A Revisit to Black Christmas (1974)

[kybearfuzz]

My Blu-ray of Black Christmas (1974) showed up Friday. It was pretty quick, considering I ordered it three days ago. I can't say I recognize a great difference in the quality, but as always I love the movie.

What's great about watching it again is finding the little things I've missed before, usually a funny line of dialogue or something minor oddity. Tonight, I realized that there was a scene where the housemother puts on lipstick to leave and gets interrupted by the sound of her cat meowing. She walks into the hallway and drops her purse, cursing the cat. I realized that she only put the lipstick on the right side of her upper lip and didn't finish. So she goes through multiple scenes with only the right side of her upper lip bright red and it looks so strange.

My favorite line from the movie:

[after the mysterious caller hangs up]
Clare Harrison: "I don't think you should provoke somebody like that, Barb."
Barb Coard: "Oh listen, this guy is minor league. In the city, I get two of those a day."
Clare Harrison: "Well maybe. But you know that town girl was raped a couple of weeks ago."
Barb Coard: "Darling, you can't rape a townie."

Dramatic irony is all over the movie. The characters are constantly looking for Clare who was the first to vanish. Her body, complete with a clear plastic bag over her head, sits in a rocking chair in front of the attic window. She's completely visible the whole time, except that no one thinks to look up.

The ending is ambiguous about who the killer is, something that I doubt the film producers could get away with it these days. Even though it's 40 years later, all of the main actors are still alive (though most died in the movie). I really wish that Bob Clark was alive as I think he could have actually done a modern sequel to the movie.

Now I'm not much for writing fan fiction, but I've often wondered what the remaining characters would have done after the movie ended. The phone rang after the police and doctor left a sedated Jess (the sole survivor) alone in the house (with a police guard at the front of the house waiting for the "lab guys"). They thought the killer was dead and they had to get a man in shock to the hospital. However, the real killer was shown in the attic after they left and he always called the house after he killed someone. The meaning is clear. He has killed Jess.


The lab guys and police would return, find her dead, and realize that they were mistaken who the killer was. Two bodies still had not been found, including Clare, but I would think would turn up in a final search of the house. By then, the killer would be long gone, as mysteriously as he appeared really.

Think about it. Forty years after the killings, the house's history would be long forgotten except in urban legend. Maybe a new sorority could have moved in, the college masking the history on purpose. The killings could begin again, with the new main characters going to a long retired Lt. Fuller (John Saxon) for info. He would realize that the killer had returned (granted he'd be 60 years old or older himself). Maybe then they could reveal "Billy" the killer and his history.

I would love that!

Ah, if I won the lottery, maybe I could make it happen. It couldn't be any worse than that piece of $#!+ remake in 2006.

Comments

[daddytodd.livejournal.com]

I saw that movie at a drive-in theater in, probably, 1975. I would've been 15. I wanted to see it because I knew Keir Dullea from 2001. It was my first exposure to Margo Kidder, long before "Superman". I really liked it. I watched it again recently on DVD -- it looks pretty bad, like it was shot on 16mm film that had been badly blown up to 35mm for screenings. Does it still look like that on blu-ray?

John Saxon was one of my favorite "no-name" stars of the era. He starred in a couple sci-fi pilots written and produced by Gene Roddenberry that never went to series. I think one was called "Planet Earth." In it, he wears an awesome skintight costume that reveals an impressive package.

[kybearfuzz.livejournal.com]

(http://www.flickr.com/photos/81961449@N00/6336331000/)The Blu-Ray version seems very clear in some ways, yet kind of grainy in others. It doesn't distract you from the movie though. I always thought the movie had a classic 1970's look to it.

And John Saxon has been a crush of mine for a long time. He's worn many a skin-tight outfit, showing off both that great furry body and other impressive parts. I got to meet him in person last year at the Horrorhound Convention. He's getting up in years.

He actually asked me first thing if I worked out and when we got close for this pic, he ran his hand down my back. I was ... um... touched :)

[daddytodd.livejournal.com]

Oooh! Felt up by a MOVIE Star! You stud, you.

I'd prolly do the same if I was within touching distance of you...

[kybearfuzz.livejournal.com]

He's one of the few famous people in the entertainment industry I've met and I enjoyed it.

And I certainly wouldn't mind you running your hand down my back :)

[daddytodd.livejournal.com]

I had the opportunity of meeting a lot of my favorite SF & Fantasy authors in the '80's, and my favorite was Frederik Pohl. I was his driver for an entire weekend in, probably, 1985. He's still alive, last I checked, and he seemed unbelievably ancient back then, 27 years ago. Driving him around was a blast. He was an endless fount of great stories about the sci-fi community in the '40's and '50's (and before and after, too, since he's been active in SF since the late '30's.)

Other famous people I've met haven't impressed me nearly as much as Fred did. A hell of a guy!