Category Archives: 80’s Movies

The Appointment (1981)

Posted on October 27, 2026 | 1 comment

 

By Richard Winters

My Rating: 8 out of 10

4-Word Review: Business trip turns deadly.

Ian (Edward Woodward) is the father of 14-year-0ld Joanne (Samantha Weyson) who is set to have an all-important violin solo and wants to make sure that her father is there. However, Ian is forced to make a business trip and not able to attend, which upsets her. That night he has strange dreams that seem to warn him of impending danger. The next morning, he sets out on his drive, but notices things are eerily similar to what occurred in his dream the night prior. Is he speeding into a deadly scenario and can he turn around before it’s too late?

This was originally intended to be a British TV-Movie, but when production received a large investment from one of its backers it allowed them a bigger budget for the special effects convincing the producers that this would work better on the big screen. Sadly, despite the excellent effects, they were unable to find a distributor, and it soon fell into obscurity. For a long time, many considered it a ‘lost film’ until Sony was able to retrieve a quality print that allowed it to be released onto Blu-ray where it’s now achieved a new and fervent fanbase.

The film is effectively spooky, but what grabbed me most was its vivid depiction of parenting a teen daughter, which many people who’ve been through it will say is far scarier than any horror movie. The inner dynamics in which the father attempts to exert authority but ends up emotionally manipulated by his moody daughter is completely on target. These moments are actually the creepiest particularly the prolonged, unblinking stare that she gives him while in the living room.

The car accident is masterfully choreographed featuring amazing camera work like the shot from underneath the speeding vehicle during the tire blowout. Having the car go off the cliff and land in a tree and then watching Woodward teeter upside down is equally compelling and even more impressive when you factor in that this was all done decades before CG or AI was even a thing. If there is one reason to see the film, and repeat viewings, it would be for this sequence alone.

However, the dream sequence that comes before it dilutes some of its impact. Too many moments from the accident get played out during the nightmare, so when the viewer finally gets to the real thing it becomes redundant. I did like the use of the big dogs, and I felt that the dream should’ve just had them, but nothing about the car, so that way when we finally do get to the accident it comes off as fresh and surprising.

The script does have its share of confusing imagery that muddles the story. While the death of the car mechanic is imaginative, I didn’t understand the point of it as he seems to be working on the car at the exact same time that Woodward is driving it. The opening scene involving a young schoolgirl going into a forest and getting ‘snatched’ by an evil spirit is equally convoluted. Sure, it’s scary, but what’s the point? Had it been Joanne it would’ve made more sense that she got connected with some evil force years earlier and now this has allowed her to do cruel things, but because it wasn’t her it just adds to more unanswered questions.

Spoiler Alert!

The ending is adequate, as it shows Joanne petting the evil dogs, which implies that she had some connection to her father’s freaky death, but I would’ve liked more of a conclusion. For instance, did she intentionally wish for the accident to occur, or did the entity come up with the idea on its own?

The film portrays her as being self-absorbed and desperate for attention, but if that were the case then killing her father would’ve worked against this. Narcists want validation, but this can only occur if other people are around to supply it and with the dad dead that was no longer going to happen. Would’ve made more sense had he been put on the brink of death only to be saved by a rescue team. He could then have come home in an injured, shaken state and be told if he ever crossed her again, he’d get the same treatment.

Or it could’ve gone the other way, where the father does perish, and then Joanne comes home to her teary-eyed mother who gives her the bad news. She could then warn her traumatized mom by saying: ‘You better make sure you’re always supportive, or otherwise the same thing will happen to you.’

My Rating: 8 out of 10

Released: 1982 (Direct-to-video)

Runtime: 1 Hour 29 Minutes

Not Rated

Director: Lindsay C. Vickers

Studio: First Principle Film Productions

Available: DVD, Blu-ray, The Criterion Channel

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Posted in 80's Movies, British Movies, Foreign Films, Horror, Moody/Stylish, Mystery, Road Movies

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The Boogens (1981)

Posted on October 25, 2026 | Leave a comment

By Richard Winters

My Rating: 2 out of 10

4-Word Review: Creatures unleashed from mine.

It’s decided that a Colorado mine, that has been closed for 100 years, should be reopened and Brian (John Crawford) and Dan (Med Flory) are the two men heading the company that has been paid to excavate it. Unbeknownst to them there are large, scaly creatures hidden inside the mine that have been dormant for a century, but with the recent activity, have been awakened and begin to terrorize the people renting out a house nearby.

The film starts out with some potential. I enjoyed the turn-of-the-century photos seen over the opening credits depicting miners and settlers from when Colorado was just becoming a state. The amusing dialogue features some quick-witted responses and interplay. Too many horror films, particularly from the 70’s and 80’s would have stilted conversations, so at least here it’s snappy. It’s also great that it was filmed on location where they get the sights and sounds of living in a cold climate just right particularly the noise that is made when someone walks over freshly packed snow. The nudity by Rebecca Balding, brought on by the suggesting of director James L. Conway, whom she later married, as a way to ‘spice things up’, isn’t bad either.

