B.J. Lang Presents

CW: 90 Minutes of abuse against a woman.

If a movie poster depicts someone in a wheelchair, yet she is not disabled in the movie, does it still count for this blog?

I argue yes, because the poster promises disability representation in the media, but fails to deliver.

Not really. I just really wanted to watch: B.J. Lang Presents (1971)

Alternate title: The Manipulator

The Manipulator is a Thriller in which Mickey Rooney plays a Hollywood makeup man who captures a woman and ties her up in a wheelchair.

It has a 3.8 on IMBD.

I got 15 minutes into this movie and then thought to look up whether Mickey Rooney has any charges against. Yes, and it's bad.

If What Ever Happened to Baby Jane? (1962) is the trashy version of Sunset Boulevard (1950), then The Manipulator is the trashy version of What Ever Happened to Baby Jane?

Many descriptions of this movie called it "nearly unwatchable" due to the "padding" How bad is the padding? It takes over four minutes before the first line of dialogue.

Dedicating the first four minutes of the movie to building atmosphere works a lot better when you can see what is on screen.

B.J. Lang, but really Mickey Rooney, walks to his "studio". He sees brief flashes of surreal creatures and people.

This is either an attempt at an arthouse film that ended up as a grindhouse film or an attempt at a grindhouse film that ended up as a grindhouse film

Or an attempt at a film that barely ended up classifying as a film.

Lang walks into his office and the music turns strangely sentimental, and then turns into jazz.

Notice the angles

The angle is from underneath Lang and the statue. I mention that because it is impossible to tell from a single, dark screenshot.

He walks past a hippogriff.

The screen going completely dark for a few seconds and then Lang turns on a light.

If the purpose of the opening of a movie is to establish mood and character, then B.J. Lang Presents (1972) has one of the greatest openings in cinematic history. Without a single word, Mickey Rooney has established that B.J. is...a creepy Mickey Rooney.

Lang imagines people cheering for him. So this movie is going to sustain the endings of What Ever Happened to Baby Jane? (1962) and Sunset Boulevard (1950) for 90 minutes

Lang talks to people, imagining he is at the set of the movie shoot. He talks to some mannequinns, thinking he is an old coworker named Wally. He laments that he couldn't cast Wally because the studio casts people ahead of time.

I'm sure this sounds creepy. It could be creepy. Maybe it would be creepy if I could see anything on the screen.

There are times when the screen goes completely dark. The constant static in the background doesn't help.

Maybe it would help if Mickey Rooney played B.J. Lang instead of playing Mickey Rooney.

When Mickey Rooney speaks for the other imaginary people, he barely changes his voice. This entire movie so far is "Well, I can see what they were trying to go for there."

Lang describes the scene his is going to shoot: A man's son gets into a fight. He kills the other guy, and sits down and asks his father how he did. His father slaps him and says:

"You took too long with him. Haven't I taught you to kill better than that?"

This movie is utterly fascinating. That joke is coherent: we expect the father to be upset that the son killed someone, but instead the father is upset that he didn't kill efficiently.

The wording and rushed delivery completely ruin the joke. Especially since there's a redundant second punchline.

Maybe this delivery is supposed to make the audience understand something about Lang's character. Who knows?

Lang watches the movie, which is really just a static shot of the attic, but he imagines surreal images.

In one of the most shameless "tell don't show" scenes ever. Lang gives the characters dialogue to expose his motivations.

"I don't know what love is, and I haven't had the time to find out."

"Only idiots and fools choose love, that's the ultimate riddles."

Yes, riddles is plural in the line.

Now, this could be effective if I couldn't hear what he was saying. In addition to the static that is constant throughout the movie, this scene has the clicking of the movie projection overriding Rooney's soft delivery.

I have closed captioning on and even it gets confused.

At least this movie is accessible. Deaf people will be equally as baffled as hearing people.

That should be on the poster,

B.J. Lang Presents (1971) has exhausted its intellectual capabilities in attempting to give Lang motivations. Time for more surreal imagery.

If you can see it. This was the most coherent image I could find in the montage.

Also, there are high, strange-sounding chords throughout this. At this point, I had forgotten that the movie is in color.

