“Summon the AAAy-toner!”
Can your soul stand
the theological implications of 1971’s The
Night God Screamed?
You get old-school 42nd
Street madness with this lost exploitation flick about the dangers of uncanny Bible-quoting
hippies and the generation gap.
Deliciously nasty
1970s trash, and a great midnight movie!
The Night God
Screamed
Dir. Lee Madden, 1971
USA, 85 min.
If you hate religion,
goodness gracious, do we have a flick for you! Not quite a “gem,” but certainly
an object of intense fascination: The Night God Screamed is an almost forgotten, “ripped from the headlines” grindhouse
flick that has gotten better with age as its subtextual philosophical questions
have gotten more prescient over the years.
Neither the
Manson-esque followers of psycho-prophet Billy Joe Harlan (a perfect Michael Sugich) nor the “Squares”
who spend their last dime on religious trinkets instead of necessities, are
spared: foolish Reverend Pierce has used this month’s mortgage payment on a
giant wooden cross; and drug-pushing Billy Joe exults to his faithful, “They
was all just a bunch of sinners...but I saved them, Lord! I showed them that
using dope was the way to turn on to You!
Meanwhile, Billy Joe’s
hooded henchman, the Atoner (“the
AAAy-toner!” shrieks the mystical nutjob in a way that will become a secret
code to everyone who sees this film), lurks and slaughters for his master, like
a medieval Jason Voorhies transplanted to suburban SoCal, prefiguring those
killers with superhuman powers who stalked 1980s slasher pix.
After testifying
against these “Kill for Jesus” freaks because they crucified (!) her preacher
husband, Fanny Pierce (former Hollywood starlet Jeanne Crain, fresh from 1967’s”youth
in revolt”/drag-racing exploiter Hot Rods
to Hell) finds herself in Straw Dogs
territory as the incensed cultists seek holy revenge—by stalking her to a house
where she’s babysitting, dig this, college
students.
Enlivened by beyond
over-the-top performances and some extraordinary documentary-style footage of
the soup kitchens of Los Angeles’ Skid Row, this is the exploitation market in
overdrive, plugging into then-topical/now-dated qualms: Fear the Hippies! The
Mansons are everywhere! Beware of longhairs! Christians are murderous,
brainwashed loonies! Hey, wait a minute…
Yet with all its sleazy
and grim turns, 1971’s The Night God
Screamed is a valid primer on the nature of guilt, earned or not—with a
great twist ending (that you should just forget I ever mentioned).
Helped by a
breakneck—hint, hint—pace, the script
that feels like something John Waters wrote, but taken absolutely seriously.
With nary a sense of
irony, the movie seems too bleak and malicious to be considered “Camp,” but its
overwrought earnestness means it should be seen as the epitome as such: the unselfconscious overacting, the old-fashioned Hippie-Fear,
the sociological pondering of the necessity of organized religion in an age of
random mass-murder and widespread unemployment—this movie seems to has faith in
its own nonsense, and it’s honestly infectious—while being too cheap and
slapdash to be completely believed.
Born and raised in
Brooklyn, director Lee Madden also helmed these exploitation classics: Hells Angels ’69 (1969; a must-see biker-heist
flick starring the actual Hells Angels) and the better-than-average
bikers-join-hippies-against-dune-buggies Angel
Unchained (1970).
The Night God Screamed is not available for home
viewing except as gray market options.
That said, I’m going
to try and screen this at the Spectacle Theater in Brooklyn in July; I’ve
started programming there and have got plenty of ideas and plans for a variety
of films.
You will be updated!
In fact, my
selections Mr. No Legs (1979) and Mercano el Marciano (2002) have
been scheduled for June; I’ll post again and with further detail in a little
while, when I know their exact dates.
Oh yeah, follow me on Twitter!
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