Unfortunately, on a horror scale it’s pretty limp. The biggest issue is how long it takes for the scares to get going. It’s not until the 52-minute mark where we get a glimpse of the creature and even then, it’s only a tentacle. It then takes another 15-minutes before we see its face and body. I’m okay for some horror films to take their time to build up the tension as long as the payoff is good, but here that’s just not the case. There are too many gimmicks like the people, and the viewer, thinking there’s something frightening lurking only for it to turn out to be the pet dog. It’s okay if this is done once, but here it goes to the well too often until it seems like the dog is the star and maybe he should’ve been.

Exactly what these creatures are, and how they got there, needs better explaining. Why do they only inhabit this one little mine and how can they last so long without food? I know bears can hibernate during the winter, but that’s only for a few months, but we’re expected to believe that these things can do it for over a century? If they are hungry for flesh as the movie’s tagline suggests, then why don’t they eat the people when they do catch them instead of just clawing them up a bit? Watching one scarf down an adult human or two could’ve been cool and might’ve made the long wait seem worth it.

It’s unimpressive that only one creature was made for the production and that’s all you end up seeing if only fleetingly. They resemble a gargoyle from a gothic mansion and in fact gargoyles would actually be scarier. We also never get a full perspective of its body as only its head and front side is shown.

What shocked me the most though was how they only attack this one home. I was fully anticipating that the whole town would be under siege. Part of what made Tremors, which has a similar storyline, so good is that it took a whole community to bring the creatures down. Having more variety of onscreen personalities as well as weaponry and traps would’ve given the plot the imagination that it needed and deserved. Would’ve worked better as a horror film/disaster flick with some scientific ‘expert’ on hand to explain the origins of the species and an elaborate way to defeat them.

My Rating: 2 out of 10

Released: September 25, 1981

Runtime: 1 Hour 35 Minutes

Rated R

Director: James L. Conway

Studio: Taft International Pictures

Available: DVD, Blu-ray, Amazon Video, YouTube

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Posted in 80's Movies, Cold Climate/Wintertime Movies, Horror, Movies with a rural setting, Movies with Nudity

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The Unseen (1980)

Posted on October 21, 2026 | Leave a comment

By Richard Winters

My Rating: 5 out of 10

4-Word Review: Deformed son kills guests.

Jennifer (Barbara Bach) is a local news reporter who decides to take her sister Karen (Karen Lamm) and friend Vicki (Lois Young) out to Solvang, California where she plans to cover the Danish Cultural Festival that is being held there. When they arrive, they learn that there’s been an error and the hotel room they had booked is now taken and there’s no other vacancies in the town. They then meet Ernest (Sydney Lassick) a museum owner who tells them he can take them to his rural home where they can spend the night. With no other options they take up his invitation. When they arrive, they are met with Virginia (Lelia Goldoni) whom he describes as being his wife, but who is actually his sister that he’s been carrying on a relationship with for the past 20 years. They’ve also giving birth to a deformed child (Stephan Furst) who resides in the basement and comes out to kill the women through the heating vents.

Sometimes the most interesting aspect of a horror movie is simply the casting. Lassick, a balding, overweight, middle-aged man, spent the better part of his career playing lovable losers and goofballs. He’s probably best known for his performance as one of the patients in One Flew Over the Cuckoo’s Nest and likely the last person you’d ever consider as being a menacing killer but here, he’s given that role and does amazingly well. In some ways because he goes so much against the grain from what we genuinely accept from psycho characters, both in his looks, age, and behavior, that it actually makes him even scarier and more unpredictable and thus each scene he’s in becomes riveting. It also helps with the plot logic. Most women would not feel comfortable accepting the invitation of going to a man’s house that they’ve just met but since this guy looks and behaves like such a chump, I could see the girls feeling confident around him, almost like he was inferior to them, and that they’d be able to hold their own and remain in control.

Goldoni is another intriguing casting choice. She had broken into the movie scene in the 50’s by starring in John Cassavetes landmark hit Shadows but had been relegated to supporting roles since. Here it’s more her youthfulness that’s the most impressive. She was already in her mid-40’s at the time, but still looking as young as the three women in their 20’s and it’s a shame, she wasn’t given more lines and sequestered to only conveying one type of facial expression, which is of the distraught variety.

On the flip side I wasn’t nearly as impressed with the main characters. Bach, better known as being the wife of Ringo Starr, may be pretty, but her presence is flat and lifeless. Her two friends aren’t much better particularly Karen who in private makes fun of Goldoni for greeting them while showing clear signs of being upset about something. However, why would this be a source of ridicule? She may have very good reason to being upset that the girls know nothing about, and a normal individual would show concern and curiosity while considering it a possible red flag versus making light of it.

I did like the Victorian style home and the fact that we first see it during the daylight instead of the proverbial nighttime, still made it creepy. My only complaint here was that the interiors were too neat and tidy. A home should reflect the personality of its owners, and these people were anything but neat and tidy in their inner lives, so the maintaining of the place should’ve given some clue to that like having it messy or filled with junk.

