Death Screams (1982)

Director:

David Nelson

Writer:

Paul C. Elliott (writer)

Release Date:

May 1982 (USA)

Genre:

Horror

Tagline:

He wants their bodies...in pieces

Plot:

Teenagers are stalked and murdered by a maniac at a town fair.

Plot Keywords:

Carnival | Sheriff | Machete | Nudity | Mutilation

Cast

Susan Kiger	...	Lily Carpenter
Martin Tucker	...	Coach Neil Marshall
William T. Hicks	...	Sheriff Avery
Jennifer Chase	...	Ramona
Jody Kay	...	Sandy
John Kohler	...	Diddle
Andrea Savio	...	Kathy (as Andria Savio)
Kurt Rector	...	Bob
Josh Gamble	...	Tom
Hanns Manship	...	Casey
Helene Tryon	...	Edna Sharpe
Mary Fran Lyman	...	Agnes Bottomly
Monica Boston	...	Sheila
Mike Brown	...	Walker
Sharon Alley	...	Sara

Also Known As:

House of Death (USA) (working title)
Night Screams
The House of Death (Europe: English title) (video box title)

Runtime:

88 min

Country:

USA

Language:

English

Color:

Color

Sound Mix:

Mono

Certification:

Iceland:(Banned) | Norway:15 (video premiere) | UK:18 | USA:R

Filming Locations:

Lake Lure, North Carolina, USA

Company:

ABA Productions

Quotes:

Lily Carpenter: Maniacs lick hands too!

Today, it's pretty lame, but years ago...

When I was very young I always caught this on tv, it showed up on A&E a lot for some reason (I honestly don't know why), but when I saw it for the first few times, it sent chills down my spine. Today, after finally hunting down the long-gone video copy (under its more well-known title, "House of Death") of this eighties slasher thriller, it was fun to look back but this isn't really that great of a movie at all. It's full of lame actors, a bad script, slack pacing, among other things. It's true, the people who created this movie could've made it a whole lot better if they had at least put a little, oh, I don't know, thought, into it. They had potential. First off it had a few good aspects of it that still impress me today, and this includes the way the director captures the eerie atmosphere of a small town with the killer lurking in the shadows. There are effective shots of deep, dark, misty woods and wind-swept cemeteries which create an extremely unique atmosphere, and put together with a very scary, when he is at least hinted at or briefly onscreen, psychopathic killer who prowls around in bloodstained black "psycho gear" complete with his bloody machete at his side. The last half hour or so is alright, with some good aspects, even though the script and acting cannot match the atmosphere created by the director. The plot, as I've mentioned, makes basically no sense and neither does the killer's "motive", which really isn't even explained when he shows his face in the last few minutes. Even so, I still can't get over some of the aspects of this movie which still can send shivers down my spine, like the killer prowling through the cemetery while blonde Playboy Playmate Susan Kiger tells the "drip, drip" story to her wide-eyed friends, or the "double decapitation in the truck" sequence (this does have some pretty graphic deaths) as well as the scene where a girl falls through the stairs and has her belly violently ripped open by the machete-wielding killer who is waiting beneath. It sounds like I love this movie a lot, doesn't it, but actually the finale of the film just holds a special place in my "slasher movie watching" history, it's basically the only good thing to watch in the whole film, which wastes too much time with teenagers at a carnival or at a bonfire. Nothing really starts happening until about an hour into the film, when the always talked about "blonde skinny dipper gets her throat hacked out with a machete" sequence occurs, which is a definite must-see. If you are a hardcore slasher fan and want something really different and have not seen this, have fun hunting it down.