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Dark and Stormy Night

USA 2009
produced by
Trish Geiger, Michael Schlesinger, Sara Van der Voort, James N. Perry jr (executive) for Bantam Street Productions
directed by Larry Blamire
starring Daniel Roebuck, Jennifer Blair, Brian Howe, Fay Masterson, Alison Martin, James Karen, Andrew Parks, Christine Romeo, Kevin Quinn, Larry Blamire, Jim Beaver, H.M. Wynant, Trish Geiger, Bruce French, Robert Deveau, Susan McConnell, Dan Conroy, Betty Garrett, Marvin Kaplan, Mark Redfield, Tom Reese, and Bob Burns as gorilla
written by Larry Blamire, music by Christopher Caliendo

review by
Mike Haberfelner

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Reporters Farraday (Daniel Roebuck) and Tuesday (Jennifer Blaire) make it to an old dark house in the middle of nowhere just in time for the reading of a will, read of course during a thunderstorm that washes all bridges away that connect the mansion to the rest of the world.

Of course, everything in the will goes to the pretty and innocent but frail ward of the deceased, Sabasha (Fay Masterson), but before the family lawyer can read the addendum to the will as well, he is killed and the letter containing the addendum is stolen. Somehow our two reporters get to conduct the investigations, and they are faced with a house full of suspects and eccentrics, including the deceased's disowned nephew Burling (Brian Howe), his cheating wife (Christine Romeo), her lover (Kevin Quinmn), a medium (Alison Martin), a safari guide (Jim Beaver), and of course the guy who claims to have stopped by just by accident (Larry Blamire) who will eventually be revealed to be an FBI-agent. The whole thing is not made any easier by the fact that every time someone wants to reveal something about the case, the light goes out and he or she drops dead, and by the fact that one person in the house might be a strangler escaped from the asylum next door.

After much chasing through corridors, the discovery of secret passageways aplenty, people dropping like flies and the revelation that the dead man had a disfigured and mad daughter (Susan McConnell) locked away in the attic, whom he leaves everything to in the end, it is revealed that there are not one but two killers, on one hand the disowned Burling, on the other Sabasha, who is really not Sabasha at all but the mad strangler.

Of course, the baddies get their just desserts, and in case you care, our two reporter heroes, who have quarrelled all through the movie, decide to get married.

 

Basically, Dark and Stormy Night is a hommage to and parody of old dark house murder mysteries popular especially in the 1930's and 40's, and as such it's pretty good but far from perfect: It's good because it remains on target throughout, the direction and camerawork are perfect in recreating the mood of the movies of old (and thus the film is shot in glorious black-and-white), the ensemble fits the requirements and the comedy is always topical and never veers off into cheap jokes or bathroom humour.

The film is by no means perfect though because while it's funny, it features hardly any jokes not already present in the countless genre parodies from back in the day, and because direction-wise it never tries to elevate itself above the directorial style of old - in a word, this film is pretty much a rehash, a very accomplished one no doubt, and one can't blame the filmmakers for doing what they did (especially as a fan of these old films), but the film could have amounted to more.

Still, the whole thing is good fun ...

 

review © by Mike Haberfelner

 

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Thanks for watching !!!

 

 

In times of uncertainty of a possible zombie outbreak, a woman has to decide between two men - only one of them's one of the undead.

 

There's No Such Thing as Zombies
starring
Luana Ribeira, Rudy Barrow and Rami Hilmi
special appearances by
Debra Lamb and Lynn Lowry

 

directed by
Eddie Bammeke

written by
Michael Haberfelner

produced by
Michael Haberfelner, Luana Ribeira and Eddie Bammeke

 

now streaming at

Amazon

Amazon UK

Vimeo

 

 

 

Robots and rats,
demons and potholes,
cuddly toys and
shopping mall Santas,
love and death and everything in between,
Tales to Chill
Your Bones to

is all of that.

 

Tales to Chill
Your Bones to
-
a collection of short stories and mini-plays
ranging from the horrific to the darkly humourous,
from the post-apocalyptic
to the weirdly romantic,
tales that will give you a chill and maybe a chuckle, all thought up by
the twisted mind of
screenwriter and film reviewer
Michael Haberfelner.

 

Tales to Chill
Your Bones to

the new anthology by
Michael Haberfelner

 

Out now from
Amazon!!!