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| Images courtesy of Severin Films and Umbrella Entertainment |
Before coming to America with Roadgames, Psycho II
and the cult favorite videogame movie Cloak & Dagger, Australian
born director Richard Franklin started out in Ozploitation with the softcore
sex comedies The True Story of Eskimo Nell and Fantasm. Though a considerably low starting point for
the eventual cult producer-director, it paved the way for his first real
sleeper hit with his third feature: the 1978 psychokinetic metaphysical horror
thriller Patrick. The story of a
comatose hospital bedridden man with supernatural abilities who begins wreaking
murderous havoc upon the arrival of a new nurse who recognizes the invalid’s
invisible powers, the film helped popularize Ozploitation in foreign
territories and spawned not one but two films with the dirty sleazy unofficial
1980 Italian “sequel” Patrick Still Lives and decades later a fully
fledged remake in 2013 with Patrick: Evil Awakens.
A favorite of Quentin Tarantino’s who referenced it directly
in the first half of Kill Bill: Vol. 1 when Uma Thurman unconsciously
spits blood in the face of Michael Parks, Patrick was intended as an
Aussie rip-off of Brian De Palma’s Carrie which ultimately found its own
footing through screenwriter and frequent collaborator Everett De Roche. The resulting film is less Carrie and
seemed to pave the way for such metaphysical terrors as The Sender with
so much of the supernatural inexplicable activity being generated from a
bedside. Despite a checkered releasing
rollout with the U.S. cut redubbed to scrub the Aussie accents and Italy’s cut
rescoring the film altogether, Patrick proved to be a successful enough
endeavor for it to fully launch the filmmaking career of Richard Franklin as
well as spawn two additional pictures mostly in the same vein. Now, let’s take a look at two Australian and
one Italian answer(s) to the new wave of metaphysical horror sweeping the
globe.
Patrick (1978)
A few years after having murdered his mother and her
boyfriend in the bath via an electric heater, the titular Patrick (Robert
Thompson) remains comatose in the private hospital Roget Clinic managed by head
Matron Cassidy (Julia Blake) and owner Dr. Roget (Robert Helpmann) who are
cruelly keeping the youth alive to study the gulf between life and death. Enter newly recruited nurse Kathy Jacquard
(Susan Penhaligon) tasked with caring for the bedridden mute character with his
eyes plastered menacingly wide open amid other patient claims that he can fly in
and out of the window at night. While
fending off come-ons from her recently divorced ex-husband Ed (Rod Mullinar),
it becomes apparent that Patrick has the psychokinetic ability to depart from
his body and move inanimate objects around like a poltergeist. Soon after doctor Brian Wright (Bruce Barry)
who takes a liking to Kathy is nearly drowned by an unseen force, it becomes
clear Patrick’s homicidal tendencies haven’t ceased despite being mute and
immobile with literally nothing to stop him from potentially killing again.
Borne out of a jump scare concept not dissimilar from Carrie’s
infamous final scream, screenwriter Everett De Roche’s Patrick kicked
around for a few years before pairing up with Richard Franklin who helped pare
down the script and brought on coproducer Antony I. Ginnane who helped raise
the film’s low budget. Made on a
shoestring $400,000 with rough cinematography by Donald McAlpine and acoustic
orchestral score by Brian May (rescored for Italy by Goblin), the regional
looking Ozploitation flick is meat and potatoes filmmaking that eventually
finds a style as the interactions between nurse Kathy and patient Patrick
intensify. Mostly driven by sharp
editing by Edward McQueen-Mason who cuts judiciously between Patrick’s soft
whispered mouth movements and Kathy’s reactions who picks up on the mute form
of communication and attempts at demonic possession.
Despite a meager box office reception in its native country
of origin, Patrick went on to become an international success in several
countries including Italy and an Americanized reedit with much of the dialogue
redubbed with new American accents, a move that irked the director and actor
Robert Helpmann who unsuccessfully tried taking legal action against the US
distributors. The film’s home video
release was checkered over the years with Severin Films finally coming in to
release a polished remaster of both Patrick and its filthy dirty
illegitimate kid cousin Patrick Still Lives coinciding with the release
of the 2013 remake. On its terms it
remains a tough and tense telekinetic thriller with startling gore effects, a
resourceful and fearless heroine as well as one of the more original jump
scares in cinema history.