Ultimately though it’s the lack of scares and violence that really does it in. The killings are too easy and it’s debatable whether any of it would be enough to kill them. For instance, one of the ladies has the metal vent lid fall on her head, which causes her to instantly die, but in reality, that might’ve only created a cranial fracture, or concussion. Being able to strangle the other one, by grabbing onto the ends of a scarf she’s wearing and then pulling on it through the vent holes is also questionable. It might’ve causes her to pass out, but complete suffocation isn’t as believable. When she does get discovered, it would’ve been cool had she been turned around and, since her face had been pressed against it, the vent grid had been etched onto the side of her face and the fact that they didn’t think to show this was a missed opportunity.

The exposing of the dark secret could’ve been handled much better. It’s not exactly clear where the father’s voice is coming from. We can only surmise that it comes during a drunken dream that Lassick has while sitting in his living room, but the whole thing is very on-the-nose as he just sits there looking sheepish while the voice over explains the whole backstory instead of seeing it play out via a flashback, which would’ve added much more to the shock value.

The reveal of the deformed adult child is yet another letdown. Furst plays it well, but he’s just not scary. In fact, he comes off more like someone to feel sorry for. The word unseen is in the title, so the perpetrator should be out of sight the whole time, or maybe some quick flash of his face at the very end, but having him come into play the way he does makes the whole thing rather contrived and doesn’t help to make this one stand out from any of the other stalker horror movies already out there.

My Rating: 5 out of 10

Released: June 5, 1981

Runtime: 1 Hour 34 Minutes

Rated R

Director: Danny Steinmann

Studio: World  Norhtal

Available: DVD, Blu-ray

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The Funhouse (1981)

Posted on October 13, 2026 | Leave a comment

By Richrd Winters

My Rating: 5 out of 10

4-Word Review: Terror at the carnival.

Amy (Elizabeth Berridge) is a teen who goes out on a double date with her new boyfriend Buzz (Cooper Huckabee) along with her friend Li (Largo Woodruff) and her boyfriend Richie (Miles Chapin). Despite her reluctance, and promising her parents that she wouldn’t, she goes along with the three to the traveling carnival that is in town. While there Richie comes up with the idea that they should spend the night in the funhouse as a dare. The four sneak into the attic, but then witness, through the cracks in the floorboards, one of the carnival workers, who wears a mask to hide his hideously deformed face, kill Carmelita (Sylia Miles) the fortune teller. When the funhouse barker (Kevin Conway) realizes they’ve witnessed it, as well as stolen their money, they go after the kids, who are now trapped.

While the plot has some intriguing elements and the pacing manages to keep things creepy, I did feel that the creativity was lacking. Nowhere is this more evident than the opening bit where Amy’s kid brother attacks her with a rubber knife while she’s in the shower that is a complete rip-off from both Psycho and Halloween. The storyline is bland and predictable. I was hoping for something more surreal like they go into the funhouse and all these freaky things begin to happen to them and then find themselves trapped inside and forced to fight off a mysterious demonic power.

The killer that is named Gunther and played by Wayne Doba I didn’t find scary at all. He wears a Frankenstein mask most of the time and then when his true hideous face is exposed it really wasn’t the shocking moment that I think the filmmakers had intended. Despite being created by noted special effects artist Rick Baker I felt it looked very much like a plastic mask that just didn’t seem all that grotesque. You also feel somewhat sorry for the guy. Like he’s someone who’s been mistreated and not necessarily fear. In Larry Block’s original script Gunther was shown raping and killing another couple who had come to the funhouse earlier. While this would’ve been much more violent, I think it would’ve also heightened the tension. It’d make clear right from the start that this was a dangerous guy with bad intent instead of sitting around for the first 30-minutes not knowing exactly what’s going to happen, or even who the true villain is.

The acting is good all-around especially Berridge who has a natural beauty and behaves the way a shy, awkward teen would, and you feel bonded to her emotionally. In fact, for me the scariest part of the whole film, and the most memorable, is when she sees her parents at the carnival, while she’s trapped in the funhouse, and she scream out to them for help, but they can’t hear her due to the large electrical fan.

Spoiler Alert!

The supporting cast is good too as each of the teens has a distinct personality and avoid for the most part as coming off like caricatures. Miles Chapin plays the guy that just keeps getting the group in more and more trouble. First, he’s the one that comes up with the idea of spending the night there, then he steals the money, which makes the barker want to go after them and then it’s his lighter that falls through the floorboard cracks that alerts everyone to their whereabouts. He was such an idiot that when his dead body, that has an ax through the back of his head, comes wheeling by, I felt the remaining three should’ve cheered it instead of being horrified. At least when he’s dead, he can’t get them into any more of a mess.

Conway is excellent and so is Sylvia Miles, who at the time was the most well-known member of the cast. I loved the moment where she’s giving this fake psychic reading and her accent changes midway through. Having her get killed though was a real disappointment as keeping her working alongside the two men to get the kids would’ve made it more interesting. I didn’t feel the scenes where Gunther pays her to have sex with him and then prematurely ejaculates was even needed. Just having the kids steal their money would’ve been enough motive to have them chased down.

