ScreamandScreamAgain

Scream and Scream Again (1970)

The movie opens up in some fictitious Communist country as a crazed officer kills his superior. Then the action moves to England where there is a killer on the loose targeting young women he picks up at clubs. The rest of the movie jumps between these story lines as we see the officer pick off another superior and torture some dissenters. At the same time the police track the killer, who is nearly unstoppable and strong beyond belief. It is only when the killer jumps into a pit of acid and the officer shows up at the same house hold of a scientist named Dr. Browning (played by Vincent Price) that the movie makes any effort to show a connection between the different plots.

Scream and Scream Again is a mess of a movie. I know that it has fans, but honestly this was one of the most disappointing and confusing movies that I’ve watched in quite a long time. For most of the duration this one feels like two separate movies and actually there is a third subplot that is revisited every so often with a man in a hospital bed. Every time the movie goes back to him he is missing a limb. Now I’m sure that is supposed to fit into the main plot that involves replicants, machines with human brains in them. But later in the movie when Browing explains the procedure it has nothing to do with lopping off a limb one at a time. Of course this idea of human machine hybrids is the ploy used to tie the two main plots together, but when I spend 85 minutes of a 90 minute movie confused and bored no twist in the world is going to make it entertaining. And before I forget Scream and Scream Again has one of the most drawn out and poorly staged chase scenes that I’ve seen ever.

As if the plot wasn’t annoying enough this movie wastes what should have been an amazing cast. Vincent Price gets to chew some scenery at the end of the movie, but isn’t in most of the beginning. Instead we are forced to watch a bunch of actors playing characters that I couldn’t care less about. And even when Price is on screen this thing is such a mess that I couldn’t care less. I’ve always said that he was one of those actors that could make anything he was in worth watching, but Scream and Scream Again proves me wrong. Adding insult to injury the legendary Christopher Lee is given a bit part and doesn’t get nearly enough to do and Peter Cushing is reduced to a glorified cameo. If you have these three actors why not show more of them instead of the drivel that is foisted on the audience?

What we have here is the deadly combination of a terrible story that is both confusing and manages to waste the efforts of 3 legends. I’m not recommending Scream and Scream Again.

1 out of 4

reviewed by John Shatzer