On N List of Movie Reviews

(For optimum viewing, adjust the zoom level of your browser to 125%.)

---

The Night Strangler (1973)

Rate: 6
Viewed: 10/19

10/19: Going for another round of neo-noir and supernatural horror, The Night Strangler is more of the same.

Not much new is uncovered, and it's been formulaic. Oddly, whether anyone knew it or not, the film was right on the precipice of the Pacific Northwest becoming a hotbed of serial killers during the 70's, starting with Ted Bundy.

The cast is mostly the same, but Ralph Meeker is out and in are Al Lewis of The Munsters fame as the homeless man and Margaret Hamilton the Wicked Witch of the West as Professor Crabwell. Darren McGavin is okay, having settled into his role nicely, but his shtick is old. Simon Oakland ruins the show with his incessant screaming, and I thought he was going to have a heart attack.

Roughly 500k people lived in Seattle at the time with millions of visitors annually, so explain this to me: how come none of them discovered the 19th century underworld? And it never rains in the city at any point? That's unbelievable.

At least, The Night Strangler is the first to show me Seattle's underground which was the result of the Great Fire in 1889 due to countless buildings that were made of wood. So, the council decided to raise the streets by at least eight feet and fill in the space with cement given Seattle was originally founded on soggy tideflats which resulted in flash floods whenever there's rain. To this day, they conduct underground tours.

All in all, despite the interesting backdrop of Seattle, The Night Strangler is a repetitive crappy B film.

---