In 2017 writer Larry Block was able to buy back his screenplay in an attempt to produce a remake that would stay more loyal to the way it was originally written. I think it’s worth a shot as this version misses-the-mark though there’s been no updates about it since then.

My Rating: 4 out of 10

Released: March 13, 1081

Runtime: 1 Hour 36 Minutes

Rated R

Director: Tobe Hooper

Studio: Universal

Available: DVD, Blu-ray, Amazon Video

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Posted in 80's Movies, Cult, Horror, Movies that take place in Florida, Movies with Nudity

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The Awakening (1980)

Posted on October 5, 2026 | Leave a comment

By Richard Winters

My Rating: 1 out of 10

4-Word Review: Queen possesses his daughter.

Based on the 1903 Bran Stoker novel ‘The Jewel of the Seven Stars’, the film centers around Matthew (Charlton Heston) who is at an archeological dig in Egypt in 1961 along with his assistant Jane (Susanah York) and his wife Anne (Jill Townsend) who is pregnant with their child. One day he and Jane come upon a lost tomb that houses Queen Kara. When the tomb is opened it unleashes her spirit, which resides itself in the baby that Anne is carrying. The delivery is painful and at one point puts Anne into a trance, but the baby survives even though at first it was considered still born. Anne takes the child and leaves the country while also divorcing Matthew. Eighteen years later Matthew is now married to Jane and working at a college professor in England. He reunites with his daughter Margaret (Stephanie Zimblast) but finds her displaying odd behaviors and eventually realizes that she’s possessed.

The movie seems intent on stealing ideas and effects from The Omen, as well as The Exorcist. The scares and effects are light and at times non-existent, which is the biggest thing going against it. When there is a killing, it comes off as very routine, or something stolen from another, better movie, particularly the sequence dealing with York falling from a balcony. The on-location shooting, shot mostly in Egypt, is picturesque, but that’s unfortunately about the only good thing I can say about it as everything else fall flat and is boring.

Heston’s presence doesn’t help things. During the opening sequence, when he’s supposed to be ‘younger’ he already looks too old, like he’s better prepared to be a grandfather than a father expecting a newborn. The only thing that changes when he gets ‘older’ is that he grows a goatee, which in some ways actually makes him appear younger. York has the same problem. During the modern-day scenes, she has longer hair while in the segments when she was supposed to be younger, she has short hair, which makes her appear older and the styles should’ve been reversed.

Townsend, this marks to date her last film appearance, doesn’t change at all between the two time periods and looks more like Zimblast’s older sister than her mother. My biggest gripe is the way her eyes never blink when she’s in her trance, which would’ve caused severe damage to the cornea and potential vision loss. Meaning that when she does ultimately snap out of her trance it most likely would’ve blinded her though here it has no effect.

Zimblast is the best thing about it. The scenes done with her inside her therapist’s office are effective and it would’ve worked better had she been the main character all the way through. She could’ve been like Linda Blair in The Exorcist, an otherwise nice person who doesn’t understand why she’s having these strange thoughts and impulses, and the viewer could’ve gotten wrapped up in hoping she could find some answers before it’s too late. Making it a mystery about what was causing it would’ve been more intriguing than spelling it all out right away.

Spoiler Alert!

The ending is a huge letdown as it has Heston dying while Zimblast goes completely into queen mode but then cuts to the credits. This then leaves open a whole plethora of questions. Like what happens to her? Does she go out and terrorize the world as this queen, or remain in the tomb and if so, what does she do there? Is she ever able to fight off the spirit and come back to being herself? This is stuff we needed to see and not just have left hanging, which makes the viewer feel unsatisfied and like they’ve only seen half a movie.

My Rating: 1 out of 10

Release: October 31, 1980

Runtime: 1 Hour 45 Minutes

Rated R

Director: Mike Newell

Studio: Orion Pictures

Available: 

 

 

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Posted in 80's Movies, Foreign Films, Horror, Movies Based on Novels

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When Time Ran Out (1980)

Posted on September 21, 2026 | Leave a comment

By Richard Winters

My Rating: 0 out of 10

4-Word Review: A big volcanic eruption.

Hank (Paul Newman) works on an oil rig that’s on a small tropical island who becomes concerned that the giant volcano there is ready to erupt. Shelby (William Holden) owns and runs a resort hotel that’s also on the island and is reticent to accept the warnings that Hank gives him as he’s afraid the news might panic his guests and cause undue harm to his business. He’s further backed up by Bob (James Franciscus) who has inherited the island from his father and wants to turn the location into a tourist local. He tries to assure the guests that even if the volcano erupts the hotel will be sturdy enough to withstand it, but Hank openly disagrees and tells those that are willing to listen that they should come with him who will take them to a safer location.

While disaster flicks were quite plentiful during the 70’s and often times ridiculed, I found most of them to be marginally entertaining and sometimes even well done, but this one is quite clearly the absolute worst. The idea for the film was ‘inspired’ by the 1969 novel ‘The Day the World Ended’ by Gordon Thomas, which was the true account of when Mount Pelee erupted in 1902 and killed 30,000 people. Had it stuck to being a historical recreation it might’ve worked, but producer Irwin Allen decided to modernize the setting and characters until nothing from the original story is left making it just another generic formula piece too reminiscent of other better films that had done it before and which offers no substance, or anything new.