Cut back to Lang sitting in his armchair. So was he in the armchair throughout all of that? Is this the next day? Who knows?

Lang starts to hear voices. Before, Lang was doing the voices himself, but know the voices come from outside. Except sometimes we hear his internal monologue and also there is giggling.

Lang hears his coworker talking about how he is going to leave the shooting schedule.

Lang pulls back a curtain and THERE'S A WOMAN BEHIND IT.

She was here all along? This is a big thing for the movie to bring out. Ths is on of the times the terms "wheelchair-bound" and "confined to a wheelchair" are applicable

The woman, Carlotta, insists she is hungry and I assume she is supposed to look emaciated.

I remember when this scene was good.

Lang thinks that Carlotta is the star of the movie and clears out a spot on the floor. Finally, he gives her lunch.

Sorry, that's from the good movie.

Lang tells Carlotta that she was hard to find and that she's a "Roxanne."

I suppose that Roxanne was his first love or something. Lang is clearly an attempt at a creepy, obsessed artist. 

Watching a movie is difficult when you have to keep guessing what the purpose of scenes are.

Lang turns off the lights and brings out a spotlight. This leads to Carlotta's famous monologue:

CARLOTTA

Mr. Lang? Are you out there? Are you, are you out there, Mr. Lang? Ahhh! Mr. Lang? Don't leave me, Mr. Lang. Are you out there?

This movie's version of 

NORMA DESMOND

You see, this is my life, it always will be. There's nothing else, just us, and the cameras, and those wonderful people out there in the dark. Alright Mr. Demille, I'm ready for my close-up.

Lang does a "creepy" scene. And by "creepy", I mean that Mickey Rooney plays with a broom, The movie speeds up, and an annoying song plays. Then he disappears.

What is this movie and why am I only twenty minutes and thirty-five seconds in? 

Carlotta sees tiger heads growling and she yells her famous line

CARLOTTA

MR. LAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAANG.

She removes her bonds and stands up. But not really, that was all in her mind.

What is this movie and why am I only twenty-one minutes and thirty-two seconds in?

Mr. Lang returns with makeup on. This is supposed to make him creepier.

Some people may be wondering "Is this a transphobic movie?" I'm personally wondering "Is this a movie?"

Mr. Lang applies makeup to Carlotta and reminisces about the time he made up Marilyn Monroe's eyes. He philosophizes that, when she was on screen, they weren't her eyes, but the public's eyes.

He also wonders why actors get so uptight about the lines they say when they don't write the lines.

Hey, I actually agree. I dislike when people judge actors and actresses based on the roles they play.

I agree with the first coherent thing in this movie.

I assume that  B.J. Lang Presents (1971) didn't have a script. They just turned on the camera and let Mickey Rooney ramble. The movie makes so, so much more sense that way.

Mr Lang calls Carlotta Roxanne and also his prisoner. Then he gets upset that he is hurting her.

So I think that the movie is trying to imply that Mr. Lang has flashes of sanity in which he realizes that he is holding a woman prisoner. He wipes off his makeup and admits that he lives in fantasy to cope with reality. and that his fantasy is consuming him.

After a few seconds of imagining that a mob is tying him up, Mr. Lang looks up into a mirror and sees he has a larger nose.

It's exhausting watching a movie in which you have to pause every scene to figure out what it means. I'm pretty sure I'm putting more thought into it than the director, but here goes:

Lang is living in a fantasy and knows it. However, when he acknowledges it, his fantasies punish him. His nose grows whenever he forces himself to lie again, a la Pinocchio,

And that's way more analysis than this movie deserves.

Lang puts on a hat. He says "when we're finished tonight", which prompts Carlotta to ask what will happen after they are finished.

A rare logical dialogue exchange in this movie.

Lang asks whether Carlotta knows her lines and pushes her in front of the mirror. Three times.

The film repeats three times. Arthouse film?

Lang tells Carlotta to do the scene where she meets her lover, Christain, for the first time

Oh, so this was how Fifty Shades of Grey (2015) was made.

I don't think that this movie's cinematography is good enough to handle fifty shades of grey, though.

Lang shines a light on Carlotta and puts different colored lenses over it.

He's better at lighting techniques than the director of this movie.

