Chilling Classics Cthursday: THE COLD (1984)

Aw yeah baby, I've been waiting for this movie's number to come up: It's The Cold, another "$50,000 wonder" from Wisconsin's own Bill Rebane. You might remember him from an earlier Chilling Classique, the train station-space virus-quarantine flick The Alpha Incident. This won't be the last we see of his work on Chilling Classics Cthursday--he truly is the multi-pack maestro--but it's quite possibly my favorite.

My love of The Cold starts right at the start (go figure), when we are treated to the credit sequence, which features some jaunty bargain bin Scott Joplin tunes and static shots of printed cards on tableaus of various recognizable board games, including Clue, Monopoly, and the Mad Magazine Board Game, which you'd best believe I played the ever-loving shit out of when I was a wee bonny lass. 

The shadows of the center card and playing pieces are one thing, but it's the random shadow on the left that gets me. And the way the credit for the director is off-center. Remember the not-so-long-ago trend of having opening credits sequences (usually from Blur, usually for David Fincher films) be all fancy and made of computer and like five minutes long? That fad was all fine and well I suppose (though exhausting, really. I don't need five minute opening credits!), but the janky-ass verité of this Rebane production is where it's at.

Now if you are unfamiliar with this particular movie, you might be wondering what's up with the game boards. Again, this is a Rebane production so you wouldn't be out of line to think that those games boards have nothing to do with anything. But! This film is also known as The Game, which explains not only the credits but also the fact that it's all about a game called...The Game, which is pronounced THE GAME.

"Okay, so is there cold in The Cold at all?" you might ask. Yes, there is! We'll get to it. But first, THE GAME. 

THE GAME comes courtesy of three "millionaire eccentrics," George, Horace, and Maude, who grew tired of Cribbage ages ago and had to really up their personal entertainment stakes. You can tell Maude is rich, especially, because she uses a cigarette holder.

They make things exciting for themselves by inviting a bunch of random people to The Northernaire, a Wisconsin island resort, where they will be tasked with...enduring some...stuff...for a while? Survivors who don't leave the island will win a million dollars. On the surface this sounds like a most dangerous kinda game, and I suppose it is. But it's all vague and nonsensical, and even the participants are confused, like they don't even know why they're there. If only they knew that this was all simply ~*~REBANE MAGIC~*~ at work, amirite?

So. How does THE GAME play out exactly? First and foremost, there is a dance party. No, I am not lying. The millionaire eccentrics get down with all the participants, to a tune that is obviously not played by the band, who are also participants in THE GAME. This movie weaves a complex web, I tells ya.

Things begin proper and random shit happens...and I do mean random. There is a shark in a swimming pool. There is an Alien homage of a type that only Bill Rebane could deliver.

Participants disappear mysteriously, sometimes leaving behind clues: "That's Ronnie's bandanna! What's happened? He never goes anywhere without it!" Sometimes a tarantula will appear, sometimes there are rats, or maybe a snake. And yes, sometimes, there is...THE COLD, which rolls out of vents or doorways or wherever and is clearly dry ice. But the actors sell it, man, from their shivering to their delivery of dialogue such as "There was the smell of death in that room. And the cold. Like a December grave."

Meanwhile, the millionaire eccentrics are having the time of their lives engaging in their Spirit Halloween foolery, often dancing and skipping down hallways, singing hits like "Jimmy Crack Corn," or going "mwa ha ha" over the intercom. I love them.

This guy is also randomly wandering around. No one sees him, but someone knows he's there and tells us he used to be in a mental asylum, but now he's the gardener, but only when THE GAME isn't happening.

Exactly who is involved in THE GAME, who ends up dead, what is really happening? If you don't really know the answers to those questions at the end of this thing, that's okay. A voiceover bookends the film, and before the final credits roll, said voiceover is basically like..."Exactly who is involved in THE GAME, who ends up dead, what is really happening? Fuck if I know."

Even Bill Rebane himself calls this semi-scripted story a "brain fart." The Cold is the quintessential cheapie quickie: one location, 3-4 crew, actors straight outta Milwaukee central casting, and a shoot lasting maybe a week, all done simply so Rebane could make another movie and maybe get his friends some publicity for their Northernaire Resort.

And as far as I'm concerned, like all of the director's other films, it's a weirdo bonkers delight. It's got all the Rebane hallmarks: the occasional out-of-focus shot, the copious (terrible) foley work, the floozy-music nudie shots, the odd clothed T-n-A shots that are filmed in such close-up that it takes a moment to register exactly what body part you're looking at, and so on.

As I mentioned in my review of The Alpha Incident, and on Evolution of Horror, when Mike Muncer and I briefly discussed Rebane's Giant Spider Invasion (which actually makes a cameo in The Cold!), these films are a decidedly acquired taste. Their journeys and their destinations are inscrutable to be sure. But I'm also sure that it's a taste I've definitely acquired, so I'm telling you now: when it's time for the next Rebane-helmed Chilling Classique 'round these parts, I will be dancing and skipping down all the hallways. Jimmy Crack Corn and I do care!