Friday, October 27, 2006

Tormented

(1960) ***


Poor Tom Stewart, he’s not such a bad guy, really. All he wants to do is marry a twenty-something chippy and live happily ever after. While preparing for his upcoming nuptials in a Martha’s Vineyard-type island community Tom’s future is jeopardized when an ex-girlfriend, Vi, shows up demanding that he call off his wedding plans and get back together with her. Although unclear, Vi seems to have the goods on Tom and threatens to expose some secret about him if he doesn’t take her back, which would destroy his professional jazz piano career. While arguing at the top of a lighthouse, Vi slips and finds herself dangling. In a moment of poor judgment, Tom sees the solution to his problem and allows Vi to plummet to her death (I would’ve done the same thing, she was annoying). The next day Tom finds her body floating in the ocean. After bringing her to shore he watches in horror as her corpse transforms into a pile of seaweed (??!). Tom gets over this strange anomaly quickly and resumes his wedding planning. However Vi is not done with poor Tom. In true Samara-like fashion, Vi’s vengeful ghost starts causing problems for him. Her dismembered hand crawls around his floor, her babbling head taunts him as it floats around his room, and her visage appears in photographs that are taken of him. All the while she says ghostly things like, “I’ll neeeeeeeeeeeeeeeever let you get marrrrrrrrrrrrrrrried, Tom” Adding to Tom’s problems the local ferryman figures out that Tom has something to do with Vi’s disappearance and sees this as an opportunity to make some fast scratch. Luckily for Tom a quick blow to the head with a pipe takes care of this little problem. Unfortunately his fiance’s 8-year old sister witnessed this murder. Will Tom ice her? Will Tom be able to marry his fiancée and live happily ever after or will Vi’s haunting drive him to madness?

All Tom wants to do is marry his twenty-something girlfriend, is he really such a bad guy?


Vi harasses Tom, ghost style…

…and starts ruining photographs by inserting her big, ghostly head.


This jerk starts blackmailing our (hero?)

I really liked this stupid movie. Rather than being scary, the vengeful ghost was just a colossal pain in the ass. Imagine breaking up with someone and then having her nagging head floating around your home. Ultimately she doesn’t really do anything “vengeful”, unless you consider being annoying vengeful. This movie made my $20-for-50-movies worth the price. Yum.

3 comments:

Octopunk said...

I love the gag where she inserts her big ghost head into the photos. What a jerk! Makes me want to chase her head out the window with a broom.

JPX said...

Exactly! She's annoying and just so happens to be a ghost. It would be like having the power of invisibility and using it to sneak into movies. Wait, it's not like that at all.

Anonymous said...

Wasn't this an MST3K flick? (With a lighthouse at the end?)

Malevolent

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