Patrick Still Lives (1980)
After making a huge splash in Italy thanks to a Goblin score
replacing the Ozploitation film’s original soundtrack, the Italians were quick
to capitalize on that film’s success. Under
two years under the direction of Mario Landi in what turned out to be his final
project, the ultra-low-budget unauthorized unofficial “sequel” to the hit 1978
telekinetic Ozploitation shocker Patrick Still Lives emerged in Italian
cinemas to great controversy. Whereas
the original Richard Franklin film was sparing on the nudity and judicious
about what it did or didn’t show, the Landi film is a dicks-out exercise in
reckless abandon and carnal excesses that remains one of the most exploitative
telekinetic horror films ever made.
After a drive-by car incident leaves young Patrick (Gianni
Dei) bedridden in a country estate with his eyes glued open like in the first
film where alongside two other patients reside under the care of Dr. Herschel (Sacha
Pitoëff). While starting out mostly
repeating the setup and story beats of the Ozploitation film, it quickly
descends into a near Roman Orgy with frequently nude sex starved characters
making up the ensemble of victims our titular Patrick will soon begin offing
with his supernatural telekinetic powers.
Soon Dr. Herschel’s newly hired secretary Lydia (Andrea Belfiore) forms
a psychosexual link with the comatose Patrick while supporting characters begin
dropping dead in an array of nasty ways including but not limited to an
indescribably offensive murder with a poker that easily pushes this into the
all-time paragons of exploitation cinema bad taste.
Vulgar, bordering on pornography when it isn’t ramping up
the psychedelia with a goofy glowing eyes shot opening the film and Bava-esque
colored lighting, Patrick Still Lives joins Lucio Fulci’s The Devil’s
Honey as one of the most abominably filthy dirty raunchy exploitation films
you will ever see. While repeating the
setup of the first film, its gaggle of horn dogs who carouse around naked and
frequently fornicating comes very close to being a porn parody. There’s even a semi-nude girl fight mid-movie
that further pushes this away from Richard Franklin and into Andy Sidaris or
Jim Wynorski territory. However it mixes
in a number of wild kills including a one-up of the swimming pool murder
attempt from the first and the film’s lighting and 16mm cinematography by Caliber
9 DP Franco Villa is significantly more colorful than the first and the funky
soundtrack by Berto Pisano stands out more than the stately score for the
first.
A movie only hardened grindhouse exploitation fans will
eagerly gobble up, the film was both a follow-up to Landi’s previous film Giallo
in Venice for producer Gabriele Crisanti as well as another one of those
movies that quickly utilized a preexisting set.
Much like how Forbidden World was quickly generated over the
weekend on the sets for Galaxy of Terror, Patrick Still Lives was
largely shot on the sets for both Burial Ground and Blood for Dracula. The ensemble cast does what they can with the
material which mostly asks for the actresses to frolic around naked. The worst abuses are suffered by Mariangela
Giordano who had to endure extensive shooting for the film’s most notorious
scene that takes all who see it out of the movie.
Again, not for the faint hearted or easily offended. In fact not really for much anyone other than
those pining for brutal shocks in between naked bodies copulating or being
impaled by foreign objects. Patrick
Still Lives exists rather in a hyper-transgressive
needs-to-be-seen-to-be-believed subverse not everyone will subscribe to. As with their previous release of Patrick,
Severin Films put together a digitally restored version with a note stating
some of the elements were irreparably damaged.
That shouldn’t matter though as occasional blemishes only enhance the
already thick musk of sleaziness permeating this naughty dirty piece of
exploitation trash riffing on Richard Franklin’s still classy telekinetic
Ozploitation epic. It is bonkers but
beware and handle this one with extreme caution before subjugating unsuspecting
viewers to something that will make them want to wash their eyes out.
