"No one will hear you scream!"

Y'all. Y'ALL. I have a new mission in life, and that is to get the whole entire world (which includes YOU) to acknowledge Messiah of Evil (1973) as the GD horror classic that it is. When someone out there declares it "list-making time" and everyone is all, "Oooh, I love this movie and that one and THIS movie totally gives me the creeps!", Messiah of Evil sits home alone, waiting for the phone to ring, waiting to be put on a list or two or all. The lists come and go, but Messiah's phone never rings. It softly cries itself to sleep, wondering what it has to do to get some attention from horror fans. Does it have to put out? Oh baby, it puts out like you would not believe, from the tagline ("Terror you won't want to remember- in a film you won't be able to forget!") on down, and I will ignore it no longer! People who like great horror movies UNITE!


Arletty (Marianna Hill) heads to the sleepy seaside town of Point Dume to search for her missing father, an artist from whom she'd been estranged for some time. When she arrives, she quickly realizes that something's just not right in Point Dume. The locals are either incoherent, frighteningly odd, or simply not at all helpful.

As she hangs out at her father's studio, she finds diaries and papers documenting what could only be described as his descent into madness. She meets Thom (Michael Greer) and his traveling companions Toni (Joy Bang) and Laura (Anitra Ford) when they arrive unannounced at the studio. Thom and Arletty dig deeper into the mystery and learn of the legend of the Blood Moon that appears over Point Dume, while Laura and Toni grow irritated that they no longer have a hold over Thom's affections.

Oh yeah, and something has caused the residents of Point Dume to turn into bloodthirsty zombie-ghoul things.

Sorry if that's all a little vague, but then Messiah of Evil is a little vague. There's a plot there to figure out, sure, but Messiah is one of those films that comes together slowly. It's more about atmosphere and feeling than it is about explaining everything away or giving concrete answers. It's got the same sort of hazy, dream-like quality that Let's Scare Jessica to Death has, and though it's ostensibly a zombie film, Messiah is definitely much closer kin to Jessica than it is to anything in Romero's oeuvre. The bookend voiceover narration in particular will likely thrill Jessica-heads.

The big star of Messiah of Evil, however, is undoubtedly the cinematography of Stephen M. Katz. Sub-par copies of the film have been floating around forever, the picture cropped into the wrong aspect ratio, the colors muddied to the point of darkness. Code Red released a special 35th Anniversary Edition DVD, restoring the picture to all its technicolor, 2.35:1 glory. It is fucking LUSCIOUS, a feast for the eyes and the pants. Messiah of Evil bears a style that, in my opinion, puts it in the same family as Argento's Suspiria- it's truly a lick-the-screen-worthy film.



While I'm all about a visceral slasher flick or any manner of outrageous animals running amok, evocative horror movies tend to dig the deepest into my psyche. They're not so much an assault on the senses as they are quiet burrowers, working their way under my skin, rendering me tense before I even realize it. Messiah of Evil is absolutely one of those films: it perfectly captures the feeling of the uncanny as we're introduced to some of the residents of Point Dume- they're off. They're stilted and not-quite-right, much like the town itself. It's too quiet, particularly at night when the streets are empty and the only sound is the buzzing of a neon sign. Both Toni and Laura walk around town, only to quickly discover that they're not alone and that they're very much in danger. These two sequences are incredibly shudder-inducing: Laura wanders into an empty grocery store only to discover some townfolk huddled over a freezer, dining on raw meat. After a moment, they notice her...



Toni, meanwhile, sits alone in a movie theater. The seats behind her slowly fill up with townspeople in a set piece reminiscent of the famous playground scene from Hitchcock's The Birds. It is pure bone-chilling awesome.

What a gem. I loved this movie, plain and simple. If you love gorgeous, creepy mood pieces, you're in for a treat. Check it out and spread the word- just be sure to pick up Code Red's superior 35th Anniversary Edition if you do. The next time you make a list of amazing horror flicks, don't forget Messiah of Evil. You don't want it to cry, do you?