Dementia 13
AS WITH many first time films from this potent era of Hollywood output, the roots of Francis Ford Coppola's 1963 directorial debut Dementia 13 can be traced to the door of low budget film king Roger Corman.
Aside from being a fine director himself, Corman always had an astute eye for young rising talent within his industry and, thanks to the raft of independent B-movie productions he always had on the go, the opportunity to give that talent a break.
Coppola, a young editor with only a handful of gigs to his name, was hired by Corman to re-edit a cheap Russian sci-fi flick that would eventually surface Stateside as Battle Beyond The Sun.
Impressed with the youngster's work ethic, Corman continued to use him on productions such as Tower Of London (1962) and The Terror (1963). It was while working in Ireland as a soundman on another 1963 slice of stylish exploitation fodder, The Young Racers, that Dementia 13 was born.
Corman was keen to cash in on the success of Psycho and encouraged Coppola to come up with a low budget knock-off to match the Hitchcock classic for shocks and suspense. Coppola, keen to flex his aspiring directing muscles, was happy to oblige: with a measly $20,000 left over from The Young Racers and the same again raised by flogging off the British rights, he stayed on in Ireland to craft the black and white cult curio that would be his first solo feature film.
The finished product is an odd mishmash of movie styles that feels, at times, like an uneasy marriage between a European art house thriller and a schlocky slice of B-movie horror.
It's the tale of a scheming woman called Louise (Luana Anders) whose husband (Peter Read) dies from a heart attack while they are out arguing on an old rowboat. Desperate to make sure she lands her old man's inheritance, she hatches a plan to convince his eccentric and creepy posh relatives in Ireland that he's merely away on a business trip.
The sudden appearance of a mad, axe wielding maniac on the scene throws her plans into disarray and leads to a bloody and bizarre climax.
Corman wasn't happy with the film Coppola delivered however and insisted that extra scenes shot by Jack Hill and a ludicrous prologue sequence be added to up the sensational exploitation content.
However, thanks to a brand new director's cut just released by Vestron home entertainment, it's now possible to see the film as Coppola originally intended.
It's coldly entertaining nonsense most of the time, but not everything works. The film's poverty row roots naturally show through (Coppola cranked out the script with art director Al Locatelli in a mere three days) and the cast are mostly drawn from Coppola's student friends from UCLA or Irish stage actors in town at the time, including Armagh's own Patrick Magee, but there's still enough going on here to make this a fascinating first time effort from the future Godfather director.
Creepy and stylish, Dementia 13 is well worth a second look.
