EATEN ALIVE (1976), aka DEATH TRAP, HORROR HOTEL, STARLIGHT SLAUGHTER

Director: Tobe Hooper

Writers: Alvin L. Fast, Mardi Rustam, Kim Henkel

Producers: Mardi Rustam, Alvin L. Fast

Cast: Neville Brand, Robert Englund, Marilyn Burns, Stuart Whitman, Mel Ferrer, William Finley, Kyle Richards, Crystin Sinclaire, Carolyn Jones, Roberta Collins, Janus Blythe, Betty Cole, Christine Schneider, Ronald W. Davis, Sig Sakowicz, David Hayward, David Carson, Lincoln Kibbee, James Galanis, Tarja Leena Halinen, Caren White, Valerie Lukecart, Jeanne Reichert, Scuffy (the dog)

In rural Texas stands the remote and ramshackle Starlight Hotel. Its proprietor is a mentally unhinged military veteran named Judd (Neville Brand). The pond below his hotel’s front porch distinguishes the squalid accommodations. This pond is home to a huge crocodile. Despite this roadside attraction having bitten off his leg, Judd still thinks highly enough of the voracious varmint to feed it the guests that he murders.

The Flashback Fanatic movie review

That Grand Guignol gourmet Tobe Hooper uses this recipe of a dollop of The Texas Chainsaw Massacre (1974), a splash of Jaws (1975), and a dash of Psycho (1960) to prep this dish of drive-in delirium called Eaten Alive. It was director Hooper’s follow up to his early-career classic The Texas Chainsaw Massacre, and it always seems to suffer by comparison. Many of Hooper’s critics say that everything else that he made suffers by comparison. I say that a director who creates a genre standard may never eclipse it, but he can continue to make effective and interesting films. That is certainly the case with Eaten Alive.

This production’s most interesting aspect is Hooper’s decision to film almost entirely on movie soundstages. Much like Alfred Hitchcock’s preferred MO, this allowed Hooper complete control of the look and atmosphere in Eaten Alive. Everything feels like it is happening in a rural twilight zone where morality and sanity are in short supply. The movie begins with the only real world exterior shot in the entire film of the full moon in the night sky. This image cross-fades into an uncomfortable close-up of a circular belt buckle and fly being opened by a whorehouse patron. From here on out, the clammy and claustrophobic world of this story is unrelenting.

Some may feel that there is little in the way of plot and an awful lot of weird character antics that are never explained to the audience. I find these bits of eccentric behavior to be interesting and, at times, even irritating, but that establishes the random chaos of human behavior that results in so much conflict and horror in the world. We have all encountered oddballs at one time or another and wondered just what the hell was their problem, yet we will never know. Those are the sorts of weirdos that populate this film as well as Hooper’s acknowledged masterpiece, The Texas Chainsaw Massacre. That earlier film is also full of characters that are strange, quirky, and often unlikable without sharing any sort of backstory about them to justify their behavior. I think that the main difference between the two films is Chainsaw’s real world film locations and its more gradual build up to escalating terror.

Aside from this being Tobe Hooper’s second horror feature, Eaten Alive is probably most notable to horror fans for being actor Robert Englund’s debut in the genre. Of course, Englund has achieved horror movie immortality as Freddy Krueger in A Nightmare on Elm Street (1984) and its sequels. In Eaten Alive, his horny character of Buck is always unlikable as he clashes with just about everyone he meets. He opens the film as he opens his pants with some vile verse that declares his drives and establishes the themes of sexual frustration and relationship dysfunction that lead to so much trouble for so many in this story.

That obnoxious horndog Buck managing to score with the luscious Lynette (Janus Blythe) is yet another perplexing and awful injustice in this film’s strange world. Maybe Lynette was a sucker for poetry. In 1977 Blythe would also appear in The Incredible Melting Man and The Hills Have Eyes.

