Dark Stormy Sunday: Night of Dark Shadows (1971)

**/*****

Night of Dark Shadows definitely removes itself from the vampire Barnabas and all that seems to have made the show Dark Shadows such a famous soap with legs still yielding fans today. This film deals with Angelique and her lover Charles Collins, their tawdry history (including her hanging and Charles’ entombment) re-awakened in the memory and dreams of ancestor Quentin (David Selby) after he and his new wife (played by introduced Charlie Angels vet, Kate Jackson) move in to the Collinwood estate. Charles Collins was sleeping with his brother’s wife, and their affair would bring out the worst in the local body living at Collinwood and its surroundings. Brother against brother, and how Angelique came between them are called to remembrance in Quentin’s thoughts. Before long Charles becomes a strong influence over Quentin. Re-incarnation and “ghosts from the past” are what this film is primarily about. Lara Parker’s presence in the film as Angelique replaces the missing Frid (so iconic to the soap that made Barnabas such a household name), but relying on her just doesn’t quite lend this particular film what it needs to have us forget about what made Dark Shadows so successful and endearing.

I did like the fact that Dan Curtis uses cast members from Dark Shadows, even though they occupy different roles than they are known for in the series. Nancy Barrett (a gorgeous woman that had one of the best parts in the previous Dark Shadows movie, House of Dark Shadows) and John Karlen (thankfully getting to actually portray a heroic character for a change) are friends of Selby and Jackson, broke and living in a cottage nearby Collinwood. Grayson Hall has a fun part as this enigmatic caretaker with an aura of mystery about her as if she knows a lot and has secrets (and ulterior motives) but won’t share them until due time. Curtis does get some fine darkened shots of Collinwood (and when the score doesn’t go all orchestral in its elegance of piano, it hits those unnerving strings that are so identifiable to a Dan Curtis production) and evocates a nice bit of spookshow atmosphere at times, but sadly, I have to admit, I found this second Dark Shadows film sometimes a bore. The ending, going for the tragic, with the typed “obituary” left much to be desired, although I understood the point that you can’t always run from the past…even if you yourself wasn’t involved with what the ancestors were participating in. What I thought was rather desperate about the ending is how Curtis has to get the lead couple back into the tower (where Charles would paint and sculpt, and the same place Quentin would work as well) after all they had already been through. Seriously, after all the nonsense with Angelique and how Hall supposedly “kept the spirit alive” threatened them, I had a hard time believing Quentin would dare return to Collinwood particularly considering everything needed to leave had been packed up. With obvious dialogue from Kate saying, “And all this time I thought it was you keeping the spirit alive…” the set up of the down ending was firmly planted ahead of time to the viewer. Obvious foreshadowing rather leaves me discontented.

“For it’s your love keeping him alive.”

While hung as a witch (a deed put together by Charles’ brother (Angelique’s husband), and wife, and the local reverend), Angelique seemed to have powers, planting a spell on a little girl that was devoted to her (the little girl is currently “inhabiting” Hall) in order to keep her spirit alive so that one day she could be “re-united” with the man she loved, Charles (supposedly kept alive by Quentin). All this re-incarnation plot allows the spirits of the dead to re-emerge in present day 70s Collinwood, 150 years in the making. Grayson Hall gets to quietly mock Kate Jackson about how her husband is acting, now back in that damned tower, Charles having control and ordering his wife not to come near him or his workplace. Meanwhile a caretaker needs assistance from a groundskeeper and the two of them try to make sure Angelique’s 150 year old plan comes to fruition. It will take Karlen, Barrett, and Jackson (and Selby’s resistance of Charles) to thwart the spirits of the dead and their plans to begin anew.

As a Dark Shadows fan, I absolutely loved Lara Parker as Barnabas' chief nemesis during the soap's finest period on television, so I was a bit disappointed Curtis didn't do a time period piece featuring her more prominently. He provides her with a mystique, and she's got the looks of a traditional Hammer beauty, but ultimately I think her use is too sparing for my tastes. Night just didn't really do much for me, I must attest. That's too bad. I consider this Curtis' most disappointing film and his worst.