Dementia 13 [Blu-ray] [1963] [US Import]

I first saw DEMENTIA 13 on late night TV back in the mid 1960s and the shadowy lighting, stark b&w photography, dissonant score, and brutal axe murders made quite an impression on me. It would be years before I would see the film again. I rented it from a Mom and Pop video store back in the early 1980s where it was on some bargain bin VHS label that touted it as Francis Ford Coppola's first film. The picture quality was not nearly as good as my old TV showing but it still remained a rather creepy film with stellar performances from Patrick Magee (of CLOCKWORK ORANGE fame who had just died following CHARIOTS OF FIRE) and the lovely and underrated Luana Anders whose facial expressions spoke volumes and whose late night swim was an adolescent's dream. Incidentally the reason she has dark panties during the swim (often pointed out as a goof) is that see through white panties would not have been a no-no in 1963. Later on I would run across countless public domain copies of it but resisted buying one until now. I took a chance on this DVD version after reading some amazon reviews and am perfectly satisfied. It's not pristine but I think it's about as good as it's gonna get and the price is very good considering they'e throwing in a blu-ray along with it.

For those of you unfamiliar with the background story, here it is. Coppola was in Ireland in 1963 doing sound on Roger Corman's THE YOUNG RACERS when Corman gave him the opportunity to direct a low budget (estimates vary between $20,000 and $40,000) horror film using the same actors. Featuring several nearby outdoor locations and shooting interiors at the local Ardmore Studios, Coppola made this film in just a couple of weeks. It was released in America and did very well indeed while making money for American International Pictures overseas as well. The plot concerns a series of grisly axe murders commited during a family get together honoring the memory of a dead girl. Memorable scenes include an underwater grave, the murder of a local poacher, a nursery rhyme, and the aforementioned midnight swim. Regarding the DVD, the picture quality is quite good with the sound a tiny bit soft on occasion but clear overall. Too bad there are only Spanish subtitles. Along with HD Cinema Classics' other Filmgroup (Corman's shadow company) release THE TERROR, which was made the same year with a lot of the same technical people and also a victim of bad public domain copies, I'm glad to see these celebrated Corman "C" pictures finally receive their due.

"Dementia 13" was the result of producer Roger Corman's infamous "apprentice" program at AIP; Corman was shooting his own film and let Francis Ford Coppolla get his first director's credit by shooting "Dementia 13" on the same location. "Dementia 13" is just a nice little low-budget horror film for which the biggest complaint is that the pace is a tad slow. The story is set in Ireland and if it bears a strong resemblance to Corman's film adaptations of Edgar Allan Poe, well "duh." When her husband drops dead, Louise Haloran (Luana Anders) know she will be cut out of the Haloran family inheritance so she pretends he is in New York on business and heads off to the ancestral home in Ireland to try and get in good with the family. But at Castle Haloran the family is engaged in a morbid ritual marking the death of John's sister Kathleen, who drowned in the pond six years earlier. The question of inheritance becomes more interesting once family members start being hacked to death by an ax-murderer.

Despite this development "Dementia 13" is not a gory film, but more of a character study, which alone makes it somewhat atypical for the time and genre. Coppolla manages to creat atmosphere so that the film is more of a psychological exercise than it is a splatter flick, and the submereged scream is certainly a memorable touch. The most recognizable faces in the film are Patrick Magee as Dr. Caleb and William Campbell, soon to go to a small measure of fame in a couple of episodes of the original "Star Trek" and a place in Beatles trivia as the man who supposedly had plastic surgery to replace Paul McCartney in the Beatles after his "death" (he was also married to Judith Exner, and anybody who has links to JFK, the Beatles and Star Trek is a pop culture immortal). If there is still a DVD version of "Dementia 13" out there that has the commentary that Campbell did for the Laser Disc version, check that out if you can.

There`s plenty of info on the plot and background of this little film elsewhere among these reviews so straight to the point;

For the cheap quickie that it is, DEMENTIA 13, succeeds fairly well. It's interesting from the start, and quickly becomes a kind of Old Dark House style thriller. There are moments of early hack'n'slash that would later influence FRIDAY THE 13TH et al, a hint of supernatural goings-on, and a riff on PYSCHO, when what seems to be the main character becomes a victim half way through.

There are faults; the killer is quite easy to guess, while some other plot points make little sense, and the production values and sound quality are variable throughout.

Nevertheless, this is fairly entertaining and is worth an hour or so of a horror fans time.

But what's the title all about???