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| Courtesy of Arrow Films |
Frequent 1960s television director
Bernard McEveety, known for his work on Rawhide, Gunsmoke, Bonanza and The
Dukes of Hazzard, isn’t typically known for horror let alone theatrical
feature films. But sometime in the early
1970s, around when horror films involving the occult and demonic such as Rosemary’s
Baby began to cement America’s fixation on Satanism, McEveety dropped this devil
worshipping low budget horror flick which was recently souped up by Arrow Video
in a forthcoming new special edition blu-ray set! With their continued focus on forgotten
horror classics throughout the last fifty years, the aptly named The Brotherhood
of Satan doesn’t quite come close to the maniacal antics of The Devil’s
Rain which followed a few years later but offers up some wild bouts of
pandemonium of its own.
Widowed Ben (Charles Bateman) is on a
cross-country trip through Southwest California with his daughter K.T. (Geri Reischl)
and his girlfriend Nicky (Ahna Capri) when they happen upon a car accident in
the town of Hillsboro with multiple fatalities on site. Upon attempting to report the accident however,
they are met with sharp hostility from the locals including a doctor, a sheriff
(L.Q. Jones from Sam Peckinpah fare), a doctor and a priest who are locked in
the throes of terror following a series of murders and kidnapping of the community’s
children. As more people continue
inexplicably dropping dead with the children vanishing without a trace, Ben,
K.T. and Nicky side with the sheriff for protection while more clues point
towards some kind of dangerous Satanic cult.
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| Courtesy of Arrow Films |
Produced by Green Acres actor
Alvy Moore and based on an original story by Sean MacGregor written for the
screen by William Welch, The Brotherhood of Satan starts out as a
microbudget widescreen regional exploitation picture before ballooning into a
full-blown Grande Guignol involving a coven of elderly witches with
supernatural powers. Later still it
features a kaleidoscopic dream sequence that would make the likes of Mario Bava
blush and for a PG rated film it remains startlingly gory and violent. Visually speaking the film like The Devil’s
Rain starts out on modest terms in the wide-open west before moving inward
towards the darkly colorful Satanic coven, and the film also sports a
strikingly spooky original score by Jaime Mendoza-Nava.
Performance-wise the ensemble cast is
mostly fine with a majority of the heavy lifting going to Strother Martin as
the film’s bloodthirsty cult leader though all the cast members do get their moments
to shine onscreen. When the film
originally came out, patrons were given packets of “Satan’s Soul” seeds
designed to provide protection against ‘the black Magic of the Brotherhood of
Satan’. Whether or not the tactic sold
more tickets or actually did spawn protection against the netherworld of Hell
remains to be seen, but for what its worth The Brotherhood of Satan is
an inspired and often overlooked contribution to the early ‘70s devil-horror
movie boom.
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| Courtesy of Arrow Films |
Something of a
little-engine-that-could of a movie, the film sports some marvelous set pieces
and does manage to create a dread-soaked atmosphere against its tight
budget. For fans of this subgenre which
only keeps increasing in popularity over the years, this is an indelible example
of what occult horror was capable of and the many dances with the devil
filmmakers would take over the next few decades.
--Andrew Kotwicki