Throughout this entire movie, Lang just babbles on and on. Lang explains the scene for Carlotta: She's in a jungle and is waiting for her lover. Carlotta needs to work on her yes-and-ing skills.

Lang does behind some rope lattice and gives directions to the mannequins. His direction is to react to what Carlotta says

One might argue that this is a fundamental part of acting, but the director of B.J. Lang Presents (1971) didn't know this.

Throughout this sequence, there are brief moments where we see into Lang's...point of view. By "brief",  I mean anywhere from a split-second to a few seconds.

Lang calls action and there's another Carlotta behind the rope lattice. Is this from Carlotta's point of view? Who knows? Carlotta speaks

CARLOTTA

There is a jungle here in the garden here tonight. Even the moon is a bit strange and dangerous.

Damn it, show, don't tell.

MR. LANG

Yes, yes there is danger. The danger of gentle combat of love or size or looks or slings and swords.

CARLOTTA

If that be so, and we are at war, what weapons will you use?

Clearly, the specific word choices are meant to evoke the famous soliloquy in Hamlet.

Then Lang attempt to paraphrase the soliloquy.

MR. LANG

Fear, my darling, is as much a part of life as it is death.

MR. LANG

Fear is the energy that crumbles and rebuilds nations, crumbles and rebuilds

Carlotta begins her lines again. Lang babbles some more  and calls Carlotta Roxanne.

Lang hears clapping and asks whether Roxanne hears them too. Carlotta affirms and this makes Lang open up to her.

This is exciting. Lang must have gone through some incredible traumatic experience to make him like this.

It's amazing how, even with the terrible lighting, one can clearly see where Mickey Rooney's face ends and the the fake nose begins.

Anyway, here is the traumatic backstory that explains Lang's actions:

When he was young, he had no friends and no family.

Flashback to some not-surreal imagery.

It' just a party with some odd camera angles and muffled dialogue. This movis hasn't done a single thing correcly besides only being 90 minutes.

Surreal imagery works a lot better when one can see the imagery.

Rooney claims he loves everyone at the party, and they begin...surrounding him? Attacking him?

He sees a baby and holds it. I assume it's either a baby he lost or himself as a baby. 

We're halfway through the movie.

Back to the chair.

So, whenever Lang has these visions, he goes back to his chair and sits down?

Lang acts out the dueling scene. They're at the theater and Lang is surrounded by followers of Richelieu.

The pen is mightier than the sword, because someone penned the screenplay to Mr. Lang Presents (1971).

Lang "dies". Carlotta launches into another soliloquy 

CARLOTTA

Mr. Lang? What... Mr. Lang? What is it? What is it? M- You're dying? Don't die. don't die, Mr. Lang. Please don't die. Don't leave me. Oh, you're lying.

Carlotta gets angry that Lang is acting and lists off roles that she could play. One of them is Ophelia.

...this movie really thinks highly of itself.

OPHELIA

Don't die, Mr. Lang. You see, I-I-I-I-I-I'm held by your ropes, your-your ropes hold me. You-you must have heard that before, that I love your ropes, i love the bounds you put on me. I hate you, you bastard. I hate your eyes. I hate the bounds you put on me. I hate you. And I never wanted anything surer in my life,  than my hatred of you. AHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHH, don't die Mr. Lang...

I remember that scene in Hamlet. It really added complexity to Ophelia's character.

Her ramblings go on. The subtext in this soliloquy is that Carlotta actually hates Mr. Lang.

Mr. Lang asks Carlotta for some pills that he happened to have, but Carlotta is a little tied up. So Mr. Lang unties her right arm, and she frees herself, gets up, and kicks Mr. Lang repeatedly. Each kick is punctuated with a shot of a surreal face.

Let's think about this scene.

Carlotta has been tied up in a wheelchair for a long time. Surely, her leg muscles have atrophied, as she couldn't even move her legs. She gets up and immediately starts kicking hard enough to hurt Mr. Lang.

This is the biggest issue with the plot of B.J. Lang Presents (1971)

Mr. Lang overpowers Carlotta and pins her down. He calls her an object.

This is clever because Mr. Lang views mannequins as real people but the real person as an object.

Mr. Lang kisses Carlotta because of course he does and Carlotta runs away.

Really?

