31 Days of Gore: Deranged (1974)

It’s October. Time to talk horror. This year I’m reviewing a different horror movie each day of the month.

I’m beginning to suspect I’ve seen Deranged before and completely forgot it. That’s because it’s a completely forgettable film despite decent acting, better-than-average camerawork, and a wonderfully odd séance, which involves a lonely widow pretending she’s possessed by the spirit of her dead husband; the spirit, the woman claims, wants the main character to “make her feel like a woman again.”

The movie opens with the following card: “The motion picture you are about to see is absolutely true.” I never believe a movie when it goes out of its way to tell me it’s a true story, but I believe it even less when it adds the word “absolutely.” For extra realism, the movie is hosted by a newspaper columnist who breaks the fourth wall with his asides. The newsman gives the film a hokey Faces of Death feel, which is fun for half of the movie, but this mockumentary gimmick is abandoned by the second half.

Roberts Blossom, best known as the sweet old man from Home Alone, plays Cobb the serial killer. In an introductory scene it’s made clear he loves his sick mother a little too much; at one point he’s trying to feed her pea soup even as her nose bleeds all over it. When she dies, he’s heartbroken, but he gets the brilliant idea to dig her up and bring her back home. When the town sheriff pulls Cobb over with his mother in the passenger seat, the policeman mistakes the smell of a rotting corpse for alcohol on Cobb’s breath… and sends Cobb on his merry little way. It’s the seventies, after all.

All is well for Cobb now that Mom’s back at home—other than the fact her skin is deteriorating. No matter; he’ll just borrow skin from living women to keep her fresh. It’s not long until Cobb is wearing the skin himself (What part of “Deranged” was unclear to you?), baiting more women than he actually needs to complete his restoration project.

I enjoyed the first half of Deranged, but the second half stretches the premise too thin. I like good horror movies and I like bad ones, but mediocre is unforgivable.

Come back at midnight Central Time for the next movie.