(1972)
Overall: MEH
A generic if agreeably made ABC Movie of the Week thriller, Night of Terror was the first of several TV full-lengths from director Jeannot Szwarc. Plenty of recognizable faces are scattered about, (Chuck Connors, Donna Mills, Martin Balsam, Catherine Burns, Agnes Moorhead, etc), and it concerns a woman who is relentlessly harassed by a bunch of criminals who insist that her apartment has something that they want in it. This is after they threw a drug stooge over a ledge, followed Mills and her best friend around, and inadvertently caused the car crash that put our lead protagonist in a wheelchair and made her even more vulnerable throughout the rest of the proceedings. Of course no one knows what the hell these criminals are after or talking about, but that hardly keeps them or the plot from following its linear trajectory. While Szwarc keeps things moving as well as could be expected without any unnecessary dilly-dallying and the movie is professionally shot and performed, Cliff Gould's plot simply does not have enough fetching details or surprises.
(1973)
Overall: MEH
Yet again, the influence of Rosemary's Baby runs deep with another occult-fueled ABC Movie of the Week, this time being the apply titled The Devil's Daughter. Written by Colin Higgins who would later go on to direct Foul Play and 9 to 5, this rare work in the horror genre from him shows a noticeable lack of originality, throwing in the common motifs of a clandestine Satanic cult that does whatever it can to manipulate the life of their Dark Lord's offspring. This includes making deaths look like accidents and making accidents look like black magic was not involved, plus there are of course people who pose as friends yet are actually in on the blasphemous shenanigans. At the on-set of the third act, Belinda Montgomery and Robert Foxworth decide to laugh and date on the very same night of his girlfriend and her roommate's sudden death, leading to a twist ending that any audience member will see coming from all of the miles away. Still, Joseph Cotten, Shelley Winters, a mute Jonathan Frid, Diane Lad, and even Abe Vigoda showing up in such black-robed, evil-chanting silliness is worth a hoot, even if it is still not enough to elevate it above being the watered-down and derivative off-spring of much finer films.
(1975)
Overall: MEH
As far as nature horror goes, director Jeannot Szwarc's second theatrically released full-length Bug is one of the more dull and lethargically paced ones. Notable as the last film that famed gimmick movie producer/co-writer William Castle was involved in before his death two years later, it is an adaptation of Thomas Page's book The Hephaestus Plague, given a surprisingly sober and sincere presentation by Szwarc. Even with a premise of killer cockroaches running amok, the only element that is played for over-the-top hysterics is the off-putting performance by Bradford Dillman who portrays one of the biggest dipshit morons in cinema history Why a seemingly normal teacher decides to mutate a newly discovered and highly dangerous species of killer insect right when they are on the verge of extinction is never convincingly explained, nor is Dillman's rapid mental deterioration which comes with beard-growing, complete solitude, and sweaty panic attacks that would make Oliver Reed proud. Besides the plot line being idiotic at best, it is also aggressively boring with only a handful of firey super roach attacks thrown in to break up the monotony of Dillman losing his mind and talking to himself while conducting experiments. The production gets a pass for taking a serious approach to something that should have been unabashed schlock, but perhaps the latter route would have actually been the more enjoyable one.
(1978)
Overall: MEH
The inevitable and underwhelming Jaws sequel Jaws 2 underwent its own share of production difficulties and became the most expensive project up until that point from Universal, falling in line with the plethora of knock-offs that came in the wake of Steven Spielberg's blockbuster. Though Spielberg left well enough alone, Roy Scheider was reluctantly finagled into returning due to some contract disputes, plus Lorraine Gray and the worst mayor in America Murray Hamilton decided that a paycheck is a paycheck. Director Jeannot Szwarc replaced John D. Hancock who worked on the project for a year and half, only to get fired a month in. Issues with the mechanical sharks, shooting on the windy seas, and Scheider clearly not wanting to be there further muddled things up and after all of this, a rudimentary B-movie done on a hefty scale was the results. Nearly fifty minutes goes by with zero shark action, allowing for the plot to merely rehash the first movie as Scheider once again tries to convince authorities that there is another set of jaws on the loose. Worry not though, we also have boring, under-written teenagers taking up screen time and screaming throughout the last act. It is passable during the six or seven minutes of shark mayhem, but everything here was done better the first time.
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