More past and future horror film notables grace the menu of Eaten Alive. Hooper’s Chainsaw scream queen Marilyn Burns makes the scene as Faye only to suffer more abuse. She is accompanied by William Finley (star of 1974’s The Phantom of the Paradise), as her unstable husband Roy, and Kyle Richards (1978’s Halloween), as her daughter Angie. From House of Wax (1953), Invasion of the Body Snatchers (1956), and The Addams Family television series (1964-66), Carolyn Jones allows herself to be made up into crotchety whorehouse madam Miss Hatty. The star of 1960’s Blood and Roses, Mel Ferrer, appears as the dying Harvey Wood, who is accompanied by daughter Libby (Crystin Sinclaire) and looking for his other, runaway daughter Clara (Roberta Collins).

Stuart Whitman plays Sheriff Martin. He seems to be that solid authority figure that can reign in some of the insanity running rampant in this story. However, it is soon established that this rural community plays pretty fast and loose with the law. Sheriff Martin is on very cordial terms with the whorehouse madam. As Mel Ferrer’s Harvey Wood asserts, Martin runs a “wide-open town.” This removes any sense of security we may derive from having an officer of the law around. Even though Sheriff Martin seems to be a decent sort, there is also a sense that he won’t be much of a controlling factor over the chaos at the Starlight Hotel.

Neville Brand’s performance really makes this flick click. He is both disturbing and amusing in a darkly comic way. His Judd is a lonely loony that mutters and sings to himself while looking at magazines as he tries on various pairs of old eyeglasses. He makes half-hearted attempts of dusting his cluttered and dingy hotel lobby while listening to obscure country-western songs on his enormous, old radio. His isolation from the rest of the world is only emphasized by his unexplained outbursts while he flashbacks to some traumatizing military experiences. In addition to these quirks, he has some real issues with the opposite sex that he works through with farm tools, rope, and electrical tape.

The icing on this macabre cake is the man-eating crocodile Judd keeps uncomfortably close by in the pond abutting the Starlight Hotel’s front porch. None other than Robert Mattey provided this nasty critter. Mattey was the special effects veteran who had created the giant squid for 20,000 Leagues Under the Sea (1954) and the giant shark for Jaws.

With an interesting cast of old pros and genre favorites, off-kilter humor provided by strange characters, an eerie and remote location, and an unsavory atmosphere, Eaten Alive satisfies the appetite of this grue glutton. Those who dismiss it for not tasting the same as Chainsaw need to order it again and savor its own distinctive flavor. It is still served dripping with Tobe Hooper’s special sauce of hysterical horror.

LIFEFORCE (1985)

Director: Tobe Hooper

Writers: Dan O’Bannon, Don Jakoby, Michael Armstrong (uncredited), Olaf Pooley (uncredited), based on the novel The Space Vampires by Colin Wilson

Producers: Yoram Globus, Manahem Golan

Cast: Steve Railsback, Peter Firth, Mathilda May, Frank Finlay, Michael Gothard, Patrick Stewart, Aubrey Morris, Nicholas Ball, Chris Jagger, Bill Malin, John Hallam, Nancy Paul, John Keegan, Jerome Willis, John Woodnutt, Derek Benfield, Peter Porteous, Katherine Schofield, Russell Summers, Jamie Roberts, Owen Holder, Haydn Wood, Paul Cooper, Sidney Kean, Patrick Connor, Milton Cadman, Rupert Baker, Chris Sullivan, Edward Evans, Nicholas Donnelly, Gary Hildreth, Julian Firth, Carl Rigg, Peter Lovstrom, Elizabeth Heery, John Golightly 

Britain’s space shuttle Churchill discovers an enormous alien vessel in the coma of Halley’s Comet. Inside the derelict ship, shuttle commander Colonel Tom Carlsen (Steve Railsback) and his crew find three transparent cases containing three perfectly preserved humanoid bodies, one female and two males. They bring the lifeless aliens back aboard the Churchill to return to Earth. When Earth loses contact with the Churchill, a rescue mission is sent. The Churchill is found gutted by fire and with all of its crew dead. The undamaged bodies of the three aliens in their cases are brought to the European Space Research Centre in London. Soon, the female alien (Mathilda May) comes to life and begins draining energy from humans she comes in contact with. This space vampire escapes and her victims also become vampires draining energy from their own victims and threatening to spread the deadly contagion throughout the world. 