Su-really.

Mr. Lang runs after her and I don't know if the shaky camera is a stylistic choice or if they didn't care.

Mr. Lang trips, goes back, and grabs a fencing sword.

This is not Hamlet.

So, I assume that Mr. Lang thinks Carlotta is a follower of Richelieu.

The film goes in slow motion and Carlotta grabs the head of an animal. She backs off and grabs the light.

Hint: playing a scene in slow motion and adding strange chords as background music doesn't make a scene surreal.

Cardboard boxes fall on top of Carlotta and she imagines herself running through a row of mannequinns. Then Micky Rooney runs through cobwebs. Then Carlotta looks down the list of more generic creepy things to put in this movie.

Carlotta gets on the rafters and crawls around. Mr. Lang talks to his imaginary film crew about how great an actress Carlotta is.

This is a whole new level of method acting.

Mr. Lang calls Carlotta Roxanne again and promises to follow her with sword in hand. Carlotta runs into a knight.

So...this is knight in shining armor imagery? She thinks he will be her savior but the suit of armor is empty? Is this a commentary of patriarchal norms? Does this movie mean anything?

Carlotta hears shrieking (from viewers who made it this far into the movie?) She find a creepy doll and backs away and ANOTHER MAN GRABS HER.

THERE WAS ANOTHER MAN IN THE ATTIC THE ENTIRE TIME

I HATE THIS MOVIE.

This is old Charlie. Old Charlie promises not to hurt Carlotta. Mr. Lang pops out and promises to kill old Charlie and compose a ballad.

Got it.

Mr. Lang is the id.

Carlotta is the ego.

Old Charlie is the superego.

Or Carlotta is the only real person and Mr. Lang and Old Charlie are competing components of her psyche.

Or this movie is terrible.

Mr. Lang grabs Carlotta to protect her and tells Old Charlie that, while he may have been the better man, he should have left before this all began. Then he stabs Old Charlie.

I doubt that the final 21 minutes will be able to explain this movie.

I doubt that another 90 minute movie would be able to explain B.J. Lang Presents (1971)

Carlotta and Old Charlie stare at each other as if they recognize each other. Old Charlie dies and Carlotta runs through the mannequins.

This isn't even surreal imagery. The movie can't do the one thing on which it is banking.

Carlotta runs into the group of musicians in Mr. Lang's flashback and dances.

Are they the same musicians or could they not afford different actors?

Carlotta runs through the mannequins and goes yellow.

Twist: this was all in her mind. She is still staring at Old Charlie's body with Mr. Lang.

Mr. Lang is amazed that thrusting a sword into someone would kill that person and agrees to let Carlotta go as long as she says that she says that she loves him "just like they all said."

Um...twist?

Carlotta runs. Mr. Lang counts to eight and then chases after her.

This is the most baffling thing that Mr. Lang has done so far. Why did he count to eight instead of five or ten?

Carlotta gets herself stuck in a square room somehow. The films speeds up and she opens a gate and escapes to a patio.

The door to the outside is locked.

Break a window?

Mr. Lang walks out to his car. Carlotta runs in the car and locks it. Mr. Lang pounds on the window.

This all sounds very tense. I'm sure it would be if I could see what was on screen.

Carlotta pounds the horn and yells for help.

It's raining, because of course it is.


Mr. Lang uses a garbage can to break the car windows and Carlotta sees a flash f a woman's face.

Mr. Lang opens the door and gets in. Cut to Mr. Lang leading Carlotta back inside.

Meh, worth a try.

Mr. Lang promises to give Carlotta whatever she wants. He admits that he is close to madness, but only because he loves her.

Mr. Lang asks for forgiveness because madness is how he expresses love. Then he kisses her and Carlotta starts laughing. He tells her to stop and he hears the animal heads, imaginary woman, and mannequinns laughing at him too.

Then he tells Roxeanne that he will kills himself and live on in a world without love. Then he stabs himself and Carlotta's eyes widen.

As he lies dying, he asks for Carlotta/Roxeanne not to judge him and lays out his entire motive for killing himself:

People have taken thing away from him his entire life and death is the only thing they can't take away from him.

Don't you understand his character so much more now?

Me neither.

