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The Toolbox Murders
[Blue Underground]
1978; color
Directed by Dennis Donnelly
Starring: Cameron Mitchell, Pamelyn Ferdin, Wesley Eure, Nicolas Beauvy, Tim Donnelly & Aneta Corsaut
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An uneven entry from the pre-DDB dawn of the American slasher era (AKA, the late '70s) The Toolbox Murders stars the one and only Cameron Mitchell alongside child / teen stars Pamela Ferdin and Wesley Eure in roles that run completely contrary to their earlier work. (Ferdin, who was probably my first crush when I was something like 10 years old, was the star of countless TV movies, After School Specials and Disney shows; Eure was the boy on Saturday morning fave Land Of The Lost.) Supposedly based on a true story, if we're to believe the graphic that runs over the final frames of the film before the end credits, things kick off with a thoroughly violent and bloody first half-hour. Mitchell plays a single father still unable to get over the death of his teenage daughter in a bloody car accident. His twisted mind finally snaps and he begins to take revenge on the world, by which I mean single girls living in the apartment complex he owns. He perceives them as dirty and evil - particularly when they're topless and he's spying on them - and sets out to cleanse them of their evil, i.e.: kill them in a bloody fashion with various implements from his toolbox. Inside the first 15 minutes he dispatches three girls with a power drill, a claw hammer and a chisel. It should be noted that this is one thickly-walled apartment block, as none of any girls' terrified screams are heard by a single neighbor. The police are suitably baffled and, the following night, when Mitchell uses a nail gun for his bloodiest kill then kidnaps a teen girl (Ferdin) who lives downstairs, their ineptitude is challenged even more. (According to the bonus interview with Marianne Walter, the girl killed in the infamous nail gun scene, her death was cited by Stephen King as his all-time favorite slasher movie scene; which, I guess, is not faint praise.) After that, the killings stop and we get to know the older brother of the kidnapped girl and his friend (Eure), who happens to be Mitchell's nephew. The brother is convinced the cops are idiots; they even suspect him until he reminds them that - duh! - he wouldn't be kidnapping his own sister. He sets out to figure out who's responsible, and enlists his friend to help him. Unfortunately, Eure susses out pretty quickly that dear old uncle is the responsible party, but keeps it to himself to "protect the family." After some utterly hilarious over-the-top dialogue by a lollipop sucking Mitchell to the bound and gagged Ferdin, including an unforgettable rendering of Richie Haven's "Motherless Child" that truly must be seen to be believed, along with more police ineptitude, we finally get to the final act for some unexpected twists and turns that you really don't see coming. Unfortunately, the payoff still isn't big enough to recommend the film to anyone but slasher fans (who still might walk away disappointed) and Cameron Mitchell superfans, who will probably love it.
—the Kommandant
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