1974 remains a banner year for horror movies. This year marks the 50th anniversary of The Texas Chain Saw Massacre and Black Christmas, as well as smaller films like Abby, The Perfume of the Lady in Black, and Sugar Hill. Buried in that year’s releases, Frightmare stands as a unique relic, a gloriously bloody proto-slasher transmitting a macabre tale about cannibalism. Once described as a “morally repellent British horror film, without an ounce of humour” by The Times critic Philip French, the Pete Walker-directed cult classic carries the essence of 1963’s Blood Feast with its own curiously deranged skin. With the holidays in full swing, it’s time to give thanks for one of the most underrated ‘70s slashers with more going for it than meets the eye.
The film, written by David McGillivray (Satan’s Slave), tells the tale of Edmund (Rupert Davies) and his murderous wife Dorothy (Sheila Keith). Both were committed to a mental asylum in 1957 after Dorothy murdered and consumed six people. Complicit in helping her cover up the crimes, Edmund is held partially responsible. Years later, doctors conclude they’re properly recovered and suitable for reentering society. The elderly couple trade their lives behind bars and cement for the idyllic countryside, returning to their secluded farm. A fresh start lies before them, and while hopeful, Edmund fears his wife might revert to slaughtering unsuspecting townsfolk. The homestead, surrounded by woods, proves to be exactly what Dorothy needs – the anxieties of the hospital melt away with each passing day. But something sinister lurks in the back of her mind, gnawing at her and soon causing her to experience a mental break.
In the city, Jackie (Deborah Fairfax), Edmund’s daughter from a previous marriage, struggles in her relationship with her half-sister Debbie (Kim Butcher), who spent some of her life in an orphanage. Debbie lives by no one’s rules but her own, an obnoxious, self-involved teen who has a run-in with the cops after a bartender is found brutally mutilated. With her older boyfriend Alec (Edward Kalinski) and his motorcycle gang, she participated in the calculated attack and later stole the dead body to hinder the police from pinning the crime on her. While contending with her wild and unruly sister, Jackie makes frequent midnight trips out to her father’s property with parcels of animal brains, hoping to trick her stepmother into believing it’s human flesh as a way to squelch her hunger to kill.
Walker, also known for films like House of Mortal Sin and House of the Long Shadows, works with cinematographer Peter Jessop (Reilly: Ace of Spies) to bring his original story to brutally pulsating vitality. The coarse, guerilla-style filmmaking frames Dorothy’s mania, casting the audience into a disastrous wasteland. The two storylines appear unrelated before colliding in the finale, resulting in carnage and mayhem at Dorothy and Edmund’s estate.
Through her friends, Jackie meets Graham (Paul Greenwood), an investigative psychiatrist, who believes he can help Debbie turn her life around. In his research into her backstory, he learns about her parents and why they spent so much time in a psychiatric ward. He’s undeterred, and in fact, he offers to help both young women cope. He pushes his way further into their lives and eventually goes to the farm, where Debbie seeks refuge from the cops. Having always known her parents were alive, Debbie has more in common with Dorothy than anyone first realizes – she proves as psychotic as her mother. Debbie, who brought along her boyfriend Alec, watches unflinchingly as Dorothy chops him up with a pitchfork. Blood splatters and his throaty cries fill the night sky.
Pretending to want a tarot card reading, Graham crosses the threshold into the couple’s cozy cottage. He seals his fate without ever realizing it. No one who enters ever gets out alive, and Edmund isn’t about to let him screw everything up. Still madly in love with Dorothy, he’ll protect her at all costs, even if that means stowing away more corpses around the property. After receiving a call from Debbie, Jackie drives out to the farm and discovers a ghastly sight. Graham is already dead, with a gouged-out eye and covered in his own blood. Certifiable and bloodthirsty, Dorothy and Debbie turn their bloodshot gaze on her and corner her in an upstairs bedroom. With the camera focusing on Edmund’s appalled expression, the film cuts to black – with the implication of Jackie’s murder. Her screams pierce the blackness, making your blood run cold.
An irreverent work, Frightmare doesn’t get the credit it deserves. With its lo-fi charm and mangled body count, it does everything a good slasher should do: turn your stomach and make you cheer on the bloodshed. Walker appropriately sidesteps any comment on mental health and institutionalization, as that’s just a blip in Dorothy’s story, and instead offers a simple narrative about a flesh-eating killer. The only thing it misses is a proper chase scene, something the viewer is left hankering for when the credits roll.
Perhaps, if the film had come out during the slasher boom of the 1980s, it would have found bigger success, a wider audience, and become more prominently discussed in the genre conversation. A perfect companion piece to such ‘80s fare like Maniac, Madman, and Pieces, Frightmare does a lot with so little, its meager budget a tremendous asset and not a hindrance. Peter Walker and his creative team delight in the grotesqueness of human nature. The camera serves as a voyeuristic conduit by which the audience glimpses the raw dirtiness and slime of society’s underbelly. Edmund’s skewed perspective, one of compassion and understanding, creates an air of sympathy for Dorothy. Walker doesn’t propose we excuse her behavior but rather relate to her deeply buried frustrations with humanity and the suffocating isolation that often breeds psychosis and mental decay.
With its lean runtime, Frightmare leaves the fatty meat on the cutting room floor and accomplishes exactly what it sets out to do: frighten and entertain. 50 years later, it endures as a prime treasure of the sleazy 1970s – complete with a wonderfully frenetic performance from Sheila Keith. She oscillates between tenderness and dangerous volatility. One moment of softness erupts into impulsive, eye-popping wackiness – properly earning her a spot next to Susan Tyrrell in Butcher, Baker, Nightmare Maker and Wendy Robie in The People Under the Stairs. Without her commitment to the work, the film would fall apart and fail to elicit any sort of reaction. In her hands, Dorothy emerges as one of the great (criminally overlooked) villains in horror.
Frightmare sits on the fringes, yet somehow carries mainstream appeal. In the era of Leatherface, Billy, and various other slasher characters, it doesn’t feel so out of place as you might expect. In its sticky filth, there’s great attention given to the craft of storytelling – so much so that the audience is covered in it.
AllMovie perhaps said it best: “[The film] is a potent little chiller that is worth a look to horror fans in search of suitably grim fare from the 1970s and a worthy testament to Pete Walker’s distinctive genre skills.”
Now is the time we all finally give Frightmare its roses. It’s long overdue.
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