Despite I Spit on Your Grave being over forty years old, it’s probably fair to say that having lead actress Camille Keaton’s name attached to a project is always going to appeal to certain audiences. It’s a fact undoubtedly not lost on the director of Cry For The Bad Man, Sam Farmer, and nor on Meir Zarchi, the director of a direct sequel to ISOYG which, strangely, also came out last year. However, Keaton’s kudos is not enough by itself, and her presence on camera does not mean the film can dispense with all of the other going concerns.
Cry For The Bad Man shows its hand immediately, as we see Keaton’s character – Marsha Kane – cleaning up blood and gore at her home. We move forward by six months: Marsha is still at the house, living alone, but one night there’s a noise outside and the house is approached by three brothers – good old boys Wayne, Derek and Billy MacMohan, who try to intimidate Marsha into selling the house, claiming her late husband had already all but agreed a deal. Marsha refuses, so they threaten to return the following evening to collect on a signed contract. Marsha makes a faint attempt to seek help from the local police, but no dice. Only her grown daughter Helen (Karen Konzen) shows any real concern. She prepares for the worst.
We hear the brothers, over a game of cards, discussing their plans for the night ahead. It seems that Wayne (Scott Peeler) is the key mover and shaker here; the other two are less than keen on terrorising a woman for the sake of it, but Wayne claims that he’s unafraid – a sentiment clearly shared by Mrs Kane. And so, the rather simple set-up for a showdown is set: determined to get their contract signed, the three brothers head back to the estate after midnight, where they find Mrs Kane ready with a panoply of firearms.
In many respects, Cry For The Bad Man is business as usual. A lone female, an isolated location, a number of male aggressors laying siege to it because they can, uninterrupted. However, fundamental things have had to change; Marsha’s vulnerability is heavily signposted as relating to her age here, a big shift away from any intimation of vulnerability through sexuality. It’s mentioned in the script numerous times, just in case there was any doubt. Otherwise, the male aggressors are represented as your standard, fairly two-dimensional, unreconstructed types, though the overblown performances on display here do look rather jarring against a modern, crisp shooting film where the use of light and shade can’t disguise the fact that this is brand-new. It’s something which, say, Rob Zombie understands when he makes his homage-style exploitation films (though of course with a far, far bigger budget). Cry For The Bad Man in some respects seems like an exploitation homage, but against a new backdrop, where some of the aesthetics and styles clash with one another unhelpfully.
Whilst obviously not intended to be a deep and meaningful movie, there’s some slight intimation of a bigger conspiracy at play in terms of land rights in the town but, mostly, that doesn’t lead anywhere. The film largely functions simply as a vehicle for Camille Keaton, who is held in shot staring down a shotgun for what feels like a large swathe of the one hour ten minute running time. She seems to enjoy this, and so far as there’s a good way to point a shotgun on film, she looks fine. There’s little genuine sense of a threat to her though; she’s the star. She’s also in her seventies, so for all the script’s bluster about how she’ll be easy prey because of her age, little comes of this on screen. Add to this some (I assume) unintentional humour – such as a First Aid kit which can be used against shotgun blasts and one which can magically hurl itself up stairs and into shot without being asked for – and the film suffers heavily under a weight of, firstly, its stasis (with little happening) and secondly, its tonal issues, making the viewer want to laugh or disengage at moments which are probably not intended to make us feel such a way.
Cry For The Bad Man has a few components in place which are functional enough, and there are a few fun developments along for the ride, but as nice as it is to see Camille Keaton on screen, the film lacks clout. It isn’t about to break Camille Keaton’s reputation, but it’s not going to do anything to embellish it, either.
Cry For The Bad Man is available On Demand and DVD now.