Mil gritos tiene la noche (1982)

User Rating:

5.3/10   

Director:

Juan Piquer Simón

Writers:

Dick Randall (screenplay) and
Joe D'Amato (screenplay)

Release Date:

23 September 1983 (USA)

Genre:

Horror | Thriller

Tagline:

You Don't Have To Go To Texas For A Chainsaw Massacre!

Plot:

Young co-eds are being cut up by a chainsaw killer on a college campus. The killer is attempting to...

Plot Keywords:

Cut | Chainsaw | Jigsaw Puzzle | Serial Killer | Pieces

Cast

Christopher George	...	Det. Lt. Bracken
Lynda Day George	...	Mary Riggs (as Linda Day)
Frank Braña	...	Det. Sgt. Holden
Edmund Purdom	...	The Dean
Ian Sera	...	Kendall James
Paul L. Smith	...	Willard (as Paul Smith)
Jack Taylor	...	Prof. Arthur Brown
Gérard Tichy	...	Dr. Jennings
May Heatherly	...	Mrs. Reston
Hilda Fuchs	...	Grace - the Dean's Secretary
Isabel Luque	...	Sylvia Costa
Roxana Nieto
Cristina Cottrelli		(as Cristina Cottrel)
Leticia Marfil
Silvia Gambino

Also Known As:

One Thousand Cries Has the Night
Pieces (USA)

Runtime:

France:87 min | Greece:90 min | USA:89 min

Country:

USA | Spain | Puerto Rico

Language:

Spanish | English

Color:

Color

Aspect Ratio:

1.85 : 1

Sound Mix:

Mono

Certification:

Finland:K-18 | Canada:16+ (Quebec) | Australia:R | France:-16 | Spain:18 | UK:18 | USA:Unrated

Filming Locations:

Boston, Massachusetts, USA

Company:

Almena Films

Trivia:

The "look" of the killer was based on the comic book character "The Shadow", not as is often thought Italian 'giallo' cinema.

Goofs:

Factual errors: At the beginning of the film when the mother is screaming at her son over the pornographic puzzle she mentions that his father is in the Air Force. In 1942 when this scene took place, the US Air Force was not yet in existence. The main US flying force was called the US Army Air Corps until after WWII.

Quotes:

Sgt. Holden: I'll send you a box of lollipops.

Movie Connections:

Featured in Paul Smith: The Reddest Herring (2008) (V)

Terrible Film...Terrific Fun!

This unintentionally-hilarious nugget of badly-dubbed exploitation serves the best opening scene I've ever witnessed for explaining why kids grow up to become heavy-breathing, fedora-and-trenchcoat-wearing, chainsaw-wielding psychos. Child abuse, you immediately ask? Nah, that's so American. This 8-year old Spaniard falls off his rocker when Mommy discovers his stash of porn mags hidden inside his toybox and burns them...right in front of him! (I are not making this up.) In a sweat-inducing situation like that, how would you react? Well, this young 'un serves cold justice by sticking an axe in her head because...that's what sexually-repressed 8 year-old Eurotrash do. And away we go, kiddies. Flashforward to 1983 and a typical college campus where someone's chain-sawing the curvy co-eds, taking certain pieces and leaving the rest for the cops to trip over. Yes, Pieces definitively proves no amount of artsy mise-en-scene can overshadow the adrenaline rush of a good chainsaw killing. It's got tons of nudity, very graphic violence and gore. And best of all, absolutely no socially redeeming value whatsoever. Be forewarned, this movie also has the most deranged use of the word bastard in film history as undercover cop (and tennis champ!) Linda Day-George pulls out ALL her acting skills and screams the word 4 times in frustration because she was too busy turning down loud music to hear the nut-bag carving a victim in the very next room! Oh, and I loved the scene where the killer follows a half-naked coed onto an elevator while hiding a two-foot, 60-pound chainsaw...behind his back. And the scene involving a skateboarding disco bunny. And the gratuitous disco aerobics workout. And the school's crazy Kung-Fu instructor who kicks the gun from Linda's hand, knocks her to the ground, and then admits he had no reason for attacking her except...he ate some bad Chop Suey. (Again, I am not making this up, really.) Boys and Girls, ask anyone, you cannot put a price tag on this kind of entertainment. As the film's tagline once screamed, `You Don't Have To Go To Texas For A Chainsaw Massacre! It's Exactly What You Think!' Director Juan Piquer Simon, I ask you, `Where is your Thalberg Award?!'