Carlotta hears people applauding. She stands up and curtsies.

So now she goes mad? Is this some cycle?

Credits.

The big twist is that this movie has a lighting director and assistant.

So, that was B. J. Lang Presents (1971). And it's impressive that the movie only left me with one question:

"What was that?"

B.J. Lang Presents (1971) is, without a doubt, the worst movie I have covered so far. It's the only movie that is actually difficult to watch. And I did it!

Night of the Seagulls

I've been nervous about reviewing Night of The Seagulls, the fourth and final film in the critically acclaimed Blind Dead Collection. Why? Because the back of the box of the Limited Edition complete The Blind Dead Collection four  DVD set (for die-hard fans only), promises "Creepy atmosphere, shocking violence, forbidden sexuality" and the first three films had none of that. So it must all be in the final film.

I remembered to finish this series after watching A Quiet Place (2018), because those monsters also hunted by sound.

You know a movie is promising when the title card has two mistakes.

This is the DVD menu screen.

And this is the title card.

They added a "The" at the beginning and a space between "Sea" and "Gulls." Is this level to which the series has fallen?

Also, nice font choice. Especially since the red words span across a bright flame and a dark background.

The frog statue is probably a new backstory for the Templars.

The chilling music worked a lot better in the dark Templar castles in the first two movies than at a beach.

It starts with a man and a woman traveling at night. I've forgotten the quality of the dialogue in this series.

Woman

Are we lost? Where are we? 

Man

I'm afraid we are. 

Later

Man

It appears there's a house. You wait here

Woman

Don't go, please.

Man

 Don't worry, dear.

Remember how the women in the last movie spent basically the entire movie in bikinis? This movie is a bit more classy and just has the woman wear a comically low-cut shirt.

She notices the Templars ride under a bridge. The man reaches the house and knocks.

The Templars ride back to the house and approach the man creepily. Then they stab him.

The Templars find his wife and grab her. Amando de Ossorio's expert auteur vision focuses the camera down her blouse.

They bring the women to the frog statue and the leader tears her blouse open.

Imagine Amando de Ossorio constructing the rules of this world.

Amando de Ossorio

They have to stab the women in their chests to extract their hearts, because the Templars feed on the hearts.

Someone Else

 Are you sure that's not just so you can have the Templars expose the women's breasts in your movie?

Amando de Ossorio

No, they need their hearts. It's symbolic.

Someone Else

 Are you sure-

Amando de Ossorio

 You don't understand auteur theory.

In this movie, they feed the heart to this statue. The Templar lore keeps changing. At least the series is consistently inconsistent.

Crabs move towards the corpse.

The world building in this series is incredibly confusing.

Flash forward to present day of 1976


Joan and her husband, Henry drive to a village. Through some Blind Dead style exposition, we learn that Henry is a rural doctor and this is his first assignment

Henry expresses surprise that the village isn't as primitive as he expected. Is The Blind Dead IV: Night of the Seagulls really going to attempt social commentary?

Joan and Henry enters a general store. Henry asks where the doctor's house is but the villagers are clearly reluctant to answer. So he grabs a man by the collar.

This is the rural doctor.

The man tells Henry that the doctor lives on a cliff by the sea.

It's like they realized it was difficult to make a seaside cliff ominous. Much more difficult than temple ruins, a dark house, and a ghost ship. When you can't show, tell.

I can't believe that they are putting in even less effort than the last movie.

Henry Stein knocks on the door and the doctor opens it. He is leaving.

Wait, so they are switching places? The doctor advises them to leave because the townspeople don't like doctors. (?)

The only two in this movie have been fairly despicible.

Henry walks the doctor to his car.

It takes twenty seconds for them to walk from one side of the screen to the other. Given the amount of time the third movie devoted to dark shots of the women on the ship, it's tolerable.

Joan lights a candle, folds sheets. washes dishes. These movies somehow always get the women to be alone before the Blind Dead attack.

But I think all of them so far have passed the Bechdel test (not sure about two). So they aren't misogynistic.

I think this is the most clothes a woman in one of these movies has worn.

The music really over-compensates for the complete lack of creepy visuals. A man appears in the window.

Now, the first three movies don't exactly generate Hitchcockian suspense. But at least there is some build-up. Some subtlety. This is like elementary school Halloween fair haunted house level horror.