The characters are of a stock variety and unable to propel the story. Newman is especially weak, he’s one of my favorite actors, but here it’s quite obvious that his heart wasn’t in it and he’s just phoning it in the whole way. Bisset is also wasted and the secret love affair that they have, she’s supposed to be marrying Holden who proposes to her, isn’t interesting because there’s never any big clash between the two men, so what’s the point of introducing a dramatic element if it comes with no payoff?

The rest of the cast suffer similarly boring dilemmas including Red Buttons who plays a fugitive being tailed by a cop played by Ernest Borgnine. The two are immediately at odds, but then when Borgnine gets injured during the volcanic event Buttons decides to come to his aid. While this is initially touching it ends up getting overplayed as Buttons continues to help him more and more until you forget that they were ever adversaries and the original irony gets completely lost.

Veronica Hamel is wasted here too playing the wife of Franciscus who is apparently unaware that she’s been played throughout her marriage, as he’s been secretly carrying on with another woman. I just can’t believe that she would be that fooled that much. Most women have a sense when something in their relationship is off, and I think she would’ve internally known he was cheating even if she couldn’t prove it. The scene where she’s finally forced to face the harsh reality doesn’t have much energy as all she does is walk away. Having her angrily attack the cheater, or the other women, or maybe even pushed them into the lava when it hits the place, would’ve given it some interesting payoff, instead of it just ending on a flat note like everything else.

Having so many people refuse to go with Newman to seek safety I didn’t buy into. There was nothing special about the hotel, which resembled more like a business building, that would convince me that it was ‘specially built, for volcanoes and would be a safe place to stay. Most people when they’re in a dangerous situation want to be doing something and not just sitting in one place waiting to die and feebly hoping for the best. Granted there still might be some that would choose to stay behind, but I felt it would’ve been a much smaller number and with that in mind we should’ve seen them pay for their bad decision by observing the shocked looks on their faces when the hotel crumbles versus an explosion that gets matted onto the film negative and looks completely fake.

I could almost handle the cardboard characters and storyline if the special effects were at least halfway decent, but they end up being the biggest letdown. Apparently, the budget got slashed significantly halfway through the production forcing them to put up with subpar effects that is just so bad it’s laughable. What’s the point of even doing a disaster flick if the whole source of what we’re supposed to fear, which is the volcano, resembles nothing more than an animated painting? Even the flowing hot lava looks cheesy like it was all done in front of a green screen making the whole crossing the bridge segment, which was intended to be the film’s tension packed highlight, come off as boring and unconvincing.

The only positive thing I can say about it is that Franciscus plays an excellent antagonist. He spent most of his career as generic good guys, so having him go against type for once, was a refreshing change of pace, but unfortunately the rest of the film is so bad that his efforts were largely forgotten and didn’t help propel his career in any type of interesting way.

My Rating: 0 out of 10

Released: March 28, 1980

Runtime: 1 Hours 49 Minutes

Rated PG

Director: James Goldstone

Studio: Warner Brothers

Available: DVD, Amazon Video, YouTube

 

 

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Posted in 80's Movies, Disaster Flicks, Movies Based on Novels, Movies with a Hotel setting

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Raise the Titanic (1980)

Posted on September 14, 2026 | 3 comments

By Richard Winters

My Rating: 1 out of 10

4-Word Review: Vessel brought to surface.

Government operative Dirk Pitt (Richard Jordan) along with the CIA become aware of an abandoned mine in Siberia that had a rare mineral called byzanium, which could be used to shoot down nuclear missiles. It was supposedly packaged into boxes and loaded onto the Titanic. The US Government now wants to obtain those boxes before the Soviets do and come to the conclusion that the only way to do it would be by raising the sunken ship to the surface.

The film is based on the 1976 novel of the same name written by Clive Cussler and universally panned for its weak characterizations and dialogue, but the plot itself was intriguing enough for Hollywood to take a stab at it. The result though isn’t much better as there’s too many people in the cast many of which are talking head figures like Jason Robards. He’s an excellent actor, but here his only task is to relay orders from other top officials and then stand around and look worried as the plans come into play. David Selby is also quite weak, but this is more because he isn’t an effective leading man and his overall presence is transparent and unnecessary.

Jordan is the only one that does well and had he remained at the center of it, it would’ve worked better. However, there’s no one to become attached to emotionally and the banal dialogue doesn’t give any of them any real distinction. They all seem alike and when one of the submersibles with several men on it implodes it has no impact and you really don’t care.

The book, as flawed as it may have been, actually did things a little better, at least plot wise. It had a hurricane come in, which allowed the soviets to take over the ship and hold the rest of the crew hostage, which then culminated in a battle. The movie though doesn’t touch on any of this. Here only one Soviet spy boards the ship but then realizes he’s easily outnumbered and essentially gives up making it all seem rather pointless to have introduced that angle at all. Granted the hurricane wasn’t included for budgetary reasons, but it certainly would’ve helped bring in more tension of which there isn’t much.

