptly and offers little to no explanation for the killer's identity or motivation. We never even get to see what his face looks like under his mask. But, even with these setbacks, the direction shows some flair and there are a few frightening demon-attack scenes, especially at the end. Cameron Mitchell plays a psychic detective on the case of a missing girl abducted by the demon, and Jennifer Holmes plays the pretty blonde schoolteacher who gets chased through her house in just her panties in the suspenseful climax (I was wide awake for that part.)

HIGHLIGHT: The pretty blonde schoolteacher gets chased through her house in just her panties (what else?)

DEMON, THE (1979)

1/2 (out of four)

A small town is terrorized by a monster who appears to be killing people so that he can suck their blood out. Poor Cameron Mitchell plays some sort of psychic but there isn't a single thing in this movie that makes sense. I've read a couple reviews on the film and even they don't make any sense out of this "horror" movie, which forgot the horror, the scares and the gore. Off topic but poor Mitchell would spend the rest of the decade appearing in this low budget films. Others of interest is FRANKENSTEIN ISLAND, MEMORIAL DAY MASSACRE and JACK-O.

So much about this film makes no sense.The juxtaposition of American and South African accents with no sense of where its supposed to be set.The killer is a complete blank,we never find out if hes a "demon" of the title or just some homicidal nut.Many of the murders make no sense whatsoever,he kidnaps women,kills people randomly and does this weird heavy breathing.Police are nowhere to be seen.And it feels like two different films merged into one,with the Cameron Mitchell psychic subplot being only connected via the killer with the two nubile young women whose scenes in a state of undress are the highlight.As mentioned by others the transfer to DVD is terrible,my copy also wrongly states the release year as 1971.

In the opening minutes of this movie, a girl named Emily Parker (Ashleigh Sendin) is abducted by a hulking, heavy-breathing psycho. Her distraught parents (Peter J. Elliott, Moira Winslow) call in a character we presume to be some sort of private investigator. He is Colonel Bill Carson (Cameron Mitchell, the films' star attraction), a retired military officer with psychic abilities. Meanwhile, the villain continues to claim random victims. This perpetrator may be something less, or more, than just a "man".

Details as to the killers' true nature and reason for killing are never delineated in this script by producer / director Percival Rubens, presumably to keep things mysterious. He / it wears gloves tipped with razors on the fingers, yet tends to murder some people with the old "plastic bag over the head" routine. Overall, the film is watchable enough, but never has much in terms of scares and suspense, and it's so poorly filmed that it's hard sometimes to see what's going on, or understand what characters are saying. The picture, at least, does have some atmosphere, and there is nudity from leading lady Jennifer Holmes (as young schoolteacher Mary) and Zoli Marki as her cousin / housemate Jo. Unfortunately, too much time is wasted on uninteresting supporting characters. There's a lot of footage devoted to the budding relationship between Jo and nice rich guy Dean Turner (Craig Gardner); the film plods as a result. Gore hounds will be quite disappointed, although anyone looking for a routine "Halloween"-inspired knock-off may not be too mindful of "The Demon"s' lack of interesting features. Most unexpected was the final scene between Carson and Mrs. Parker.

Mitchell is once again professional enough to give "The Demon" some needed credibility, although in truth we don't really see a lot of the Carson character. He's NOT as major a player in the course of events as one would think. Holmes and Marki have some appeal, and while the cast is fairly nondescript, they're at least reasonably competent as actors.

"The Demon" is not a total waste of time, but it's still going to leave some viewers wanting more.

Filmed in South Africa.

Five out of 10.