Joan spots the face and screams. Then she hears Henry's car approach. The door starts to open.

Well, that lock was worthless.

This is Teddy.

A cynical viewer may assume that Teddy is a reuse of the character of Murdo from The Blind Dead II: Return of the Evil Dead,

Teddy claims he is especially afraid tonight. The audience knows that it is the Night of the Seagulls. Joan takes him in and patches him up.

the old doctor gets on his horse and warns Henry to leave as soon as possible because It Comes At Night (2017)

Okay, I have two movies that disagree with you, but this series doesn't have any continuity.

Maybe the twist is that this movie takes place at the same time as the third movie? I mean, it ended with the Templars washing up on the shore. Is this a Saw IV (2007)/Saw III (2006) deal?

Henry and Joan sleep next to each other. Joan can't sleep. Henry blames Teddy, whom she hid in the attic.

You know what would have been an interesting scene? Joan hiding Teddy in the attic.

You know what else would have been an interesting scene? Joan telling Henry about Teddy.

Just because the dead are blind and hunt by sound doesn't mean you can "tell, don't show".

They hear a bell from the sea. Henry claims that ships ring the bell on foggy nights.

THIS TAKES PLACE AT THE SAME TIME AS THE THIRD MOVIE. CONTINUITY!

The Templars awaken. In the first three movies, they at least eastablished that the graves existed before the Templars awoke.

Remember how in The Blind Dead II: Return of the Evil Dead, Murdo had to kill a woman and let her blood drip onto the graves of the Templars on the anniversary of their deaths? Whereas in The Blind Dead I: Tombs of the Blind Dead, the Templars awoke because Betty played a radio station? Now it's just because it's The Night of the Seagulls

The world-building in The Blind Dead Collection is lack-luster.

They don't even have a jump scare chord here:

. The fourth movie has just given up,

The logical thing for Henry and Joan to do is get up and go to the beach.

"We sacrifice women differently here"

Give a man a fish, and he'll eat for a day. Sacrifice a woman to undead Templars, and you get a lackluster conclusion to a Night of the Living Dead rip-off series.

The Templars get on their horses...

I hate to beat an undead horse, but where did the horses come from?

The people in black are the woman of the village and this scene is super important because it passes the Bechdel Test.

Christian Symbolism?

Now that it is night, the atmosphere should be creepier, but instead it's just fuzzy,

The undead Templars approach the woman and she screams. Joan wakes up.

Hold on, Henry and Joan wake up, go the beach, see women in black leading a woman in white to the sea, shrug, and go back to sleep?

Joan thinks she hears a woman scream, but Henry assures her it is just the seagull. Joan retorts that it is night time. Joan has been clothed this entire movie and now she has won an argument against her husband. Is The Blind Dead IV: Night of the Seagulls finally a feminist movie?

Spoiler: No

Cut to a lion statue

Frogs, crabs, seagulls, and lions. The mythology of this world is bizzare.

Joan attempts to buy something from the general store, but the owner resists and helps Lucy, the woman behind her.

Bechdel Test Pass #2

Joan shoots back that the villagers have strange customs such as being rude to people. beating up a defenseless idiot, and singing at the beach at night.

The writing in the fourth movie has really gone downhill. If they wanted the list to be dramatic, they should have escalated in this order:

1. Being rude.
2. Singing at the beach at night
3. Beating up a defenseless idiot.

Or bring the real issue up

1. Being rude
2. Beating up a defenseless idiot
3. Singing at the beach at night while tying a woman to a rock.

Or, if they wanted to be funny, they could have subverted the final one.

1. Beating up a defenseless idiot.
2. Singing at the beach at night while tying a woman to a rock.
3. Being rude.

Joan buys some food and Lucy helps her carry it home. Lucy offers to help Joan and Henry with the doctor's house in exchange for money. Joan accepts and also asks if she was part of the sacrificial ceremonies last night.

Lucy denies that they exist and this is the worst job interview I've seen.

Lucy goes to the doctor's home, Henry posits that the villagers don't see him because they still see a witch doctor.

Remember, The Blind Dead IV: Night of the Seagulls is still going for social commentary.

