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Psychic Killer
R1 - America - Dark Sky Films Review written by and copyright: Jeremiah Chin (29th December 2008). |
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The Film
 In the earlier day sof the rating system of the MPAA, the range between ratings was almost a completely different outlook from today. In the 70’s through the early 80’s the PG–13 rating had yet to exist, so you had films with content that would today be thrown into the R or PG-13 category fall into the PG range and films that fell into the X category weren’t yet automatically banished from mainstream theatres and stores (especially if the film is ‘Rated X by an All White Jury’ like “Sweet Sweetback’s Baadasssss Song” (1971)). So when 70’s horror films like “Psychic Killer” (1975) hit DVD, the PG rating can be a bit deceiving. The film follows Arnold Masters (Jim Hutton) who has been locked away in an insane asylum for supposedly killing the doctor who refused to treat his sick mother. In prison he meets a fellow inmate who also feels wrongly convicted, but assures Masters that he will have revenge on those who have wronged him, engages in a voodoo hex ritual and then kills himself. Masters comes into possession of the amulet of his fellow inmate and gains the same ability to take revenge on his enemies with the power of his mind while appearing to be dead. Soon Masters is found to be innocent of the crime he was wrongfully imprisoned for and decides to take a psychic vengeance on those who put him in prison. Lt. Morgan (Paul Burke) starts to see a pattern leading back to Masters, and starts trying to pin the crime to Masters even though no evidence exists at any of the crime scenes. Strictly from a conceptual standpoint the film has a lot of potential, a sort of “Carrie” –esque plotline, but without any of the real depth; just an obsession with the idea that something paranormal exists and can be used to kill. At the same time "Psychic Killer" tries to build off of the “Psycho” (1960) plotline of the mother obsessed killer, while completely avoiding any of the play on gender that has been so heavily analyzed in Hitchcock’s arguably most famous film. Yet the plot isn’t really that in depth, but it doesn’t have to be. The deaths are laughably bad and much of the writing is unintentionally hilarious through the first half of the movie and is really fun to watch. Unfortunately the more Lt. Morgan catches on to the crimes, the less fun the movie becomes and thus begins a downward slope in the second half of the film that just isn’t as exciting as the buildup that got you there. I was fairly surprised with the amount of nudity and violence in a PG movie, but like I mentioned earlier, it shouldn’t come as any real shock considering PG-13 (and R as we now consider it) had yet to exist, but what’s there is not nearly as gory as the other B and exploitation movies of this era. There’s death by a car driving off a cliff (hilarious to watch), an apparent suicide with a gun, but perhaps the most ridiculous, a shower that just gets too hot. All of these psychic deaths are laughably bad and add to the enjoyment of the movie. Overall the film hits a good midrange of awesomely bad-ness where it executes it’s ridiculous deaths and plots incredibly well within the first half to three quarters of the movie, the ending itself is fairly good, but between the very end of the film and somewhere after the halfway point, the film just starts to get caught up in a romance with Lt. Morgan that takes too long to develop and isn’t particularly necessary except for inspiring Masters to do some more psychic death. Overall, a fun 70’s horror flick that doesn’t quite live up to it’s potential, but has some great moments along the way.
Video
Visually the movie display’s Dark Sky’s ongoing effort to preserve the feel of cheap, 70’s films and uses the 1.78:1 anamorphic widescreen aspect ratio well, keeping cigarette burns, grain and all kinds of odd dirt on the film. Because of this visually the movie hits a lot of the right notes, though the original visual style and the way the film is treated leave some scenes almost indecipherable.
Audio
The English Dolby Digital 2.0 Mono audio track again keeps to the low budget feel (and reality) of the film, though the audio is fairly consistent in quality and doesn’t have a lot of problems that interfere with the film. The accompanying soundtrack is surprisingly suiting to the film, it adds a very 70’s feel to the attempt at suspense, but keeps the film moving and doesn’t get too annoying. The disc also features optional subtitles in English only.
Extras
Not a whole lot in the way of extras on this disc though 3 original TV spots are featured as is the original theatrical trailer. The first TV spot runs for 31 seconds, the second runs 31 seconds as well and the third also runs 31 seconds. The theatrical trailer runs for 3 minutes and 1 second.
Overall
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