The way the ship gets brought back up to the surface is a bit suspect. I have no expertise in the matter, but it seemed too easy to the extent that it feels almost like a non-event. The special effects are subpar. It’s obvious that it’s a toy model and therefore not half as impressive to look at as it comes to the surface as I’m sure the producers thought it would be. The only moment that I did like is when Jordan boards the ship for the first time. Unfortunately, he only enters one room and then it cuts away. Would’ve been fascinating seeing him walk all around the ship going into many different rooms, but this was again likely scrapped due to the same budget constraints.

Spoiler Alert!

The biggest letdown is with the ending, which is similar to the one in the book where they find the boxes inside the ship’s vault to be filled with nothing more than sand. Then it is deduced, using wildly circumstantial clues, that the rare mineral was buried in a gravesite at a cemetery in Southby, England. However, when this is determined the American agents decide to leave it there, but why was it so important to get their hands on the mineral before, but now suddenly it isn’t? What if the Soviets, or some terrorist group, figure out the locations of the mineral and dig it up? Wouldn’t that still create the same frightening scenario that the US was hoping to avoid when they took so much time, effort, and money to bring up the ship?

This makes the whole thing not only a waste of time for the viewer, but also the taxpayers who funded what amounts to being just a wild goose chase. It becomes an inadvertent satire on government waste and misguided operations and on that level, it succeeds, but as a story it should remain sunk and submerged.

My Rating: 1 out of 10

Released: July 30, 1980

Runtime: 1 Hour 54 Minutes

Rated PG

Director: Jerry Jameson

Studio: ITC Entertainment

Available: DVD, Blu-ray, Amazon Video, Fawesome, Plex, Roku, Tubi, YouTube

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Posted in 80's Movies, Action/Adventure, Drama on the High Seas, Movies Based on Novels

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Where Are the Children? (1985)

Posted on August 31, 2026 | Leave a comment

By Richard Winters

My Rating: 2 out of 10

4-Word Review: Her kids go missing.

Nancy (Jill Clayburgh) is a married to Clay (Max Gail) and living in Cape Cod with their two children Michael (Harley Cross) and Missy (Elisabeth Harnois). Nancy has a dark past. Nine years earlier she had two other children, Peter and Lisa, who vanished and later found drowned. She was convicted of the crimes but then released on a legal technicality. She remarried, as her first husband (Frederic Forrest), despondent over the deaths, killed himself though his body was never found. Everything was going great until the nine-year anniversary of the deaths when her current two children go missing while playing in their backyard. Could this be just a coincidence, or is someone from the past crimes involved with this one?

The film is based on the Mary Higgins Clark debut novel of the same name, which in turn was inspired by the real-life case of Alice Crimmins, who was convicted in the deaths of her two children, but like in the movie, was later released. The concept has a lot of potential, but for me a lot of tension gets lost when right away we’re shown who the bad guy is and his interactions with the kids. Don’t get me wrong, Forrest is a fine actor and it’s fun seeing him play a nut case and the kids are really good too, but it would’ve been more intriguing had we seen things solely from Clayburgh’s perspective where we really didn’t know much more than she did and having the kids suddenly disappear could’ve been played up as a surreal nightmare.

It’s also cartoonish when the bad guy, who’s been spying on them through a telescope, has to write in his notebook in big letters ‘TOMORROW’ with an exclamation mark in reference to his plan to go through with the kidnapping the next day, but people only write notes to themselves when they’re living busy lives and doing several different projects at once. With this guy it’s the only thing he’s been obsessing over, so therefore no note was needed as he was clearly not going to forget.

The supporting cast is quite dull particularly Gail as the second husband. It’s great that he takes his wife’s side and insists she has nothing to do with the missing kids, but after a while I would think, some doubt would have to creep in. He keeps insisting that he ‘knows’ she didn’t do it, but how could he? He wasn’t home when it happened and because it’s such a coincidence with the past crime any normal person would have to have some suspicion towards her. Having him start to suspect her, even if it’s just slightly, as the film progresses would’ve created an interesting subplot and made his character less one dimensional.

The main character has problems too. For one thing the odds of her having two kids in her second marriage, that are the exact same age as the two from her previous one, including the boy older than the girl, is too astronomically high to be believable. Even her having just one kid, compared to two from the first, would’ve been enough and not made the kids from the second one seem like just a generic carbon copy.

I also felt that if someone has lost her kids in such a traumatic way that she’d been more protective of these to the point that she might go a bit overboard by not letting them play outside or only letting them go out if she was always right there to watch them. Her taking a shower while the kids are outside makes her look irresponsible. When I was a kid one parent would watch the kids while the other one bathed. Bad things and accidents can happen to kids in a matter of seconds and with the water running, she’d have no way to hear it.

