Review: A Night to Dismember (1983)
Directed by: Doris Wishman
Starring: Samantha Fox, Diane Cummins, Saul Meth
Written by: Judy J. Kushner
Music by: Danny Girlando
Country: United States
Available on: DVD (Frolic Pictures)
IMDb
Director Doris Wishman is kind of notorious for her cheapie sexploitation flicks, of which she made dozens during her lengthy career. But she took one crack at the horror genre: an absolutely, absurdly delirious nightmare entitled A Night to Dismember that’s so brain-addling and sense-melting it left an indelible impression in horror film history.
Let’s first pause for some brief background on the clusterfuck production of this thing. Filmed in 1979, the movie was intended to be Wishman’s homage to Halloween (1978) and the primary cut, starring Diane Cummins in the lead role, was reasonably coherent. But rumor goes that, during post-production, several reels of film were destroyed in a fire at the processing lab (or maybe a disgruntled employee of the lab intentionally ruined it), leaving only 60% or so of the film intact. Determined to get her crazy-ass slasher masterpiece on the streets, Wishman rewrote the screenplay and went out there and filmed additional stuff with porn star Samantha Fox as the lead. She cobbled this new shit together with old shit and outtake shit, hired McGruff the Crime Dog to record some velvety voiceover that attempts to explain what’s going on during this mess, and edited and released it in 1983 (or maybe 1989, since it seems no one can find evidence of any physical copies before ‘89). This cut is hereafter referred to as the “Fox Cut.” The Fox Cut went on to cult film infamy, and everyone lived happily ever after. Until 2018, when a copy of the “lost” print showed up on YouTube. Apparently, the cinematographer had a copy of it that he had never bothered to show to anyone before (hereafter referred to as the “Cummins Cut”).
Various plot summaries on the internet inform me that this movie is about a woman released from a mental institution who might be murdering members of her own family. I can’t be entirely sure this is accurate. The Fox Cut, despite reputation, is definitely more straightforward in this regard, thanks to the awful voiceover that plainly relays the events, even if you can’t discern any of it from watching what’s on screen. The plot of the Cummins Cut is decidedly more opaque, even though it’s supposedly what Wishman originally intended (there’s no way to know for sure, since she had died long before it was unearthed). The Cummins Cut features some narration, as well, though from a spooky old man hanging out in a graveyard whose blathering is much less helpful. There are a lot of the same murders, but the story focuses on different members of the same family and stuff occurs in a completely different order. The plot doesn’t matter one lick in either version.
Wishman’s more widely released Fox Cut is, presumably thanks to newly shot footage, a lot more bloody and more naked and probably appeals more to a typical slasher audience after some mammaries and some murder. But the obvious constraints of working with half a movie, some random new reels, and “creative editing” (used loosely) permeate every frame. There’s absolutely no regard for continuity in lighting, set design, haircuts, wardrobe, whatever. It’s thrown together for the fates, or the taxed psyches of its viewers, to reconcile. The music is a library grab-bag of old-timey sci-fi cuts; filler from ‘80s exercise vids; whooshes, bleeps, and scratches from Halloween sounds tapes; and upbeat elevator tunes taken straight from an after-school special. It’s terrible and it’s fascinating. It’s what happens when ingenuity and apathy paradoxically occupy the same brain-space.
The Cummins Cut, though bereft of the more sordid stuff, is a way more eerie experience. The semblance of linearity attempted in the Fox Cut is gone, replaced by entirely random events shaped mainly by Cummins’ Mary Kent wandering from one nightmarish death set-piece to another sans a kindly detective explaining what the fuck’s going on. The cheery soundtrack has been replaced by a dirge of contrabass, swirling metal scrapes, piano plinks, manipulated synths, tidal waves of reverb, whispered voices disembodied from anyone that might be speaking, and the whirl of the camera and the persistent buzz of room tone. None of the audio is remotely synced, which twists the entire experience inside-out. Most of the video is washed out to the edge of oblivion.
The Fox Cut was very obviously shaped by a “normal” human brain, although one working with very, very limited resources and probably eager to be rid of the thing. The Cummins Cut feels like the private home video of a psychopath, filmed without the knowledge of anyone on screen. Each cut offers a completely different experience and it’s worth seeing them both, especially since neither is longer than 80 minutes. However, as someone who hadn’t seen either and accidentally saw the Cummins Cut first, I easily prefer that one. It’s a distinctly unsettling sensory barrage that seems to have some oblique, arcane purpose, while the Fox Cut is a very amusing excursion into accidental cinematic calamity.
Overall ratings:
Fox Cut — 6.5 out of 10
Cummins Cut — 8 out of 10
(The ratings below reflect the Cummins Cut.)
