Name that b-movie!
April 17, 2018 8:03 PM Subscribe
Hivemind, I come to you begging for your kind help now that Google's failed me. Circa 1940-60s, obscure, black and white, low budget film about a *female* psychopath/serial killer with a knife and hypersexual personality, almost NO dialogue! Not being able to remember the name of this movie is driving me bonkers. Help!
What I can remember:
- Black and white, and definitely a b-movie- everything about it screams "low budget"
- Made sometime between 1940s-1960s
- Almost NO dialogue (but not a silent film)- this detail is important
- Opening scene is of a woman who lives alone in an efficiency apartment
- It's heavily, heavily implied early on that she is a psychopath/serial killer with no interests other than going out at night to kill
- She carries a knife, is presented as hypersexual and perhaps manic
- A lot of dark city streets, feels a tad noirish
- Begins having sex with a man on the street and then kills him with knife
- She expresses no remorse when she kills, only pleasure
- Doesn't talk much but loves to cackle wildly
- She may or may not have a boyfriend that she teams up with to seduce and kill men; I feel less confident about this detail
- The characters are very "flat", and film has an exploitative quality about it
I saw it a couple years ago. I thought it was one of the movies in a horror/drive-in movie box set I have, but I checked and it's not listed among them. So now I'm thinking I watched it home on Comet, but couldn't drum up any info from their website or past film screenings.
I know my boyfriend was watching it with me but it was late and he fell asleep halfway through it. I asked him if he remembered watching the beginning and he said definitely yes, and verified the details I recalled. He wasn't able to remember much more about it, but was the one who suggested we probably watched it on Comet. Anyway, his independent verification was enough to convince me that I probably didn't just invent this memory or embellish some weird dream I had.
Thank you in advance!
What I can remember:
- Black and white, and definitely a b-movie- everything about it screams "low budget"
- Made sometime between 1940s-1960s
- Almost NO dialogue (but not a silent film)- this detail is important
- Opening scene is of a woman who lives alone in an efficiency apartment
- It's heavily, heavily implied early on that she is a psychopath/serial killer with no interests other than going out at night to kill
- She carries a knife, is presented as hypersexual and perhaps manic
- A lot of dark city streets, feels a tad noirish
- Begins having sex with a man on the street and then kills him with knife
- She expresses no remorse when she kills, only pleasure
- Doesn't talk much but loves to cackle wildly
- She may or may not have a boyfriend that she teams up with to seduce and kill men; I feel less confident about this detail
- The characters are very "flat", and film has an exploitative quality about it
I saw it a couple years ago. I thought it was one of the movies in a horror/drive-in movie box set I have, but I checked and it's not listed among them. So now I'm thinking I watched it home on Comet, but couldn't drum up any info from their website or past film screenings.
I know my boyfriend was watching it with me but it was late and he fell asleep halfway through it. I asked him if he remembered watching the beginning and he said definitely yes, and verified the details I recalled. He wasn't able to remember much more about it, but was the one who suggested we probably watched it on Comet. Anyway, his independent verification was enough to convince me that I probably didn't just invent this memory or embellish some weird dream I had.
Thank you in advance!
The Sniper is widely considered to be the first serial killer movie, so probably not 1940s. Not all of the details match, but your description makes me think of Polanski's Repulsion.
UPDATE: Jinx!
posted by rhizome at 8:10 PM on April 17, 2018 [1 favorite]
UPDATE: Jinx!
posted by rhizome at 8:10 PM on April 17, 2018 [1 favorite]
Response by poster: Definitely not Repulsion. Not even close. I have seen Repulsion. This film was not Polanski quality, it was drive in movie quality.
Definitely not The Sniper because this wasn't about a man.
posted by nightrecordings at 8:19 PM on April 17, 2018
Definitely not The Sniper because this wasn't about a man.
posted by nightrecordings at 8:19 PM on April 17, 2018
Response by poster: Correction, I now see what you meant about The Sniper as far as timeframe. Sorry about that! I appreciate the responses so far and will keep the threadsitting to a minimum unless someone has questions.
posted by nightrecordings at 8:23 PM on April 17, 2018
posted by nightrecordings at 8:23 PM on April 17, 2018
Response by poster: YES!!! Thank you lovecrafty!!!!! "Dementia (1955)" is it!!!
posted by nightrecordings at 8:32 PM on April 17, 2018
posted by nightrecordings at 8:32 PM on April 17, 2018
This thread is closed to new comments.
posted by machinecraig at 8:09 PM on April 17, 2018 [1 favorite]