Girls, I am telling you, you are not going to believe this. Remember (for those of us who can!!!!!) back in the 1970s, when ABC would broadcast the TV Movie Of The Week? Sometimes, they would have some real trashy gems, and one of those I just saw recently--"How Awful About Allan," made in 1970.
This delightful tripe was written for TV by Henry Farrell, who, in his day was better than none on the theme of relatives driving each other nuts. Which he coined with "What Ever Happened To Baby Jane?," which some of my girls may recall was a 1959 novel (which I own, and have read, of course!) before it became the definitive Bette Davis Joan Crawford movie. If Farrell were alive today, he might have come up with something like "Mulholland Drive;" who knows, David Lynch might have been marginally influenced by him.
In this film, Anthony Perkins plays the title role, a young man who is blamed for the death by fire of his brilliant, academic father. Seems a paint can was left near a radiator, or something, there was combustion, and before you can cry "Psycho!" Perkins' father is screaming in agony, and while Perkins goes in to help, his father directs him away, as the flames are too engulfing. Nevertheless, someone dives in to help; that is his sister, Katherine, older, and played by Julie Harris as a self-effacing spinster. The fire results in her being scarred, and I am telling you, when the victims are hauled out of the charnel house at the beginning, and the camera focuses on Harris' scarred face, you can clearly see it is simply make-up rubber stuck onto the side of her cheek! Well, I guess the budget did not allow for much!
Everyone is traumatized by this. Even Joan Hackett, nearby neighbor, and fiance of Allan. Also, this is is set in a university town, where everyone, even Joan Hackett, as Olive, has some tenuous connection to the university. None more so than Allan and Katherine, whose father not only was a brilliant academic, but who are the joint inheritors of his legacy--house, papers, everything! Uh-huh!!!!!!!! A pretty nice catch, wouldn't you say??????????????????
Bur right now, all have problems to attend to, themselves. Due to trauma and guilt, Allan is struck blind, and sent--remember, Anthony Perkins is the star, here---to a mental institution! His sister Katherine has to decide if she is going to live with her scarring or see what Elizabeth Arden can do for her!!!!!!!!!! And Olive has now become the neighborhood spinster, because it looks like her marriage to Allan is off.
Things are a mess, but they are about to get messier. At the institution, the doctor, played by the late character actor Robert H. Harris (who appeared in the AIP 1958 film, "How To Make A Monster," not to mention the role of Henry Bellows in the 1967 camp classic "Valley Of The Dolls," as well as Seth Bushwell, the newspaper editor, in the film version of "Petyon Place," just ten years before!) deems Allan fit to be released, so off to home he is whisked, where he is dominated--excuse me!--cared for!!!!-- by
sister Katherine, who has to have more than sibling love on her mind, and Olive, the fiance, now trying to worm her way back into Allan's life again. With Olive being played by Joan Hackett, it is hard to believe she would wait for years for this nut job. Come on, Joan, you can do lots better!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
Due to the upkeep of the family home, Katherine has fallen on hard times, so she has to taken in a boarder-- a student-- from the college everyone seems to be connected to. His name is Harold, but nobody seems to see him. Soon, though, Alan starts hearing mysterious voices calling his name, and seeing ghostly shapes through his barely discernible vision. What is going on? Is someone trying to kill Allan? Why? Is there a maniac lose in the house? Is it the boarder? Olive? Allan? Or is Henry Farrell just trying to recycle "Hush...Hush Sweet Charlotte?" Not a chance that he can top that!
I simply cannot wait to tell you, darlings! Allan hears his name called from the kitchen, and goes into the pantry, where he finds himself locked in, and a fire ablaze. Fortunately, there is a gigantic bag of flour on hand--what a does a house of two need with so much flour? Are they starting a bakery????????--which he uses to put out the blaze. Then, he breaks through the door, and confronts his masked attacker, who is a tiny little thing, but must be a stunt double, because, when he pulls the mask off, it is revealed to be Julie Harris as sister Katherine, I had to wonder, "How could she be that strong?"
Imagine! Miss Julie Harris as a psycho villain!!!!!!!!! Butter would not melt in this spinster's mouth, though this spinster is not all that spinsterly. Seems Katherine has an ex-boyfriend, Eric, still hanging around--a real bad boy type, which is what mousy girls are often attracted to--and he has been the mysterious figure Allan has been seeing. The vocal sounds have come from Allan's own recorder, thanks to Katherine--the old "Strait-Jacket" routine. Best of all is Katherine's motive--she blames Allan for the death of their father whom she calls "the greatest man that ever lived." He is so great that, in two flashback sequences having all the stylish campy incompetence of "Who Killed Teddy Bear?", Allan is seen being beaten by his father with a ruler. This film is so cheap you can see the ruler just touching the hands, and then hear the off screen sound of a slap. Katherine, as a child, is sitting watching, and laughing! The bitch! Then, as a teenager, Allan interrupts Daddy and Katherine in what looks like something private, meaning a sexually abusive father-daughter relationship that Katherine loved! No wonder she thought Daddy was the greatest!
She had even had the scar removed after Allan went to the loony bin. But, when he came home, as part of her plan , she put on cheap rubber makeup that would barely make it at a Halloween party!!!!!!!!!!!!!! Oh, come on!
But things end on a hilarious note! Katherine now gets hauled off to the loony bin, Joan now has Allan all to herself, but the trauma of Katherine possibly being released, causes Allan to go blind again--but not before Perkins gives the filmmakers their money's worth by leering his Norman Bates grin at the camera once again!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
"How Awful About Allan" should have been titled "How Awful Is This Movie!" But, I am telling you, to see Julie Harris play a sick bitch is something else! It has to be seen to be believed!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
To my more religious readers, not to worry--Julie is resting in peace now, and God has long ago forgiven her, for this nonsense!
But, for those who have not seen it, it is SUCH fun!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
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