Review: Deathdream (1974)
(aka Dead of Night, The Night Walker)
Directed by: Bob Clark
Starring: Richard Backus, John Marley, Lynn Carlin
Written by: Alan Ormsby
Music by: Carl Zittrer
Country: Canada, United States
Available on: Blu-ray/DVD (Blue Underground)
IMDb
Director Bob Clark had a fascinating career. He’s responsible for a classic holiday horror movie (Black Christmas, also released in 1974), a classic sex comedy (Porky’s, from 1981), and a classic Christmas movie (A Christmas Story, from 1983). But before any of that, he and writer Alan Ormsby made two intriguing low-budget zombie flicks: Children Shouldn’t Play with Dead Things (1972) and this. Deathdream is about one Andy Brooks, who’s killed in the Vietnam War, yet makes his way back home again right as rain — as long as he’s got fresh human blood to keep him from decaying. Although it’s never explained why Andy is now in the condition he’s in, it’s obvious as soon as he shows up on his family’s doorstep, after they had received notice he was killed in action, that something is terribly wrong. This setup is hardly what you’d expect from a zombie movie and that’s why it’s so great. Deathdream makes its way at a leisurely pace, but Clark and Ormsby use that time to build a disquieting fortification through Richard Backus’ emotionally detached and creepy performance, John Marley as Andy’s paranoid and distraught father, and longtime Clark collaborator Carl Zittrer’s absolutely unnerving score. The film is laden with bursts of crazed emotion, accentuated by jolts of piano and piercing strings, all juxtaposed by Andy’s dead calm. For someone who’s worked in so many disparate genres, Bob Clark is a supreme manipulator of tension and so much of this movie is spent tautly waiting for Andy’s next move. There are many good scenes with characters who loved Andy languishing in quiet despair while he either coldly refuses to return their long-displaced affection or does something heartrendingly cruel and foreign. I do wish Andy’s newly acquired bloodlust pushed him to commit more grisly violence, but I suppose if he got too messy, all that precious rejuvenating blood would have been wasted. This brings up a minor lapse in logic: Andy needs to inject himself with fresh blood, but it’s established that, in his condition, his heart no longer beats. So how does his body circulate the blood? Eh, who cares. You know a movie is great when all you’ve got is nitpicks at internal logic. Deathdream is very near the top of the rotting heap of zombie films, saturated with atmosphere and melancholy as Andy’s condition tears his family apart and leaves them mourning anew.
Rating: 9 out of 10