The bells ring. Lucy denies that she hears them. Teddy says he is scared of the bells and wants to sleep in the attic. Henry claims that the bell is for fog.

There's a knock on the door, and Henry asks Lucy to get it. She resists. Henry opens it instead.

Okay, calling it right now, Lucy is a traitor who wants Joan to be sacrificed.

A woman named Tilda comes in and sobs that they are going to take her away. Henry gives her a sedative.

A man and a woman come to pick up Tilda, and are angry that the doctor treated her.

Yeah, wasting a sedative on someone about to be sacrificed.

Just a thought, but how did the villagers think putting the doctors right beside the sacrificial spot and not informing them about the sacrifices would work?

This is two nights in a row. I thought it was the Night of the Seagulls. How quickly do they burn through women to sacrifice?

The undead Templars approach and this one turns his head side to side.

Tilda screams and he fixates on her.

A subtle way to indicate that the undead are blind. But if they hunt by sound, why do they go near the rushing water? Haven't they seen A Quiet Place (2018)?

The Templars cut her ropes and carry her through some temple.  I'm glad we're getting to the Templars halfway through this movie.

If they are blind, why would they bother lighting torches. I thought fire destroyed them?

Wait, that was just the first movie. This series has no continuity.

A Templar lays her down and rips open her top.

Amando de Ossorio

They have to open her gown to stab her in the right place to extract her heart.

Someone Else

The knife can pierce through a woman's chest, but not her light gown?

Amando de Ossorio

Of course not, but they have to see where to stab.

Someone Else

I though the gimmick of this series was that the undead were blind.

Amando de Ossorio

Are you questioning my auteur vision?

The Frog statue is still important.

The Templar stabs her and the movie doesn't show the moment of piercing. Has the Blind Dead Series cut down on strawberry syrup?

Crabs come towards Tilda's corpse. What do the crabs mean?

Joan and Henry go to the village. and ask the shopkeeper about Tilda.

You're describing most women of this series.

Teddy, who now feels comfortable being outside, knows where Tilda Flanagan lives. He claims that "they" always beat him and points to a building were Tilda "used to live."

Also, he claims that "they" are evil and have taken Tilda away.

Joan and Henry leave and the villagers run to attack Teddy for giving away the secret.

Joan and Henry go to Tilda's house, THERE ARE ONLY TWO PIECES OF CLOTH ON THE CLOTHESLINE!

Tilda's parents refuse to Henry in and say that she went to the city.

Some condescending rural doctor stuff there.

Teddy stumbles around the cliffs. The movie is over halfway over. The villagers come to attack. They push him off the cliff and he dies.

....I did not see that coming.

Lucy serves dinner. There's a knock on the door and the camera zooms in on her eye

Maybe the movie is trying to make the audience think that Teddy is now undead?

Lucy goes to open the door and the music is over-compensating for the lack of suspense here.

52:16

God damn it, it's the Jehovah's Witnesses.

So they are sacrificing women each night or else the village will be destroyed? Doesn't seem sustainable.

Teddy isn't dead, he just fell off a cliff and hit his head. I must have assumed.

Lucy is fairly upset that she has to be sacrificed now. Henry is upset because she might not come back like the Flanagan girl. The seagulls fly by again, so they decide to leave town.

Yes, seagulls flying at night is the final straw.

The women lead Lucy down to the sea. The music is two eerie chords over and over and over again.

Henry decides to leave and go to the police like some first-world savior.

A knock at the door. Henry assumes it must be Lucy, which means it isn't.

Seriously, every single time a character asserts that a knock on the door is someone, it turns out to be someone else.

Who verbally asserts who they think is at the door anyway?

It's Teddy!

The women lead Lucy to the sacrificial rock. Do they have to dressed the chosen one in a white gown or something?

Teddy claims that the dead rise up and take one girl every night for seven nights. Also, the cries of the seagulls are the souls of the sacrificed girls.

Woah, there.

That is some bizzare world-building to throw in 11/12 of the way through a horror series.

And that still doesn't make seagulls at night creepy.

The seagulls stop crying, which means that something is going to happen (?) Henry goes to save Lucy

The blind dead approach on horses

I hate to beat an undead horse, but where did the horses come from?

