I bet you’re clamoring to know why I call this Coppola’s first ‘official’ film. Before this he directed two softcore porn films, The Bellboy And The Showgirl and This Time For Sure, also known as Wide Open Spaces until the actresses complained. Anyway, he left both of those off his CV. He also directed one-fifth of The Terror, along with Roger Corman, Monte Hellman, Jack Hill, and a struggling young actor by the name of Jack Nicholson. Of course, Francis and I had worked together on the temple scene from Apocalypse Now.
Dementia 13 or The Haunted and the Hunted 1963 HD by Francis Ford Coppola | Horror Thriller Film | William Campbell, Patrick Magee & Luana Anders
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Movie Info
Dementia 13 (UK title: The Haunted and the Hunted) is a 1963 Horror film-Thriller (genre) released by American International Pictures, starring William Campbell (film actor), Patrick Magee (actor), and Luana Anders. The film was written and directed by Francis Ford Coppola and produced by Roger Corman. Although Coppola had been involved in at least two nudie films previously, Dementia 13 served as his first mainstream, “legitimate,” directorial effort. The plot follows a scheming young woman who, after having inadvertently caused the Myocardial infarction death of her husband, attempts to have herself written into her rich mother-in-law’s will (law). She pays a surprise visit to her late husband’s family castle in Ireland, but her plans become permanently interrupted by an axe-wielding lunatic who begins to stalk and murderously hack away at members of the family.
Corman offered Coppola the chance to direct a Low-budget film horror film in Ireland with funds left over from Corman’s recently completed The Young Racers, on which Coppola had worked as a sound technician. The producer wanted a cheap Psycho (1960 film) copy, complete with Gothic fiction atmosphere and brutal killings, and Coppola quickly wrote a screenplay in accordance with Corman’s requirements. Although he was given total directorial freedom during production, Coppola found himself fighting with Corman after the film was completed. The producer declared the movie unreleasable and demanded several changes be made. Corman eventually brought in another director, Jack Hill, to film additional sequences.
Plot
One night, while out Watercraft rowing in the middle of a lake, John Haloran and his young wife Louise argue about his rich mother’s Will (law). Louise is upset that everything is currently designated to go to charity in the name of “a mysterious Kathleen”. John tells Louise that if he dies before his mother does, she will be entitled to none of the inheritance. He then promptly drops dead from a massive Myocardial infarction. Thinking quickly, the scheming Louise throws the fresh corpse over the side of the boat, where he comes to rest at the bottom of the lake. Her plan is to pretend that he is still alive, in order to ingratiate her way back into the will. She types up a letter to Lady Haloran, inviting herself to the family’s Irish castle while her husband is “away on business”.
Upon arrival, she immediately notices that things are a little strange in the castle. She observes John’s two brothers, Billy and Richard taking part in a bizarre ceremony with their mother as part of a yearly ritualistic tribute to their youngest sister, Kathleen, who died many years before in a freak drowning accident. Lady Haloran still mourns for her, and during this year’s ceremony she faints dead away. As Louise helps her into the house, her mother-in-law tells her that she fainted because one of the flowers she had thrown had died as it touched Kathleen’s grave.
Louise, realizing that Lady Haloran is emotionally overwrought and superstitious, devises a plan intended to convince the old woman that Kathleen is trying to communicate with her from beyond the grave. This plan involves stealing some of the dead girl’s old toys and placing them at the bottom of the estate’s pond where they will float to the surface in the middle of the day in an ostensibly ghostly way. At night, Louise swims into the pond and begins placing the toys as planned. However, she is shocked to see what appears to be Kathleen’s perfectly preserved corpse at the bottom of the pond. Horrified, she swims to the surface and is abruptly axed to death by an unknown assailant. The killer then drags Louise’s bloody corpse away.
Concerned family doctor Justin Caleb arrives and becomes determined to solve the mystery. He questions the family in an intense, almost insane manner. Meanwhile, the murderer strikes again, decapitating a man who is poaching on the estate. Caleb has the pond drained, revealing a stone shrine for Kathleen, with the words “Forgive Me, Kathleen” on the monument. The following night, Lady Haloran is attacked by a shadowy figure, but she survives.
Finally, Caleb utilizes an obscure nursery rhyme (“Fishie, fishie, in a brook, Daddy caught you on a hook”) recited by Billy under hypnosis to help him discover Louise’s corpse hidden in a meat freezer. Next to the body is a wax figure of Kathleen. Caleb places the figure in a public square to lure the killer. Taking the bait, a gibbering Billy attempts to kill Richard’s fiancée Kane with an axe; he has become insane with the guilt he has felt for years over having caused the death of his sister Kathleen. Caleb removes a gun from his coat pocket and shoots Billy to death.
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