This
little drive-in flick was one that I had forgotten about until I heard another
reviewer talking about it. That inspired me to track down my own copy. I
couldn’t find the thing anywhere. I was sure it was on one of those Millcreek
sets. Luckily the internet provides, and I was able to find a copy to stream.
The story
is simple and fun. Rich old guy, played by the always awesome John Carradine,
dies and divvies up the money between his four children and three servants. He
is a bit of a sadist and hates everyone, so he has a perfect setup. A pool of
money is set aside for the servants and over a hundred thirty million is split
between his kids. To collect it all they need to do is spend the week in the
house. If any of them should leave or die their share gets split between the
rest. That is a recipe for murder and mayhem.
Sure
enough the old guy knows his family. Starting with a dog (damn it movies stop murdering
dogs!) the killing gets rolling on the first night. In fact, the whole movie takes
place that first night. The family can’t make it twenty-four hours before the
murdering begins and considering this motley crew that isn’t surprising. Makes
me thing that maybe the old guy had a point? The rest of the movie are the
bodies piling up and as a result the suspect list shrinking. By the end credits
all is revealed, and one final bit of fun is tossed to the audience.
So much of
what makes a movie a good drive-in flick is here. The veteran actor, Carradine,
was clearly on set for a day or so as he is hardly in the movie. It is done
really well so I consider this a bonus and it is fun to see how they cut him
into scenes. There is also a bit of sleaze with one set of the siblings having
a relationship that is clearly not appropriate. Can’t have a fun murder mystery
without a bit of incest, am I right? The acting is okay with some intentionally
over the top work coming from Richard Davalos as the tortured sister loving
brother Johnny! Dude screams his dialogue for most of the movie. It was also
cool to see Faith Domergue who was in a lot of classic fifties movies getting
some work towards the end of her career. This and the equally fun The House of
Seven Corpses were nice ways to end a film career.
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| Is there anything manlier than an ascot? |
The kills
are pretty tame and, in some instances, played for laughs. Sure, you get the
straightforward death by gunshot and poison, but they also toss in bees and
boobytrapped lamps. This isn’t the kind of movie that you watch for gore and
scares. It is almost a comedy without trying outright to be one. I also have to
say something spoiler free about the ending. We get a couple different twists
and a really amusing last line right before the credits roll. Even if you
aren’t having fun trust me you will want to stick around to the end.
Will to
Die is a strange movie to explain and categorize. I can’t say that it is a good
movie, but it hits all of those must have bullet points for a decent one. The
most important of those was that I never was bored. Silly as it might be at
times there was always something on screen to hold my interest. I’m going to
recommend that if you can track down a copy that you should check it out.
note: I couldn't find the trailer to link above but I did find the entire movie! No reason not to watch it now.
© Copyright 2019 John Shatzer
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