The women try to prevent Henry from stopping the sacrifice, but then just shrug and let him go.

It would be funny if ths was all a huge joke they played on the new doctors.

Henry unties Lucy as the Blind Dead approach with swords. They duck and the swords hit the rocks.

By the way, the booklet that came with the Blind Dead Collection box called these some of the most effective monsters in horror history,

Henry, Joan, and Lucy escape back to the house. They plan to leave once Teddy is better, but Lucy has to stay to be sacrificed. She gives a history lesson about Templars.

I hate it when these series give the villains sympathetic backstories in the final moments!

Every seven years, the village must sacrifice seven girls for seven nights or the knights will raze the village.

I'm just wondering how people figured this out. Like, did they observe that every seven years, knights came from the sea and destroyed the village? And then kept trying different things to stop it? How long did it take them to realize they had to sacrifice seven girls on seven nights on that specific rock? Did they tie up an eighth girl and then, when she lived, go "Oh, guess it's just seven"?

Henry decides to be the one to prevent this sacrifice and potentially doom the town

This is some offensive first-world savior storytelling here.

This has been going on for who knows how long. You would think someone would  think "Maybe it's possible to defeat these slow, blind knights. We have seven years to figure it out,"

Henry thinks he hears the car and opens the door.

...I went back in the movie and looked for when they sent someone out to get the car. I couldn't find it. I don't know why they car isn't right outside. I don't know who they would send to get the car.

It doesn't matter, because whenever a characters thinks someone is at the door, it turns out to be someone else. In this case, it is nobody.

Henry boards up the house. Joan and Lucy break up the furniture to get more boards. The undead Templars struggle to hack through.

Seven nights every seven years  for hundreds of years and nobody has thought to board up their house?

A hand reaches through a gap in the planks. Joan gives Henry a piece of wood and he hits the hand.

Even the first movie was slightly more empower to women than this.

Also, the movie using the "scare chord" when Henry hits the hand rather than when the hand appears

Henry decides that the back door is sufficiently reinforced despite a hand going through the planks and moves Teddy to the front door.

The blind dead go through the back door easily. By the way, neither this movie nor the previous one has mentioned them being blind.

Joan grabs a torch and wards off the Templars. Henry grabs a candle and sets a Templar on fire.

WOW.

Centuries and nobody has figured out to use fire.

The Templars approach Teddy and Lucy. Being in a poor, rural area, they...haven't discovered fire. (?)

They carry teddy off to a corner. Why would they take Teddy instead of Lucy, the sacrifice.

Joan, Lucy, and Henry watch the Templars kill Teddy. I assume that Henry and Joan discarded the candle and torch because....

They escape through the attic window to get on the horses.

I hate to beat an undead horse, but where did the horses come from?

Lucy tries to preven them from getting on the horses, but Henry insists. Lucy only has known about the Templars her entire life, why would she know what to do?

Turns out that the evil Templars' horses don't obey them and head towards the castle.

Eight minutes left.

Lucy falls off the horse into the sea. The Templars kill her.

Joan and Henry reach the castle and get inside.

Why would the castle of the blind undead have torches? Just saying. Also, using one board to block the door?

Henry claims that it's Joan, not Lucy that the undead want, because Lucy broke the rules...

This is supposed to be a twist, but how does Henry know this?

Henry finds the frog statue and asserts that destroying it will end the ritual.

How. Does. He. Know. This?

Why has nobody else in the village, all of whom know the story, figured this out?

A few Templars come out of the coffins. Rather than taking the torches, Henry and Joan get behind the statue and...push.

I would hope that the statue that has lasted hundreds of years is reinforced into the ground.

Instead, the statue easily tumbles off and breaks.

This obvious causes all the Templars to fall over and blood to spill out of their eyes. Does this affect all the Templars in the Blind Dead cinematic universe, or just the ones in this movie?

BEST TO WORST

1. Blind Dead II: Return of the Evil Dead
2. Blind Dead I: Tombs of the Blind Dead
3. Blind Dead IV: Night of the Seagulls/ The Night of the Sea Gulls
4. Blind Dead III: The Ghost Galleon

And I made it through the entire synopsis without making a "Night of the Can't-See Gulls" joke,