Touches You

It’s an especially fun movie from a director and cast who are clearly having a good time allowing themselves to let loose.

It's complicated... I really like the directing, acting and writing but, there are issues with the way it's shot that I just can't deny. As much as I love the storytelling and the fantastic performance but, there are also certain scenes that didn't need to exist.

If the ambition is to provide two hours of instantly forgettable, popcorn-munching escapism, it succeeds.

One Dark Night is a movie which brings back lot of nostalgic memories. It was 1991 and cable TV had just hit this part of the world. Star Plus now became the craze of us kids (I was aged 14 then) and every Friday night there used to be aired an English movie in Star Plus. and the first movie that was thus aired was One Dark Night. My brother (aged 12), me and my parents sat and watched this movie. this was the first horror movie which we watched on TV. It gave us the creeps. and after seeing the movie- we were so scared that my dad decided that we will sleep together in the hall...... but seriously was this movie so scary- 22 years have passed and now my diet includes a steady stream of horror movies (and books). i have seen greater and bigger horror movies and also cheaper and worse ones... but as a movie that brings back nostalgic memories of childhood this is one prized possession,

Co-writer / director Tom McLoughlin, who would go on to write and direct "Jason Lives", the sixth entry in the "Friday the 13th" series, began his filmmaking career here with this nicely done, old school, effectively atmospheric low budget horror flick. Granted, it's not terribly slick, but the crudeness of the thing actually helps to make it more endearing.Its teenagers-in-jeopardy plot has a lot more to do with the supernatural than other horror flicks of the early '80s, working in a very intriguing concept: that of a psychically gifted, malicious, telekinetic creep still possessing dangerous powers even after death. He's been entombed in the very mausoleum where nice girl Julie (cute and adorable Meg Tilly, in her first lead role) is forced to spend the night as part of an initiation rite into a small scale high school clique. Before the night is over, our villain, who's nicknamed "Raymar", is giving Julies' tormentors a taste of their own medicine.McLoughlin and company really envelop us in this movies' palpable ambiance, milking the mausoleum setting for everything that it's worth. The cinematography, by Hal Trussell, production design, by Craig Stearns, and music, by Bob Summers, are all excellent. The pacing is efficient, and even the exposition scenes in "One Dark Night" are worth watching, touching upon subjects such as "psychic vampirism" and Kirlian photography. The film gets off to a fine start, and builds up to a cracking finale as Raymar unleashes his abilities on the terrified girls. This is one movie that gets a lot out of its location and sets.Folks who like lots of bloody violence may be disappointed, but that doesn't mean that there isn't some good gross stuff on hand, as Tom Burman, Ellis Burman, and Bob Williams supply some deliciously nasty looking corpses, which never exactly come back to life, but are manipulated by Raymars' mental powers into moving around.The cast is quite easy to watch, especially Tilly. The equally cute Elizabeth Daily, the gorgeous Robin Evans, and the appealing Leslie Speights are an amusing trio as her tormentors. Melissa Newman is good as Olivia, Raymars' daughter who ends up becoming the heroine of the piece, David Mason Daniels is likable as Julies' boyfriend, Donald Hotton is compelling as one of our exposition providers, and Adam "Batman" West is adequate as Olivias' husband. Some performers to watch out for are Leo Gorcey Jr. as the young coroner, Martin Nosseck (a man with a wonderful character face) as the caretaker, Kevin Peter Hall as a basketball player, and Nancy Mott (soon to become Nancy McLoughlin) as the spaced out Lucy.Overall, this is fun stuff, although it definitely may seem lightweight to some viewers, with its lack of emphasis on sex and gore. At the very least, it's got some quirky little details (like Speights' character compulsively sucking on a toothbrush throughout) and priceless dialogue ("You named it, you claimed it.", "You go, Hugo.", and "Nerdle brain") going for it.Eight out of 10.

Talk about (pleasant?) surprises! Without ever having seen it, I always assumed that "One Dark Night" was just another umpteenth and uninspired teen slasher – based on the title and the premise about a sorority initiation – but actually it's a tad bit more ambitious and versatile than that. Please don't misinterpret; "One Dark Night" is NOT a good film, but at least it pretends to be better than most of its contemporary genre colleagues. There's an awesome opening sequence where you witness a convoy of coroner trucks arrive at a house to pick up what must be the most macabre discovery of the century. The culprit of a series of murders, an elderly man who apparently thought he was a "psychic vampire", also died at the scene and leaves his estranged daughter behind with lots of questions pondering on her mind. The mausoleum where the strange old man is buried just also happens to be the abode for an initiation ritual of a girly high school sister sorority. The very young Meg Tilly has to spend the night in a mausoleum, but she's too stupid to realize that the lead sister is the ex of her current boyfriend and hates her guts. She rather dies than to take accept Julie into her clique, so they break into the mausoleum as well with the intention to scare Julie away. The psychic vampire (apparently he's only a type of zombie-master, after all) comes to life, obviously, and the girls are trapped inside. The entire first hour of "One Dark Night" is dull and with practically nothing going on. I actually even almost wished it would be another umpteenth slasher, in fact! Luckily enough, the final twenty minutes compensate for a lot, with sinister images of coffins slowly sliding out of their tombs and bodies emerging. The original thing, however, is that they're not zombies. The corpses remain dead and motionless, but they're being "operated" through little blue lightening firing from the eyes of the psychic zombie. This probably makes "One Dark Night" the only film ever to feature a character dying from suffocation underneath a pile of rotting corpses. The climax is a hodgepodge of gore and senselessness, but sadly there's no sleaze. One of the sorority chicks continuously chews on a toothbrush, though, which is quite odd and – who knows – maybe arousing to some?

So much promise, but too little in the end. I never even heard of it, until a friend brought it up. Tom McLoughlin's directorial debut feature (who would go on to helm Friday the 13th Part 6) shows plenty of polished style and atmospheric visuals, but the concept is never truly grasped and budget restrictions go on to show up. The plodding climax, with its tatty special effects (involving rotten corpses) only cemented it and it was obvious it was going for moody atmospherics than say blood and gore. Sure that's fine, but being lightweight it never demonstrated much in the way of thrills and taut locations never really struck a chord. Bob Summers' ominously seething electronic score worked more often than it didn't.World renowned psychic Raymar is bizarrely found dead along with several female victims and his body stored in a mausoleum. In that same mausoleum, high-schooler Julie decides to spend the night so she could be accepted into the clique; 'The Sisters'. However the girls have plans to scare her out her wits, but don't realize the horror that's actually awaiting them.I didn't find it tedious, but while the whimsical story is compelling, it's slight and flat structure just goes on to feel senseless. I wished it explored its odd supernatural and blaring telekinesis current, but its low-scale properties is no excuse for its languishing pace and messy intentions. Of course it deliberately lets the situation leisurely evolve with constant window-dressing and dragged-out dialogues, before breaking loose from its slumber. Performances are reasonably modest. Meg Tilly is fine in an innocent role, but its Leslie Speights, Robin Evans and Elizabeth Daily who add a real perkiness to their parts. Melissa Newman holds her own and Adam West doesn't get a lot to do.Strange, but merely okay.p.s. Would be interesting to see how McLoughlin's director's cut 'A Night in the Crypt' shapes up?