Open Season (1974)

          Presenting horrific behavior in a matter-of-fact style, Open Season is unusual among the myriad ’70s movies about the corrosive effects of violence. Whereas many ’70s films engaging this subject matter use vigilantism as a prism for exploring morality, Open Season takes a decidedly nihilistic approach. The principal characters are three average Americans who spend their annual camping trips hunting human beings for sport. Some brisk but pointed dialogue late in the movie explains why: The friends became addicted to killing people while serving in Vietnam. Pretty heavy for a European exploitation movie that caters to the international audience by featuring several American actors. Sleekly filmed by UK director Peter Collinson (helmer of 1969’s The Italian Job), this slow-burn thriller stars Peter Fonda, John Phillip Law, and Richard Lynch as the hunters.

          Their characters are introduced effectively at a backyard barbecue, the apex of suburban normalcy, before they kiss their wives and children goodbye and depart for their annual getaway. Upon reaching the boondocks, the dudes drink heavily and zero in on a young couple traveling the same roads. Nancy (Cornelia Sharpe) is a sexy blonde, and her companion, Martin (Alberto de Mendoza), is a clean-cut dweeb whom the hunters correctly guess is having an extramarital affair with Nancy. The hunters pretend to be cops in order to pull over the couple’s car, and then the hunters abduct the couple, transporting their hostages to a lakeside cabin miles from civilization. The hunters toy with the couple, forcing Martin to do housework while cleverly manipulating Nancy into believing she can seduce her way out of trouble. After the men have their fun with Nancy, the real gamesmanship begins—the hunters release Martin and Nancy into the wild with a 30-minute head start, and then the hunters gather high-powered rifles and begin their pursuit. 

          The best sequences of Open Season depict savagery casually. The hunters use good manners while humiliating Martin and shackling Nancy so she can’t escape. Worse, they treat their whole adventure like a regular hunting trip, downing beers and trading jokes even as they prepare for sadistic homicide. The filmmakers wisely eschew musical scoring during many scenes, letting the creepy onscreen events manufacture mood without adornment. When music does kick in, however, some of the misguided attempts at replicating hillbilly melodies are distracting. The acting is uneven, though Fonda, Law, and Lynch simulate camaraderie well. (FYI, William Holden makes a mark in a very small supporting role.) Best of all is the film’s final half-hour, during which a remote island becomes a killing ground. Once the characters in Open Season throw off their pretenses, the savage heart of this nasty little movie beats loudly.

Open Season: GROOVY

The Reincarnation of Peter Proud (1975)

          Creepy, provocative, and sexy, this psychological thriller asks what might happen if a rational modern man began to suspect that he was the reincarnation of someone else—and then complicates that central question by implying that the soul haunting the modern man’s body came back to settle some nasty unfinished business. Michael Sarrazin, perfectly cast because his wide eyes and slim build give him an ethereal quality no matter the circumstances, stars as Peter Proud, a West Coast college professor whose life seems perfect. He’s happy, respected, successful, and romantically involved with a beautiful fellow teacher, Nora (Cornelia Sharpe). Yet when Peter starts experiencing disturbing nightmares and phantom pains that doctors can’t explain, he seeks out help from a paranormal researcher, Samuel (Paul Hecht). Samuel suggests that Peter may be reliving memories from a past life.

          Determined to resolve the situation, Peter tracks down the Massachusetts city in which his nightmares/memories take place. Finding the city confirms to Peter that the reincarnation is real. Next, Peter connects with Marcia (Margot Kidder), the widow of Peter’s prior incarnation, and Ann (Jennifer O’Neil), Marcia’s daughter. Peter doesn’t explain to either of these women why he’s in Massachusetts, partially because he doubts they’ll believe him and partially because in the recurring nightmares/memories, Marcia murders Peter’s prior incarnation. Obsessively investigating the past-life mystery damages Peter’s present-day life, because Nora bails on Peter when the going gets weird. Later, things get even worse when Peter’s relationships with Ann and Marcia gain Freudian dimensions.

