The Sadist (1963)

I think this is a new genre that they're all sort of working their way through it and haven't got all the kinks worked out yet but it's a genre that works for me.

This is a coming of age storyline that you've seen in one form or another for decades. It takes a truly unique voice to make yet another one worth watching.

While it doesn't offer any answers, it both thrills and makes you think.

The tone of this movie is interesting -- the stakes are both dramatic and high, but it's balanced with a lot of fun, tongue and cheek dialogue.

Three schoolteachers stop at a garage on their way to a baseball game at Dodgers Stadium. Their car isn't running properly and so they need to look at it and maybe try to fix it. But thats not their biggest obstacle- they come face to face with Charlie Tibbs and his girlfriend- a couple of killers who are accused of murders in Arizona and are on the run. Charlie has a gun and insists that they work on the car so that he can get away in it.This film is like a play that has been filmed- there is primarily one main setting (the film reminded me of Cujo in that respect). But this doesn't mean that the film is static and boring. The one setting is used innovatively and this means that the film is directed with verve. There is also a sense of 'us versus them' with the schoolteachers in their Sunday best (shirts, ties or a nice conservative dress) whilst Tibbs is looking every part the juvenile delinquent in his denims and sporting a greasy quiff. Tibbs is obviously based on real-life serial killer Charles Starkweather.This film is brilliant- will the teachers get away, when and how? The film ramps up the tension and suspense and never lags- there's no scenes that feel unnecessary. The film is also very extreme for its time.Arch Hall Jr in the lead gives an extraordinary performance as Tibbs- the Sadist in the title. His face and facial expressions are almost other-worldly and supernatural as is his portrayal. Quite extraordinary.Watch out for the poignant scene in which the schoolteachers hear on the radio the baseball game they should be at instead of fighting for their lives.There's also some innovative direction within the film- it almost feels like Tibbs' gun in the first half of the film is an actual character.I didn't know about this film until recently. I'm glad I do now. Why isn't this more widely available on DVD and Blu ray?Apparently this film is a favourite of director Joe Dante's- a seal of approval anyone would be proud of.

Wow, this gimpy legged grinning killer and his mute but sicko giggly girlfriend are impossible to scrub out of your brain. They make up for their mental midgetness with over the top murder and mayhem. When they jack off the soda pop bottle you know it's time for their next victim to beg for mercy in a fruitless attempt to go on living for one more minute.I loved the music during opening credits while the sadist's eyes burrowed into your soul. This was 1963, early days for this much madness on screen. Enjoy yourself watching this and expect to be yelling, "Run, you idiot, run!!!" more than once during the show.

