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Saturday, April 20, 2013

Stream-And-Run: The Devil Within Her (1975)


    Babies: you can’t trust them.


    NOTE: Netflix is taking down virtually all of their MGM titles on May 1st, so I thought it might be fun to see how many I can watch in the next two weeks, and then post quick, little hit-and-run reviews here. Hope you enjoy, and if you want to see any of these movies and have Netflix, better watch ’em now!

    This movie is seriously goofy - and I mean that in the best possible way. How else would a movie about a demon-possessed baby who offs victims left and right play? It’s hard to ascertain how serious the filmmakers’ were about their horror film, but when the said film features such lunatic scenes of a baby trapping his father in a noose and beheading another with a shovel, well… I have to guess they knew exactly what kind of movie they were making. The Devil Within Her (aka I Don’t Want to Be Born) concerns a former stripper played by Joan Collins, who one evening spurns the sexual advances of her dwarf coworker. Angered, the dwarf places a curse on her, saying her baby will be born a monster. Cut to several years later, and Collins is now married and expecting her first child. Upon its birth, the baby seems normal, but soon things start taking a turn for the worse as the little shit starts scratching and punching and generally causing mayhem wherever he goes. Despite the inherent silliness of the film, there are some effectively creepy scenes - such as the baby giving an inhuman cry when his father and his nun sister begin to pray over him. Rosemary’s Baby this ain’t, but it still proves to be a very enjoyable film in its own right.

    * If Caroline Munro is a selling point for you on this (and why the hell wouldn’t she be?), know going in that she’s barely in it. Faring a little better is Donald Pleasance, who even though here only appears as a “guest star” gets several meaty scenes, and also lends the film a certain amount of gravitas.

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