Monday, May 19, 2008

Final Girl Film Club: The Devil's Daughter

You know, I went into The Devil's Daughter not expecting much. You know, 1970's TV Movie about devil worship and all that. Surely it won't be much of anything. Color me embarrassed - it was actually pretty good. It's on par with a long Night Gallery or Twilight Zone episode (love those), and about half-way through, I said to myself, man this seems really familiar. I've actually seen it before, some time or another, probably when I was home sick from school and needed something to watch on TV.

In The Devil's Daughter, Diane Shaw returns home for her mother's funeral. She's never really known her mother, and at the gravesite, enter Shelley Winters. (Has she ever not been large and scary? Even in the Poseidon Adventure she was scary and she was supposed to be a nice character...) Lilith is a friend of dear old mom, and why don't you dear sweet girl come home and stay with me while you find a job and get settled? Of course, a nefarious plot must be afoot, and really, it's not too hard to figure out early on, but getting there is half the fun in this movie. 

Shelley Winters is more than enough of a reason to watch this movie - she's camp personified. She's like that crazy old lady that bakes you cookies all of the time that you just can't get rid of, and the cookies are missing the sugar but you don't have the heart to say anything. Her two neighbor friends are unsettling, like two overgrown idiot twins, even down to the same outfits. But the kicker comes at the end, in true, ta-da, movie of the week style. Again, it's not a shocker if you have seen any horror movies at all, but it's well done and like I said before. It's  just like ending up a Night Gallery episode, and my TIVO really knows just how much I love that show. 

Rating: 5 Purrs, cause you gotta love a movie that features an over-the-top painting of Satan that every character just pretends is perfectly natural for 3/4 of the movie, and of course, the mad, smiling face of Shelley Winters there at the end - now that's creepy

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