THE UNSEEN (1980)

Director: Danny Steinmann (as Peter Foleg)

Writers: Kim Henkel, Nancy Rifkin, Michael R. Grace, Danny Steinmann (as Peter Foleg), Michael Viner (uncredited), Thomas R. Burman (uncredited)

Producer: Anthony B. Unger

Cast: Barbara Bach, Sidney Lassick, Lelia Goldoni, Stephen Furst, Douglas Barr (as Doug Barr), Karen Lamm, Lois Young, Maida Severn 

During a breakup with her boyfriend Tony Ross (Douglas Barr), television news reporter Jennifer Fast (Barbara Bach) and her camera crew of sister Karen Fast (Karen Lamm) and Vicki Thompson (Lois Young) drive to the small town of Solvang, California to cover the annual Danish festival. When they discover that all of the local hotels are filled, they are offered lodging at the remote country home of museum proprietor Ernest Keller (Sydney Lassick). While Ernest seems very cordial, his wife Virginia (Lelia Goldoni) is meek and distraught. The middle-aged couple is sharing a secret about their relationship and the presence hidden in the basement of the Keller home. 

The Flashback Fanatic movie review

With a small cast and an intimate setting, The Unseen is a film that keeps things simple and is all the more effective for it. Some may feel that it is not busy enough or that its title menace is not as malevolent as they would like, but the story is still full of evil intensity and the situation is always believable.

While this production was trying to sate the horror hunger that recent hits like Halloween (1978) and Phantasm (1979) whetted, it is unique and should not be dismissed as just another Friday the 13th (1980) clone. Many horror films at this time were very distinct from one another, as the slasher formula had not yet been thoroughly established. Although probably influenced by Psycho (1960), The Unseen’s theme of relationship roles and consequences really sets it apart. The dichotomy of the film is between two very different, dysfunctional couples that are both dealing with control in a relationship. 

The couple of Jennifer and Tony that we first see in the film would seem to be ideal. They are young, attractive, and live comfortably. However, it is immediately apparent that they are not communicating due to some unresolved conflicts. Tony can’t accept that his knee injury has ended his professional football career. He is just as upset that Jennifer’s career ambitions in television news won’t wait for marriage and family. She is pregnant and resolved to have an abortion in the new year. This couple is splitting apart because neither one will compromise or relinquish control of their relationship to the other. 

The couple of Ernest and Virginia Keller is odd and leaves us feeling even more uncomfortable. They have long been settled into their roles, yet this has not made them compatible. The seemingly pleasant Ernest tyrannizes his mate. Virginia is always stressed and subservient. They are harboring secrets that lead to the deadly conflicts throughout the story. The control in this relationship has been completely assumed by Ernest. This couple may be committed, yet they are together for the wrong reasons and are never truly happy. 

As things play out, the strange, committed couple is the source of all sorts of terrible consequences, but the more ideal yet uncommitted couple appears to be quite helpless. The Unseen is ultimately a film about humility. Normalcy and success don’t always empower people or make them happy. 

Barbara Bach was fresh off of her success as a Bond girl in 1977’s The Spy Who Loved Me. Due to her poised demeanor, her character of Jennifer Fast seems rather distant and it is small wonder that she doesn’t seem moved by her lover’s desire to have their child. Later in the film, Bach’s performance rises to the occasion when she is menaced and thoroughly miserable. 

As Jennifer’s lover Tony Ross, Douglas Barr has the rather thankless task of being a completely ineffectual character that drives home this story’s humility theme. In the very first scene of the film, we see that his ability and influence are impaired. Our expectations for what part Tony may serve in the story are repeatedly confounded. This seems to underscore the point that the “perfect people” don’t always have the answers and their actions may be futile. 

Jennifer’s sister Karen (Karen Lamm) and Vicky (Lois Young) join Jennifer to complete the trio of beautiful guests to be menaced in the Keller household. Karen is actually the most vivacious personality in the film while Vicky is the wide-eyed innocent that provides Ernest Keller and the audience an R-rated eyeful. 

It is the unhappy circumstances of the Keller family that result in all the misery and horror to be found in The Unseen. We can lay most of that blame at the feet of Sydney Lassick’s character of Ernest. He is seemingly nice and accommodating, a bit silly, and ultimately vile. He is central to all the evil in the story. In my favorite sequence, we see him reminiscing about his old sins and being haunted by the voice of his tyrannical father. This scene gets us up to speed with just how twisted the Keller family situation has become with a nice horror payoff. Old man Keller sounds like such an ogre that we can almost understand why Ernest has gone off the deep end. 

Lelia Goldoni is so stressed as Virginia that we can’t have too much sympathy with Ernest, no matter how he was raised. She always seems to be on the verge of emotional collapse from Ernest’s domination. 

Last, but certainly not least, Stephen Furst portrays the title character. He is grotesque, dangerous, and pitiful. Once you find out just what he is all about, you realize just how commitment in relationships is not always a virtue. As writer Kim Henkel had already demonstrated in The Texas Chainsaw Massacre (1974), family values can get people killed.