I was not expecting The Sadist to be so damned bleak. I'm not sure when the first really nihilistic American horror was produced, but when I read the description on the 50 Tales of Terror Box and saw the date (1963), I assumed it would be horror, but probably on the corny side. True, we're in post-Psycho territory by this point, but I didn't think that there were that many films that were this rough from the era. The Sadist feels ahead of its time in terms of its depiction of a horrifying hostage situation. It never really even tries to be fun - it's just a really messed up guy holding people hostage and threatening to kill them for 90 minutes. It's certainly not torture porn - but is psychological torture porn a thing? And any rate, I was pretty impressed and surprised with the film. For a movie over 50 years old with a pretty thin story, it is taut, well-made, and plenty disturbing.
The story? A trio of school teachers - a young man and woman (not a couple) and an older friend are driving to LA for a Dodgers game. Their car breaks down, but they manage to pull into an auto salvage yard. At first, it seems deserted... but then they find... The Sadist! He's played by Arch Hall, Jr. of Eegah! fame, and he's got his girl Judy with him, who appears to be mute. The Sadist has a gun, and holds them hostage, forcing them to fix their car so he and Judy can hightail it out of there. And I don't know if it's really a hostage situation, since he never really tries to hide the fact that he plans on killing them. But he sure does a good job of psychologically tormenting them! But will the Sadist succeed in his murderous plans? Or do our school teachers have a few tricks up their sleeves? Tune in to find out!
So, the most overwhelmingly obvious thing about The Sadist is its tone. For an early 60s film, I was surprised by how dark it was. It can't compete with the type of violence we'd see in a similarly plotted movie nowadays, but still... I couldn't imagine this didn't generate *some* controversy when it was originally released.
The other notable thing is Arch Hall, Jr. as the titular sadist. It's truly bizarre performance. To me, Hall has one of the most eminently punchable faces in movie history (and I mean that as a complement), and here he plays the psycho as a mentally-ill/rebel-without-a-cause/annoying-spazz. I can't really tell if it's a traditionally "good" performance, but he is really committed here and giving it his all. I was sad to see that his career was so short - only six films in five years. Prior to this, I'd only seen his "aw-shucks" cutesy schtick in campy flicks - if The Sadist is any indication, he at least had the chance to be a really interesting actor to keep an eye on.
There is some creativity in how the film is shot (and considering it's on the 50 Tales of Terror budget set, it looks and sounds really good too). There is some great "behind-the-gun/first-person-shooter" shots, and the desolation and openness of the desert setting is put to good use. The auto salvage yard in the desert wilderness provides a good bare-bones setting for a relatively bare-bones tale.
The lack of any real soundtrack for most of the film added to the overall bleakness. With that element of the "movie-ness" taken away, you kind of start to feel like you're sitting there watching this unfold. Really, the only non-actor audio until the climax is the radio play-by-play of a baseball game, and it's used to a pretty chilling effect.
But I was a little disappointed in the last 10-15 minutes. I feel like writer/director James Landis had spent most of the film bucking convention (and maybe even common sense). While I still feel he got to tell the story he wanted to, I was a little bummed that there is a full orchestral score and a more traditional climax to the film. The lack of music had set up a good vibe, so it was too bad they strayed from that during the big ending.
But ultimately, I really dug The Sadist. It's pretty unconventional (even by today's standards), but is still really effective in being relentlessly bleak. If you can get past the truly weird but still captivating performance of Arch Hall, Jr. (it took me about half the film), I think you'd find a lot to like.
I would recommend this film.
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