children in need.

“If you do nothing unexpected, nothing unexpected happens.” 

Just heard that the legendary Fay Weldon has died so in way of tribute.....

Killer's Moon (1978).
Dir: Alan Birkinshaw.
Cast:  Anthony Forrest, David Jackson, Tom Marshall, Georgina Kean, Chubby Oates, Peter Spraggon, Paul Rattee, Nigel Gregory, Jean Reeve, Elizabeth Counsell, Charles Stewart, Hilda Braid, Jane Hayden, Alison Elliott, Jo-Anne Good, Jayne Lester and Lisa Vanderpump

"Of course it's a dream! And stuffed full of jailbait!"

Welcome to the Lake District in what must be - judging by the grey skies and even greyer fashions - the late seventies, where uptight spinster Mrs. Hargreaves (Reeve from the Molly Sudgen hit That's My Boy) and the bewigged Ms. Lilac (Counsell, the original teevee posh totty) are busy escorting a group of scarily ample breasted and peachy arsed school girls (resplendent in mini-kilts, thigh high white socks complete with blouses two sizes too small and expertly portrayed by the likes of Georgina Kean, Alison Elliott, the still very yummy Jo-Anne Good, Jayne "Mine's a short" Lester and bizarrely Baywatch Nights star Lisa Vanderpump who manages to make even a cardigan look sexy) to a choral concert in darkest Edinburgh.

As is always the way in these movies it's not long before the school bus breaks down leaving our barely legal babes with the prospect of having to stumble thru' the woods at night looking for a convenient hotel or cottage to stay in.

Don't worry too much tho' as they soon come across Bert the local gamekeeper (expertly portrayed by Stewart who, according to the internet is better known as King Charles I of England. Who'd have thunk it?) who grumpily leads them to the local hotel run by the kindly Mrs May (Braid best known as Nana Moon from Eastenders).

"Oooh Alfie the though of you in that leather jacket makes me so moist".

Offering them food, shelter and inane (possibly drunken ad-libbed) chat for the night there's nothing else for the portly driver to do than to go back and spend the night in his bus, free from the incessant chatter of a dozen school girls constantly interrupting him as he settles down to a quick (hand) shandy over the latest copy of Razzle followed by tears and a Pot Noodle.

This proves to be a big mistake tho' as no sooner has he stepped out of the hotel and into the bushes that he's beaten to death by an axe wielding mentalist who, alongside his three equally mad pals have escaped from a local hospital.

Which, it seems, is par for the course in such films.

It appears that these mentalist mates have been undergoing an experimental treatment for lunacy that involves sending the patients to sleep before doping them up to the eyeballs with large doses of LSD.

This has the effect of letting them live out their evil side whilst dreaming thus causing them to use up all their mentalism and wake up cured.

Or something.

Look it made sense at the time.

A Clockwork Orange: The Oxfam Years.

Meanwhile in a nearby field, city whizz kids Pete and Mike (Forrest and Marshall from fuck knows what else, the bin round probably) are taking a well deserved break in the country shagging birds and jogging whilst wearing tramps tracksuits.

Robin Askwith was obviously busy.

It's not all fun and games tho' as no sooner has Pete pulled up his trousers and sent the huge pants wearing local barmaid Julie (Somebody's Daughter star Hayden) on her way when a blood encrusted, three legged dog turns up just as the boys axe disappears.

Could these things be related?

Anyway back to the plot where our frightening foursome - Mr. Jones (Spraggon), Mr. Muldoon (Rattee), Mr. Smith (K-9 and Company's Gregory), and Mr. Trubshaw (Blake's Seven star Jackson) - decked out in a collection of hand-me-down white boiler suits and in Trubshaw's case a bowler hat are slowly making their way toward the hotel, stopping only to invade the gamekeepers cottage and Julie's underwear, all the time encouraging each other to act out their most violent psycho-sexual fantasies.

It's all becoming a wee bit like a Derby and Joan version of A Clockwork Orange.

But with added bush.

Which is nice.

Possibly.

"Is it in yet?"

Arriving at the hotel it's not long before our psychotic stooges have broken in, killed Mrs. Hargreaves and begun molesting as many of the school girls as they can get their sweaty sausages fingers on.

When they're not ringing bells and - gasp - throwing sultanas at each other obviously.

Luckily the dynamic duo of Pete and Mike are on the case and armed only with a shotgun, some big sideburns and one of Ms. Lilac's wigs vow to save the remaining schoolies and their collective virginity’s from the raping rabble currently tainting the good name of the Lake District tourist board.

"Now I'm gonna show you how Pudsey Bear really lost that eye!"

Wobbling precariously on a tightrope straddling good clean fun and crass exploitation, Alan (Invaders of The Lost Gold, Space Precinct, Die Unbestechliche) Birkinshaw's loon filled Killer's Moon could possibly be seen as one of the most offensive and sexist British movies ever made, with it's totally unnecessary scenes of schoolgirl bush, mindless violence and raisin-based rape as well as giving us such breathtaking dialogue (from acclaimed novelist Fay Weldon no less) as:

 "Look, you were only raped. As long as you don't tell anyone about it, you'll be alright. You pretend it never happened, I'll pretend I never saw it, and if we ever get out of this alive… well, maybe we'll both grow up to be wives and mothers…"

Which is delivered with nary a hint of irony from one female character to another, minutes before they're attacked by a pitch-fork wielding nutter with half a face.

I said possibly because on viewing the things mentioned above become irrelevant because the movie is so bloody odd.

Yes it's true that most of the 'characters' (if you can go as far as to call them that) have to spout some of the most inane dialogue ever written and most of the actors seem to visibly have trouble walking and talking at the same time but somehow it all works, as if we've traveled into a bizarre alternate reality where Pete Walker made Carry On Camping from a script by Robert Bloch.

Yes the movie is really that good.

In a very guilty way obviously.

And the thing that makes the film so enjoyable must be the totally camptastic performances from Messers Spraggon, Rattee, Gregory and Jackson, hamming it up like there's no tomorrow and giving probably the sweatiest portrayal of mental illness ever captured on film.

Jackson's Mr. Trubshaw even gets to make a few jokes about the NHS before he's finally dispatched.

Now you wont find any of that in Darren Aronofsky's Mother! will you?

Cheryl Baker and Jay Aston decide whether it'll be tunnel or funnel onstage tonight.

Rescued from obscurity a few years back, Killer's Moon has quite rightly gained something of a cult status over the last couple of years and frankly it's well deserved, all we need now is some enterprising cinema owner to show this and Horror Hospital as a Saturday night double bill, dress the ushers (male and female) in thin white nightshirts and the projectionist in an old pair of decorators overalls and you'd make a fortune.

Tho' it'd probably cost you a bomb to clean up afterwards.

So, who's game?

I am and I'll even supply the three legged dog.

Recommended.

Sort of.