Patrick: Evil Awakens (2013)
Just one year before making the beloved Golan-Globus legacy
documentary Electric Bugaloo: The Wild, Untold Story of Cannon Films,
documentary filmmaker Mark Hartley fresh off of his Ozsploitation documentary Not
Quite Hollywood set to reimagine one of the greatest Ozploitation films of
all time Patrick in his first fictional feature. Penned this time around by Justin King along
with Mark Hartley, Ray Boseley and Antony I. Ginnane based on the original 1978
film of the same name, this new 2013 Patrick or Patrick: Evil Awakens
as it is known internationally more or less follows the same story beats
but ups the ante on the violent gory deaths, special effects department and a
little more sex and nudity than before though it doesn’t quite go the full orgiastic
bacchanal of Patrick Still Lives. Mostly
it’s a souped up redux of the Richard Franklin film sporting an overqualified original
score and Charles Dance as the mad doctor Roget.
Young nurse Kathy Jacquar (Sharni Vinson of You’re Next)
accepts a new position in a remote psych clinic run by strict Matron Cassidy
(Rachel Griffiths) and the mercurial Dr. Roget (Charles Dance) and befriends
plucky Nurse Williams (Peta Sergeant) over some drinks. Her caregiving work leads her towards comatose
patient Patrick (Jackson Gallagher) who seemingly is unresponsive to outside
stimuli but when the doctor and matron aren’t looking the wide-eyed vegetable
begins spitting a pattern of communication almost like morse code. Updating the timeline to the modern age with a
computer keyboard rather than a typewriter, soon Patrick begins typing secret
messages to Kathy and begins to meddle with her life outside of the clinic which
she grows increasingly repelled by the doctor’s illicit malpractice. Soon however, Patrick’s power over the clinic
intensifies to a fever pitch, resulting in numerous gruesome deaths and a lover
melting his hands on a stove.
Far more overtly gothic in tone with the clinic itself
looking more like an old dark house kind of insane asylum rather than the
modern medical office of the first film but close to the wackiness of the
Italian “sequel”, Patrick: Evil Awakens is more or less the first film
again with the prologue saved for the finale in a startlingly grisly naked electrocution
death. Sporting panoramic 2.35:1
widescreen cinematography by Garry Richards and a completely overqualified
soundtrack by legendary Brian De Palma composer Pino Donaggio, the film has the
look of a modern gothic horror thriller with the clinic itself taking on a
haunted mansion aura replete with dark clouds to augment the gloomy tone. The film also utilizes a far more polished
production design than the regional feel of the original film though at times
it feels more like a film set than a clinic.
Sharni Vinson as the film’s heroine is, like the character
in the 1978 film, resourceful and quick witted even when it seems like she or
others aren’t in complete control of their own actions. Charles Dance is probably the most accomplished
character actor in the piece and seeing him in the role of the doctor reminded
me of Clemens from Alien 3 and made me wonder if this version of Patrick
might bite his head off. Jackson
Gallagher as this Patrick is less intimidating than Robert Thompson’s
wide-eyed freak but the CG department does a lot with his eyes to signify when
he’s taking over via telekinesis and the actor has since gone on to a
successful sitcom television career.
Released by Umbrella Entertainment which has also since gone
on to become one of the world’s top leading boutique labels for home video
releases, Patrick: Evil Awakens opened to generally mixed reviews. While polished and dynamic with a stronger
visual sense than the previous two films, there’s still something amiss about
this new “improved” redux. Clearly the
documentary filmmaker turned fictional feature director loves Ozploitation with
Patrick being among the first few to popularize the subgenre
internationally and he gets great performances out of his ensemble cast
members.
Some of the telegraphed scares poorly rendered via CG like a
car going off of a cliff tend to work against the film going for visual effects
shots beyond the budget’s means. The
Pino Donaggio score is terrific but you can always just buy the soundtrack
album and listen to that on its own. Not
to say this remake is a bad effort, just that it never quite reaches the
unexpected regional heights of Richard Franklin’s still seminal Ozploitation
epic. Generally a decent facelift of a
renowned little horror classic but of this director’s oeuvre I’m personally
more enamored with his nonfiction work.
In the end, of the loosely connected Patrick film
dynasty, it is unquestionably the first one that still reigns supreme. If you have the stomach and sanitary means, Patrick
Still Lives is bonkers but don’t say we didn’t warn you. Third one is fair with a good score and great
gore effects but it never quite reaches the intensity or scares of the first. An unusual trilogy of films that proved the
Aussies also had a thing or two to say about the psychological telekinetic
horror thriller even the Americans didn’t think of.
--Andrew Kotwicki
