Deadly Games (1982)

When I started up “Deadly Games” (1982), I expected yet another slasher variation with the expected tropes and routine. I had no idea Steve Railsback, Dick Butkus, and, of all people, June Lockhart would be in it! The copy I watched was the typical murky VHS rip where the dark is really dark and without caps (I watch all my films with caps/subtitles if they are available) the audio of the killer can sometimes be hard to hear. The opening of the film goes as you would think: a very attractive woman with dark hair arrives home, the garage door opening to let her in. She gets that damned bra off to get relief, removing her top, taking in the night air with a pleasant smile. She doesn’t realize that a creep in ski mask and gloves breathing real hard [natch] is spying on her, eventually, with breathy tone, prank calling her. She later contacts her boyfriend, hoping it was him who called her. She exhales but isn’t allowed to remain at ease because the creeper eventually reveals himself to her in the garage, pursuing her. He breaks through a window after she locks the doors, but as the pursuit reaches the other end of the living room, the victim backs into another window, falling to her death as the house sits somewhat on a cliff. Again, this is routine, unimaginative, and basic. Just before this, we see the killer’s gloved hands at some odd board game it appears he created, with cards, pieces for players, and this elaborate board with spaces and areas prepared for participants. Alexandra Morgan was the victim, Linda, and her sister soon arrives (oddly not too emotionally distraught considering the death is rather fresh) with the keys to the house as the detective on the case, Roger Lane (Sam Groom; I know him from “Law & Order”), talks about her pretty smile! Umm, dude, the sister is dead and you are hitting on her sister??? Anyway, the sister, Clarissa (Jo Ann Harris; a familiar face in late 60s and the decade of 70s in television), obviously wants answers and Roger hopes to provide some. Linda’s neck was broke from the fall but because of the manner of death, very little evidence is available considering the killer didn’t actually get to really have his way with the victim.

At a diner, Clarissa meets up with old girlfriends from high school, and she’s barely recognizable because she’s lost weight and matured into an attractive woman. While those girlfriends talk about the death of Linda, Clarissa talks with the waitress and her cook beau (Butkus). This is crosscut with Railsback’s Billy, who seems to be a bit of a loner that keeps to himself, he’s good friends with Roger. Roger’s ex is the fetching (but rather snobby and catty) Susan (Jere Rae Mansfield; Scott Mansfield is the director of “Deadly Games”). Roger plays a board game with Billy, the very board game we see at the beginning of the film to sort of serve as a clue. Characters in the board game such as The Wolfman, the Creature, Frankenstein, and Dracula are brought up by Roger as they sit down to play. Before the game, Roger agreed to choke Billy a bit at his urging, with Billy going into a coughing fit (a cigarette hanging from his mouth along with one of those nagging hacking coughs he can’t shake).

With a football game featuring the husbands of the gals in the film, I can only suspect that slasher fans will be restless, looking at their watch, wondering if there is anything for them. Railsback is clearly the film’s suspicious character because he was nearly killed “in the war” and rescued by Roger “behind enemy lines”.

“Are you suggesting an orgy? Do you want me to be in the middle of an enormous flesh sandwich???”

It isn’t until about 38 minutes in that the film provides a second victim in a promiscuous Colleen Camp, the pool party town’s adult set hanging around for a bit in conversation at her home leaving right before her drowning. Camp’s Randy has slept with a few married men, barking at Roger for butting into her personal business, interfering in a near sexual encounter with a buddy of his. She calls Billy a freak while telling Roger he is a lousy lay. Prior to this he was hiding away in the dark of Linda’s home as Clarissa is startled by him in the attempt of answering a ringing phone she shouts to wait. So both Roger and Billy both have reason enough to want to “quiet” Randy. This wasn’t too long after Camp was in “They All Laughed” & “The Seduction”. That she has two dialogue scenes, talking about shagging men and being horny, Camp is discarded with very little significance. She deserved better. But she was considered a sexually adventurous woman, too liberated and free for a slasher film. Roger can’t wait to tell his wife, Susan, how she died, pondering what it must be like to know death is imminent, describing a wire around his ankle holding her under the pool water. These two are together why exactly?

Credit for casting Jo Ann as the lead actress. She’s got spunk, energy, spark, and playful enthusiasm. Considering the film seems to lay flat on the screen, like a dead fish with no life, she injects something in the film, her personality like a shock paddle burst badly needed but even she can’t lift this enough beyond brief blips while the lifeline remains stagnant and auto-pilot horizontal. She might be a bit too quirky for some folks, though. She talks back and forth to herself, often in different voices, mimicking characters she knows from movies, while Roger seems to enjoy playing along. Roger and Clarissa clearly enjoy each other’s company and kiss periodically. It’s okay to Clarissa who seems to realize he and his wife are existing as husband and wife as if taking on a regular role. But her desires are denied as Roger decides to fuck the waitress (married to Butkus, who told Clarissa that he was okay with her infidelity because he loved her) when she hits on him at the local club.

The film’s final act really lands with a thud to me. Roger slips in the ski mask and gloves (and wears black shirt and pants) while the waitress is asleep, creeping up to strangle her. Later he hides in the backseat of another friend of Clarissa’s nearly strangling her in a parking garage, interrupted by security. But the victim departs from her cop husband in her car in a drive to Clarissa’s, fleeing into a foggy cemetery, fucking fainting when he catches up to her!!! He carts her to a shallow grave with a gravestone depicting her sleep in 1980 (I wonder if this film was actually shot two years prior to release…), where she awakens to the hole. She falls into a big fucking hole (a crater-sized hole that anyone could escape!!!) while the killer glacially tosses dirt on her…how about climbing out of it and running away!!! Mind-numbingly awful. By the end, Roger never meets with Clarissa, doesn’t answer her calls, quits courting her, pretty much letting her know that he’s just not interested. This is another part of the film that just makes such little sense to me. Roger flirts, kisses, caresses, courts with Clarissa for about half the film, complete with this montage of happy-go-lucky funtime as Billy hangs out with them. They play the board game, goof off in the local darkened theater, and even hang around the playground. Just having a great ole time, complete with this syrupy soft rock song in the background as the three giggle and smile. All is well, except Roger is the ski mask maniac, so when Clarissa goes looking for him at the theater (because she just can’t seem to take the hint), he sneaks up on her—after talking to himself about boredom in a small town and wanting to scare Linda, disappointed she went out the window but admitting to the thrill of murder—in full creeper outfit, as she shoots him dead. So Billy is upset, turning off all the lights in the theater (because he knows his way around the entire building in the dark) preying on Clarissa as she tries to retreat. I did like Clarissa in the darkened theater in two different sequences, but the abrupt ending with Billy swinging towards her in a freeze-frame fade to black feels rushed. There was a room full of mannequins that is briefly viewed and some silhouettes of Billy are well done. But overall this just feels unsure of what it wants to be so the film never quite finds its identity. And the pacing just absolutely strangles this film to use a pun. Railsback has some moments here and there but he’s never quite developed as he could be—he’s suffering PTSD while Roger seems to have developed a dark side since returning from war—and Roger has these interludes of darkness where you can see his soul is lost. I dunno...this film just never seems totally whole, as if parts were left on the cutting room floor. 1.5/5

*Lockhart seemed to have worked one day during the week shoot, with one single scene as the mom of the victim, as Clarissa apologizes for missing the funeral get together, while remaining a bit too bubbly and jokey considering the timing and all. Joan carries the loss on her face while humoring Jo Ann and her quirks. The no nonsense nature of Roger and his house visits uninvited never failed to baffle me. What a peculiar guy.