InSanitarium: Alone in the Dark (1982)

What happens when you get a bunch of old men, tell them to act insane and give them weapons? Until we arm our septuagenarians in 'the homes,' we have today's film. It is a fairly-forgotten movie, in spite of its notable cast. Why does this happen? Well, most people can count on their hands the number of major slasher films that were blockbusters that did not include the words 'Freddy,' 'Halloween' and/or 'Friday the 13th' in the title. Let's make up for this oversight, shall we? This is..

Alone in the Dark

In case it was not clear, this is NOT the Uwe Boll 'adaptation' of the game. I have already reviewed one Boll film and think that is enough. Okay, maybe Postal if someone manages to get me drunk. Really, really, really drunk!

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Our story begins with a new psychiatrist and his family showing up in a lovely New England house. He is taking over for the previous doctor who has left for personal reasons. This proves to be a somewhat important fact later on. The estate is a very nice one, save for one problem: the dangerous psychopaths who inhabit one of the place's floors. In many ways, the group appears to be a more dangerous version of the group in the 80s film The Dream Team. They even have the crazy guy who thinks that he is a religious figure, only he is not funny. The key members of the group include the religious nut (Martin Landau), the mysterious nose-bleeding man (nobody famous), the fat killer (also an unknown) and one violent guy (Jack Palance). I'm sure that this will not end badly.

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While our hero deals with some personal issues at home, the crazy people scheme. In their deranged minds, they have formed a simple answer to why their favorite therapist has left: the new guy killed him. They plan their revenge, but first, they need to get out. As luck would have it, a massive storm in the area causes a major power outage. They kill their guards and go out into the general population. It goes about as well as you might think. Palance goes out to a punk rock club and nobody blinks an eye. Martin 'Ed Wood' Landau chops up some nice people in a diner. Oh and the nose-bleed guys puts on a hockey mask to disguise his face. We actually never see it for a long time. Do I smell a plot point coming on?

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During all this, a lot of personal issues have come up. The doctor's sister is in town and she is not exactly 100% mentally-sound anymore. Another young woman is in the house and she is a bit more politically-motivated. She comes back from a rally with a mysterious man who got arrested with her. Mysterious man, huh? After arriving back home, the killers show their ugly heads. They even kill the hippie-esque owner of the sanitarium (Donald Pleasence) with a crossbow. Man, that guy's track record with killers is not too good. This is the best part of the movie, full of suspense, scares and one random freak-out (featuring monster effects by Tom Savini). By the way, in case you did not figure it out, the mysterious man is the nose-bleed guy.

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I will spoil the ending here, but for a good reason. It is a surprisingly-lazy Deus Ex Machina move.

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The last remaining killers (read:the leads) finally get in the house and corner our heroes. As Palance prepares to shoot them, the power flashes back on. This causes the television to turn itself back on (what kind did they buy?!?) and it shows the previous psychiatrist interviewed by a reporter. The people back off and the day is saved. Wow, that was a really dumb ending for such a good movie.

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This movie is honestly quite good, especially considering the average quality of slasher films of this day. I mean, we've all seen The Burning, right? The film is pretty much sold on its casting and that is it. While the movie is paced well, shot well and done in a solid manner, it would be merely average with any other set of actors. Seeing Palance and Landau both in villainous roles was nice and its a shame that it did not happen more (aside from Palance's good performance in a 1970's adaptation of Dracula). I have also gone the whole review without mentioning that the lead is one of the guys from The A-Team. That says something about how interesting the casting is when I forget to mention that factoid. If you can forgive the ending (a necessary evil for many of these films), you will have a really good time.

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Have you ever wanted to see a giant series of coincidental events all take place in one location at one time? In that case, I have the direct-to-video movie for you. Stay tuned...