For a career move taking this role was a big mistake. Jill had been in several films during the late 70’s and early 80’s that had won high acclaim and she seemed set to become the big leading lady of the 80’s, but she then made the mistake of starring in Hanna K. a Costa-Garvas directed film that saw limited release, so for many filmgoers it seemed like she had disappeared from the film scene and was no longer in the limelight for a good four years. This film role was meant to be her ‘comeback’, but she really doesn’t have much to do for most of it other than sitting around inside the police station wearing a stupor like expression. She kind of comes on strong at the end when she decides she’ll go and save the kids on her own, but she’s just a thin woman with no weapon or any idea who the bad guy is, or how many of them, making it likely that she could easily be overpowered and thus should’ve let the police do it instead.

Spoiler Alert!

The ending, and the reveal of who the bad guy is, is a big letdown. Like I said earlier Forrest gives an interesting performance, but to have him be the first husband who somehow faked his own suicide, isn’t plausible. For one thing it should’ve been reported as a missing person case and not a suicide since his body was never found. At the very least his identity should’ve been kept a mystery till the end when Jilly confronts him in the home versus having sharp-eyed kid recognize him earlier from a news report.

His motivations for why he seeks ‘revenge’ on Jill is confusing. Supposedly he was a closet pedophile who played kinky games on Jill who he forced to dress like a child and when she refused to keep doing that, he started to do it on their kids and then killed them when they threatened to tell, but if anything, he should’ve been happy that Jill was accused of the crime while he was allowed to walk free without suspicion. Would’ve made more sense had the husband really killed himself and then someone who was close to him, like maybe a brother, decided to seek out revenge on Jill while under the mistaken impression that she really had murdered the first children and then unjustly let out.

My Rating: 2 out of 10

Released: November 15, 1986

Runtime: 1 Hour 37 Minutes

Rated R

Director: Bruce Malmuth

Studio: Columbia Pictures

Available: DVD (Out-of-Print), Amazon Video, YouTube

 

 

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Posted in 80's Movies, Kidnapping Movies, Movies Based on Novels, Obscure Movies, Thrillers/Suspense

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Pulse (1988)

Posted on August 24, 2026 | Leave a comment

By Richard Winters

My Rating: 3 out of 10

4-Word Review: Electrical current terrorizes family.

David (Joey Lawrence) moves in with this father (Cliff De Young) and stepmother (Roxanne Hart) for what everyone hopes will be fun and relaxing summer. However, a strange electrical current of unknown origin has infiltrated the grid that controls the appliances of their home. It has already destroyed the home across the street and now seems intent to do the same to theirs. Will the family be able to fight it off and survive, or will they become victims as well?

At the outset before watching the film I was really surprised why this wasn’t better known as I had only become aware of it just recently. Some may argue that because it was given only a limited release that caused it to die off into obscurity, but there’s a lot of movies that weren’t well known when first shown but later acquired a cult following and with this type of premise, you’d think it would make for a good candidate. The special effects, particularly the ones shown inside the electrical circuitry, is impressive and well ahead of its time.

Unfortunately, it gets too invested into these shots. Watching the inner wiring of machines melt away up close is fascinating to see, but having it go back to it in what seems 5 or 8 more times, it starts to get boring and redundant. The other effects, the ones done outside of the machinery, is not nearly as effective. Seeing the family’s TV go ‘haywire’ by having small bleeps appear on the screen will not freak out anybody, and for today’s viewers will come off as nothing more than somebody’s screensaver. Having the washer/dryer backfire a bit in the kid’s face as he looks under it, isn’t real exciting either and for the first hour these are the only so-called ‘scares’ that you’ll see.

Joey Lawrence was not a good casting choice. His claim to fame at the time was his appearances on the TV-Show ‘Gimme a Break’ where his basic talents centered on his singing ability and being an adorable little kid, but in a dramatic setting his exaggerated facial expressions particularly when he’s frightened are over-the-top and a more subtle nuance would’ve been preferrable. I didn’t care for his kid brother Matthew, who plays a neighbor kid, either. I couldn’t understand why his befriending of that kid was even put in as it doesn’t amount to much with the plot. Had they both teamed up to battle the pulse then fine, but that’s not how it works here. I also didn’t get the need for why Joey was a product of a divorce as that angle doesn’t make any difference and he could’ve just been their kid and living there right from the beginning. On that note too his bed, which is styled like a race car, looked cheesy and something better suited for a 4-year-old then someone ready to turn 12.

De Young and Hart are far better actors, and I would’ve preferred it to have just been them fighting the evil force, or maybe also having an infant child to protect, and not having Lawrence in it at all. I realize that in order to attract a youthful audience the main character needed to be a kid, but ultimately it detracts from the tension, what little there is, versus making it stronger. I was also disappointed that Hart disappears halfway through as she was the one thing that kept it together and her absence is sorely missed.

Spoiler Alert!

The scares and action do get more pronounced during the third act, and some may describe this part as being moderately riveting, but having the dad and son work together to battle it doesn’t have much meaning. Had the two been at odds at the beginning and then gotten past their differences in order to battle a common enemy then it might’ve had impact, but there’s no character journey, or arc at all, so ultimately, it’s a generic outing.