The Flashback Fanatic movie review

Lifeforce has a strange dynamic going for it that makes it quite distinct from the many big-budget, special effects laden, sci-fi and fantasy extravaganzas that were becoming more frequent during the '80s and are as common as cold sores today. This film has no contrived daredevil heroics, no snarky humor, no personal relationships, and no character back stories or conflicts. There is only the strange phenomenon causing death and chaos that must be stopped by the authorities in the government, science, and military establishments. That is probably why no big name movie star of the day appears in the film. They can’t flaunt their celebrity persona if they are just supposed to play someone doing their job.

What the film seems to be striving for is to immerse its audience in its science fiction concept and its horrific consequences that threaten the entire world. Lifeforce certainly manages quite a bit of awe and dread, particularly in its opening scenes in outer space when the eerie and immense alien spaceship is discovered and explored. I also appreciate the sci-fi link to an old-world horror in this story. That is a tried-and-true angle used in many other British productions such as the film Quatermass and the Pit (1967), aka Five Million Years to Earth, and some great episodes of the Doctor Who television series. 

I usually get impatient with entirely concept-driven sci-fi. I feel such stuff is often the vanity project of someone showing off their supposed intellectual ingenuity by waving around all the scientific claptrap they can to distract from the fact that they can’t create characters of any interest and any situations to engage the emotions. That is not to say that I want the latest movie hunk or babe of the moment slinging their catchphrases and affecting phony attitudes; I want something sincere. Most genre films can’t do that anymore. They need to appease the attention-span-challenged masses by convincing them they are getting something fast, sophisticated, and state-of-the-art. Once you get past today’s CGI effects, shaky-cam shots, and quick-cut editing, you often find nothing more than insincere rip-offs. 

The makers of Lifeforce are dangerously close to making exactly the kind of film I have absolutely no use for: the special effects orgy. Effects alone are never enough to keep me involved and entertained. Although it is certainly trying to impress us with its many special effects, Lifeforce stays focused on its cataclysmic menace and the efforts of humans to stop it. It is not also trying to be an action film with ridiculous stunts, snarky leads, and feel-good setups and resolutions for its characters. Since all of the characters in this film are not revealed in any depth, we in the audience might engage with the situations on a more personal level. 

I suppose that the total lack of knowledge we have about any of the characters in Lifeforce can make for an uninvolving experience for many. Again, it is the situation that is meant to involve us. We only see what these people do in response to the menace they encounter as they try to do their jobs to deal with it. The one person going through constant emotional turmoil is Steve Railsback’s Colonel Carlsen. He is the only astronaut to survive from the Churchill space shuttle that discovered the alien craft. He is haunted by his memories of the Churchill disaster before he returned to Earth in an escape pod. He also shares a telepathic connection with the Space Girl that he doesn’t fully understand, but he can use it to help the authorities track her down. 

That’s all the drama you get in Lifeforce. Otherwise, it’s some eerie atmosphere, the intrigue of trying to understand and locate the alien menace, ever-escalating chaos, and a bunch of wild special effects. 

As anyone who has seen this film can attest to, Lifeforce is unforgettable due to the spectacle of the often nude Mathilda May as the Space Girl. Despite being an ideal example of human female beauty, she convinces you that she is truly alien. She has a great presence that is simultaneously serene, sexy, superior, and sinister. No one confronted by this siren stands a chance. 

It must also be noted that the great Henry Mancini composed the musical score. He opens and closes the film with a rousing theme that evokes the awe that the best sci-fi horror films should achieve. 

Due to its epic scale, large cast, and sci-fi razzle-dazzle, Lifeforce may seem like an anomaly in director Tobe Hooper’s filmography. However, this movie still pulses with Hooper’s typical horror and hysteria. This was the most expensive film that Tobe Hooper ever directed and it sure seems like he put all of those bucks up there on the screen. This was part of a three-picture deal that Hooper had with Cannon Films. Unfortunately, it seems that all three of those productions underperformed at the box office. Nevertheless, Lifeforce seems to have developed more respect and a devoted cult following over the years. Mathilda May cannot be denied.