By anybody's standards, Arch Hall, Jr., was no titan among thespians. Nevertheless, he made at least one nerve-racking thriller where he displayed surprising acting chops. As the eponymous character in "The Sadist," Arch makes life thoroughly miserable Hell for a trio of teachers. The set-up for "Stakeout" writer & director James Landis's suspenseful saga is both classic but formulaic. When the fuel pump in their car goes bad in the middle of nowhere, three public school teachers pull into an auto-parts salvage yard just off the highway. It seems that this unlikely trio was driving to a Dodgers baseball game in Los Angeles. One woman is riding with two men, and she cannot understand the complicated rules of the game. She cannot fathom the weirdness of baseball, especially the necessity of having to touch the bases during a home run. One of the teachers knows his way around engines because he repaired tanks in the army. Anyway, no more than 12 minutes later, the villainous Arch Hall with his fluffy coiffure appears with his girl friend and an automatic pistol. The remaining 79 minutes gradually gets under your skin because Arch makes you believe that he is bad, as in lethal. The action plays out as close to real time as possible. Aside from the opening scenes, "The Sadist" takes place in one setting during noon.After he wanders up with his girlfriend Judy at an auto salvage yard, Charles A. 'Charlie' Tibbs (Arch Hall Jr. of "The Choppers") takes school teachers Ed Stiles (Richard Arlen of "The Pit"), Carl Oliver (Don Russell of "The Incredibly Strange Creatures Who Stopped Living and Became Mixed-Up Zombies!!?") and Doris Page (one-time actress Helen Hovey) hostage. Charlie smacks around Carl with his pistol. Later, he harasses defenseless Doris for putting on airs. Carl is a 50-year old school teacher with a mustache and horn-rimmed spectacles. In other words, he is harmless. Ed is the mechanic of the three who tries to change out the fuel pump. Naturally, Charlie picks on the older teacher. The heartless killer forces him to get down on his knees and talk until he finishes drinking his soda. Eighteen year old Judy Bradshaw (Marilyn Manning of "Eegah") is just as heartless as her bloodthirsty boyfriend. "School's out, teacher," Charlie says and blasts Carl at point blank in the same composition. Charlie and Judy retire to gargle more soda pop while Ed explains the problem to Doris. As it turns out, Charlie and Judy is a murderous couple who have killed two other innocent bystanders before they got to the salvage yard. Arch is pretty intense when he challenges Ed to disarm him. You see, Ed has been trying to figure out how many bullets Charlie has fired.Landis generates suspense when two thirsty California Highway Patrol motorcycle cops roll onto the premises. They just want a Coke because the heat is so brutal. Charlie has stashed Ed in the trunk of a car when he makes small talk with the police. Judy has a knife pulled on Doris, and they lay hidden out of sight behind a car. When Doris cries out during a struggle over the knife, Charlie shoots the two cops without so much as a second thought. Afterward, Judy scavenges their corpses and then snatches up a cat and fondles it. Charlie gives Ed eleven minutes to repair the car. Charlie doesn't trust Ed worth a damn. Ed orders Doris to climb behind the wheel while Charlie covers Ed with his Colt auto-pistol. The way that cars worked back in 1963, Ed has to prime the carburetor with gasoline to get the engine started. As he brings the gas pump nozzle under the hood, he surprises Charlie and squints enough into his eyes to blind him temporarily. This is when our villain mistakenly kills his girl. Ed scrambles off to hide in the salvage yard and appropriates a tire-iron. A tense game of cat and mouse occupies the last ten minutes as Charlie and Ed search for each other. Mirrors are used with considerable finesse during this scene. Principally, Ed tries to make Charlie empty his pistol. Charlie surprises Ed and shoots him several times with a revolver stuck in his waistband. Doris flees on foot and Charlie takes Ed's car to pursue her. He gets the car stuck in sand and follows Doris on foot with a knife. He chases her around the woods and falls into a well teaming with rattlesnakes. Basically, this resembles a scene from "True Grit." Indeed, Charlie is given a fitting death scene at the fangs of the poisonous reptiles. The ultimate irony is the radio broadcast of the Dodgers game throughout the action.Landis wrings genuine suspense from this modest but compelling stand-off of a saga. A definite plus is future Oscar-winner Vilmos Zsigmond's evocative cinematography. The scene where crazed Charlie guns down his gal by accident because gasoline blurs his vision is nothing short of fantastic. "The Sadist" qualifies as a believable portrait of two vicious murderers before anything like "Badlands." Mind you, Arch didn't deserve an Oscar, but he strives to act like somebody that he clearly could never have been in real life: a homicidal maniac. Primarily, he hams it up, but he creates a despicable psychopath.

My first thought on this movie was "This was like a Bad Criminal Minds Episode without the main Regulars preformed by a Group of Underfunded High School kids in the Theater department." My Second thought was how did MST3K ever miss this movie? This had all the makings of a classic MST3K.But then my over all thoughts on the film, But actually the movie wasn't that bad and it kept my interest right up to the end. Reading the trivia section on this movie lifted this up quite a bit in my final over all review. Spend some time with this movie if you catch it. I'll stick with the Criminal Minds comment but then it goes to prove how important the regulars are on the show.