It’s also frustrating that no explanation is ever given for what’s behind this force. At the beginning we see a bolt of lightning come out of the sky and strike a power cord, so it seems like it’s simply an act of nature, but as the story progresses it becomes obvious that this force, whatever it is, is ‘plotting’ and ‘thinking’, so what exactly is it? Having it travel to the neighbor’s house and start to harass them just deepens the mystery. Is this force just going to take down each house and family one at a time? And when it gets done with this cul-de-sac is it going to move on to another one and another subdivision and so on until it destroys every house in the country? Who’s going to stop it, or is that even possible? These are all questions that needed to be answered and instead it ends right when it starts to get interesting making it a cop-out that promises way more than it delivers.

My Rating: 3 out of 10

Released: March 11, 1988

Runtime: 1 Hour 31 Minutes

Rated PG-13

Director: Paul Golding

Studio: Columbia Pictures

Available: DVD, Blu-ray, Amazon Video, Roku, YouTube

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Posted in 80's Movies, Sci-Fi, Thrillers/Suspense

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Loophole (1981)

Posted on August 11, 2026 | Leave a comment

By Richard Winters

My Rating: 3 out of 10

4-Word Review: Robbing an ‘impenetrable’ vault.

Mike (Albert Finney) is a career safe cracker who finds their last job unrewarding as the loot was less than expected. He decides their next project will be breaking into a bank safe that is supposedly impenetrable, but with one unknown loophole as it’s housed near a main sewer line. He comes up with the idea that he and his men will go into the sewer tunnels and drill holes through the brick walls until they can get underneath where the safe is and then drill through the floor of that until they can get inside. Of course, once they get into the safe it will set off alarms, but the police will not suspect anyone’s inside as the safe door will still be locked shut. In order for their plans to work they’ll need the assistance of Stephen (Martin Sheen) an architect who will be able to locate where the safe is while they’re tunneling underground. At first, he resists, but pressure by his wife (Susannah York) for him to maintain their affluent lifestyle eventually gets him to agree.

The film starts out in a highly unusual way in that with no backstory, or set-up, or even credits jolt the viewer right into a robbery in progress, watching in detail as Mike and his assistants break into a safe, which is disconcerting.  I almost thought there was some sort of glitch in the streaming of the film, and I had somehow come into it in the middle half and completely bypassed the beginning and this goes on for about 5-minutes. Without knowing who these characters are, or why they’re doing it, it’s not interesting or captivating. The result is off-putting and gives the production an amateur vibe.

When the story does finally come into play it still remains fairly awkward. I was surprised that Finney, who had taken a 4-year break from film acting, would choose this one for his ‘comeback’. The character he plays here is dull and one-dimensional and offers no real arc, or emotion. It’s interesting to an extent to see that he lives in affluence with a family, but the woman who plays his wife looks too similar to York, who plays Sheen’s spouse and thus it gets confusing at times, and more effort should’ve been made to make her distinct from the other.

Sheen does better as at the very least you see some change occur in the person he plays and some drama, at least at the very beginning, in his scenes. I liked how he’s resistant to the plan initially by constantly desribing himself as ‘an honest man’, which allows for some tension, but the way he ultimately caves is disappointing. There is the fact that he’s unemployed and in need of the money, but there still should’ve remained friction all the way through. If honesty is truly important to him then there should be lingering guilt about what he’s getting into and evidence of an inner struggle versus him ultimately just becoming ‘one of the guys’.

The robbery itself is pedestrian and been done before in other films. Having their truck get a flat tire, in order for the crew to slide through a trap door of the vehicle and into the manhole cover of the sewer without being detected, seemed too risky especially since it gets done in the daytime instead of under the darkness of night. At one point even the police drive by, which could’ve backfired as once the robbery has been committed, and the investigators realize how it was done they’ll immediately backtrack to the truck and research from the license plate who owned or rented it. Making it probable that they might not have been able to get away with it and would ultimately be caught.

Spoiler Alert!

The most disappointing aspect should’ve been the most exciting. It has to do with the sewer tunnels flooding during an unexpected rainstorm. Finney and his colleagues decide to wade their way through it, but Sheen hangs back insisting he’d rather stay in the safe though this will risk him getting caught once the bank opens on Monday morning.  Watching the water push up through the hole in the floor of the safe eventually creating an entire pool, which gives Sheen less and less room to stay above it, is quite intense, but then the film sells out in the most horrible fashion I’ve even seen, where he’s shown ‘waking up’ inside his own bathtub with absolutely no explanation of how he got out of the safe. If that’s not a copout I don’t what is and seriously ruins the film to the extent that I suggest no one bother to watch it as the stupid ending just destroys the whole thing.

My Rating: 3 out of 10

Released: March 13, 1981

Runtime: 1 Hour 45 Minutes

Rated PG

Director: John Quested

Studio: Goldcrest Films International

Available: DVD, Blu-ray, Fawesome, Plex, Roku, Tubi, Amazon Video

 

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Posted in 80's Movies, British Movies, Foreign Films, Heist Movies, Movies Based on Novels, Robbing Banks

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