Monsters - The Feverman

 

Romero's cinematographer, Michael Gornick, directed this very first episode of Richard Rubinstein's executive-produced Monsters, titled "The Feverman". Starring David McCallum as a sort of alcoholic, disheveled healer who always asks high and is paid the highest price in order to cure the harsh fevers of the sick if they meet the financial demands for such an undertaking. McCallum's Boyle looks as if he hasn't bathed in days and is sick with some sort of wasting-away disease. With "the crystals" on a chain around his neck and enough financial incentive, Boyle toils away in the basement of his two-story home with whatever Big Bad emerges as the sickness plaguing someone brought to him to help. In this case, a desperate father (John C Vennema) has a little girl with a high fever in need of Boyle's healing, but his physician comes along skeptically, Dr. Burke (Patrick Garner). Burke assumes Boyle is a hack taking the money from in-need people, not realizing he is the genuine article, even if he looks like a wino who can barely walk and has slurred speech. Abby Lewis is the elder assistant who sees to the customers, demanding payment before unlocking her door to anyone seeking the healing from The Feverman. The Fever itself (Katy Dierlam) is a hideous, bulbous cancer that is a handful to vanquish. When Burke will not stay out of the way, intruding on Boyle during his process of battling the cancerous fever, this causes a distraction...when Boyle turns away just briefly to criticize the distracting Burke, the Fever crushes up against him and a beam, fatally wounding him. While Boyle falls into a heap, dying, he demands Burke take up the mantle and fight the Fever, letting the crystals accept him as the new healer.

If you have watched your share of "Tales from the Darkside", the look of "Monsters" is familiar. You can clearly tell the same ones responsible for the former anthology series were involved in the latter show. The budget, few number of actors hired, and story confinement to basically one setting all resemble "Tales from the Darkside". The monster is sure grotesque enough and when pressing McCallum against a post, it is not far-fetched to accept the girth would crush his insides and seriously harm him to the point of deadly injury. Garner hits the right cynical tone as the critic of McCallum's who considers his reputation as a healer as bunk...until he sees exactly what the sickness that invades people looks like first-hand. The changing of the guard does appear to be a freeing of McCallum whose condition seems to have taken quite a beating over the years in the role of healer...combating the likes of Dierlam could seriously take a toll, I'm sure. While the father leaves with his daughter intact and whole after Boyle gets Burke to fight off and defeat the first sickness while in his new role, a shift of the Feverman burden to a brand new doctor. McCallum is really solid (no surprise) as the deteriorated healer, seemingly ready to release his "gift" to someone else. Not a bad opener to "Monsters", I didn't think. 3/5

***I am watching the series for free on The Roku Channel***