          As helmed by J. Lee Thompson, who mixes carnality and savagery in this film much as he did in the great Cape Fear (1962), The Reincarnation of Peter Proud is efficient, erotic, and evocative—an offbeat mixture of sleazy thrills and thought-provoking concepts. Although the film loses points for its troika of mediocre female performances (Kidder, O’Neill, and Sharpe are each gorgeous but amateurish), Sarrazin’s intensity keeps the piece on track. Written by Max Ehrlich, who adapted his novel of the same name, The Reincarnation of Peter Proud fits into the mid-’70s trend of sensationalistic pseudoscience in popular culture. Furthermore, the writer gives decent lip service to the philosophical and theological implications of Peter’s experience, because—as the story’s paranormal researcher says at one point—the revelation that reincarnation is real could permanently alter the human experience by erasing fear of death. No dummy, Ehrlich delivers all of this heady material in the form of a story filled with sex and violence.

         And while the film’s brutality is fairly minor, the film’s sexuality is quite intense. Both lurid aspects of the picture converge in a climactic scene (no pun intended) featuring Marcia masturbating in a bathtub while recalling the brutal affections of her late husband. This startling vignette was almost certainly the most graphic depiction of female self-pleasure in a mainstream movie until the release of Brian De Palma’s Dressed to Kill (1980). Yet the presence of such moments gets to the heart of why The Reincarnation of Peter Proud is so watchable. With strong elements ranging from the disturbing psychosexual connotations of the story to the unnerving score by the great Jerry Goldsmith (love those electronic accents!), The Reincarnation of Peter Proud engages the viewer on myriad levels simultaneously. It’s not high art, per se, but it’s definitely not low art, either.

The Reincarnation of Peter Proud: GROOVY

The Next Man (1976)

          While primarily a suspense film about a diplomat being targeted by a femme-fatale assassin, The Next Man slips in a few provocative ideas about the never-ending conflicts in the Middle East. It also features an authoritative performance by Sean Connery as a man who tries to change the world with his wits, rather than his fists, even though The Next Man is one of several pictures in which the Scotsman is incongruously cast as an Arab. While it would be fabulous to report that this picture pulls its disparate elements together in a compelling way, The Next Man is, sadly, meandering and unfocused.

          The set-up is simple enough: Amid a climate of rampant political assassinations, Saudi Arabian ambassador Khalil Abdul-Muhsen (Connery) stirs up international controversy by suggesting during a speech at the United Nations that Israel should become a member nation of OPEC, the Arab-controlled oil-production consortium. Meanwhile, he’s seduced by sophisticated beauty Nicole Scott (Cornelia Sharpe), who is actually an international assassin tasked with killing him.
          The big problem with the movie is twofold: First, viewers learn Nicole is an assassin before she even meets Abdul-Muhsen, so there’s no mystery about her motivation, and second, once she becomes sexually involved with the ambassador, she has countless opportunities to kill him that she does not exploit. Particularly since Abdul-Muhsen’s enemies perceive his continued existence as a threat, it makes no sense that the conspirators would delay the inevitable, especially since the trite subplot in which Nicole grows to love her target never rings true.
          The fault for the ineffective romance angle lies partly with the script, since Nicole is presented as such a cipher we have no way of gauging which feelings are true and which are deceptions, and partly with Sharpe’s performance. A long and lean blonde with piercing eyes, Sharpe was understandably successful as a fashion model, but she’s lifeless as a dramatic actress.
          As directed TV veteran Richard C. Sarafian, who helmed a number of pulpy oddities in the ’70s, The Next Man has a few effective scenes, like a siege on Abdul-Muhsen’s vacation home in the Bermudas, but the lack of credibility in the main onscreen relationship, combined with the awkward juxtaposition of talky political scenes and violent action sequences, steer The Next Man way off course. Connery’s charisma, the offbeat subject matter, and Sharpe’s beauty make the picture watchable, but just barely.

The Next Man: FUNKY