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The Changeling
(Ghost/Conspiracy) skulls
* No Blood * Not Particularly Violent * No Strong Language *
* No Nudity * No Sexual Situations * Not Gory *
1979/Color/115 Min./Vestron Video & Associated Film Distribution & Chessman Park Productions Ltd./USA/Canada/Rated R
Director.............Peter Medak (The Babysitter, Zorro, The Gay Blade)
Screenplay.......William Gray & Diana Maddox
Music................Rick Wilkins & Ken Wannberg
Producer...........Joel B. Michaels & Garth H. Drabinsky
Executive Producer.....?
Based on a Story by Russell Hunter
Dramatis Personae
John Russell............George C. Scott (Excorcist III, Firestarter, Rage)
Claire Norman.........Trish Van Devere (Day of the Dolphin, The Hearse)
Sen. Carmichael......Melvyn Douglas (Ghost Story, The Vampire Bat)
Joanna Russell........Jean Marsh (Upstairs Downstairs, Willow)
Parapsychologist.....Barry Morse (Asylum, The Fugitive-TV, Space 1999-TV)
Captain DeWitt........John Colicos (The Postman Always Rings Twice)
Mrs. Norman............Madeleine Thornton-Sherwood (Sweet Bird of Youth)
Leah Hammon.........Helen Burns
Albert Hammon........Eric Christmas (The Philadelphia Experiment)
Mrs. Grey..................Frances Hyland
Minnie Huxley..........Ruth Springford
Eugene Carmichael..James B. Douglas (The Dawson Patrol)
Security Guard.........J. Kenneth Campbell
Eva Lingstrom..........Roberta Maxwell
Robert Lingstrom......Bernard Behrens
Critique: This story is full of plot twists, complex machinations and the abuse of power and wealth. Mainly, though, it's about a very restless and angry spirit who is determined that John do something about his case. Was that the best seance in Horror movie history? Not that the competition is that solid.
Plot Summary: Upstate New York November 27. While John Russell calls about trouble with his station wagon, his wife and daughter are run over by a snow plow truck before his eyes, so he moves to Seattle on March 4th. Russell, a composer, goes to the university and takes a position as a music lecturer, starting a new life. He rents a large house, and soon he's banging away on the piano keys. One morning, John wakes to a deep pounding coming from he knows not where. Perhaps it's the furnace. Soon the composing is going remarkably well and John's out riding with a woman who's eye he has caught. John is tormented still by memories of his daughter and the quirky furnace explanation for the pounding at six O'clock every morning is wearing a bit thin. After a chamber music session, John hears more unusual sounds, and upon investigation, sees a specter of a drowned person in a bathtub. With little fuss, he decides on a supernatural explanation and goes to look into a history of drownings there, meeting Mrs. Huxley in the process who says that the house ought not to have been rented and that it's not fit to live in. When he tries to get more out of her, she clams up. Later, a window breaks above John, indicating more occult activities. He rummages around in a pantry to get at that window which has been closed off, and his efforts are rewarded by a very intentionally locked door which soon seems to open on its own. The room is cob-webbed and obviously hasn't been disturbed in a very long time. He finds a document dated January 1909 and then opens a music box, finding to his astonishment that the music is precisely what he has been composing. His initial investigation uncovers no listings of inhabitants before 1920, but later discovers that someone sold the house in 1909 after tragedy. A seven year old child was struck there by a coal cart. John and his woman friend go to the graveyard and find the girl Cora's grave in the family plot. Perhaps this has something to do with his own lost daughter. A ball bounces down the stairs. When he tosses it out the window he finds that another identical one follows it down the same stairs. Someone wants something. John consults a medium who reports in a scary scene that it was "Joseph" who was killed and he asks John for help. Through investigation of the seance tapes, John gets the story of Joseph's murder by his father through the seance. What's the connection to the the Sacred Heart orphanage that also came through in the seance? A wheelchair shows up at the head of the stairs. ??????
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