February 2007 - Horrorphile

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Horrorphile - February 2007

Curtains

February 28th 2007 09:44

Curious little stalk’n’slash flick from Canada called Curtains (1983), which had a troubled production; the original director Richard Ciupka was fired after shooting half the film. The producer completed the movie, which in turn is credited to “Jonathon Stryker” who is actually a film director character in the movie.

Curtains tells the slight tale of several women vying for the coveted title role of Audra in egocentric director Jonathon Stryker’s (the very hammy John Vernon) latest cinematic opus. He is staging his auditions in his wintery mansion, and has been joined by his old flame and ex-muse, Samantha (Samantha Eggar).

But someone is taking extreme exception to the casting process and is offing the hopefuls before they can deliver the goods to Stryker. The killer hides behind the mask of an old hag. Who can it be?

Curtains isn’t the most original film in the world. It borrows heavily from several other horrors, such as Terror Train (1981). But it does possess a vague stylishness which other slashers from this period would’ve chewed their own arm off to have owned. But don’t get overly excited, as most of the film is rather pedestrian (no real surprise there as the producer directed half the movie).

The cast is an intriguing bunch. Some faces that you’d recognize from other Canadian features, but looking a tad younger here. The question is what happened to most of these actors? They seemed to have slipped between the cracks. The always watchable Michael Wincott is utterly wasted here and doesn’t even get one line of dialogue, although to be fair, apparently several scenes were cut which may have added more weight to some of the characterizations.

There are two standout scenes; one takes place in broad daylight on a frozen pond while the young Christie (Lesleh Donaldson, who looks very much like a young Lorraine Bracco) practices her moves to impress Stryker. The ghetto blaster she’s been using has died, and then there’s that doll hidden under a mound of snow. A figure speeds toward her in slow motion … it’s the hag-masked killer armed with a scythe! Actually the more I think about this scene the sillier it gets.

The other memorable scene is very atmospheric and impressive in maintaining suspense and an almost expressionist visual sense. Tara (Sandra Warren) is being steadily stalked by the killer through the claustrophobic surrounds of a backstage setting complete with mannequins and hanging costumes, as well as the odd hanging ballerina. Those creepy shots where you are nervously waiting to see the killer appear round the corner always work a treat.

There are many scenes however which seem entirely incongruous to the movie’s plot; but when retrospect analysis (hmm, that’s probably giving the film way too much intellectual clout) they do work as metaphors for the movie’s main themes of play-acting, faking, pretensions and deception.

It’s a pity Curtains wasn’t a little longer (a curious thought, since most slashers shouldn’t by more than 90 mins), so that the competing actors could have had more time to play (pun intended). Or maybe I just wanted to spend more time with one in particular, Laurian (Anne Ditchburn) the ballerina, as she was very cute. But then the leggy and busty Tara had my undivided attention too.

Sheesh, I must be clutching at straws. It appears Curtains has a little cult following, which might have something to do with pure nostalgia and the fact that due to film rights wrangling the movie is currently not available on DVD. It certainly commands a mood, a few nifty camera angles (as well as a contrived “curtain” wipe between certain scenes), a half decent score, and has a genuinely surprising reveal of the killer, but the deaths aren’t dramatic enough and Michael Wincott didn’t even get to say one bloody word in his sumptuously deep husky voice.

And so the curtain falls on Curtains.

And I quickly exit stage left.

Here's the original trailer ... amuse yourself, knock yourself out: