"House Of Evil" was another piece of trash we watched on "Ghost Story." All these were shot around 1972, when Jodie would have been about ten. You can see the acting brilliance in her face, and when she is still, she is just like any other little girl. But when she walks--you have not seen such butch swagger since Saturday night outside of Henrietta Hudson!!!!!!!!!!! Nothing says bull dyke more than how Jodie walks in this! Which proves gay is what we are born with, darlings, not all that other moralist crap!
What made this story rise above the crappy norm is its cast--Jodie, Brad Savage, Richard Mulligan, Joan Hotchkis, and two veteran pros, Mildred Dunnock and Melvyn Douglas. The last plays a grandfather with an ax to grind. It seems Mulligan was married to his first daughter, Laura, who died in child birth, giving birth to Judy, (Jodie) who was born deaf. It seems there were complications, and it came down to a choice between the mother and the baby. The baby was chosen, and Grandpa has never forgiven Laura's husband, feeling he killed his daughter, and so despises the entire family, except for Judy, who, as Laura's child, he sees as his blood.
All this may seem vaguely "Shadow Of A Doubt." But there is more. Though the writers offer no explanation (and how I wish they did) Grandpa has telepathic powers; he can communicate with Judy this way, even though she is deaf, and he can hear the voice of Laura from beyond, advising him not to visit and go through with his agenda.
The agenda is to destroy the entire family, save Judy, and take custody of her. He sets out to do this by building a doll house for Judy that replicates the one they all live in. When Mildred Dunnock, as Mrs. Rule, bakes some odd cake like cookies, with faces, he makes them, with toothpicks, into voodoo dolls, and has Judy place them in the house. Mrs. Rule, who worked for the husband when he was married to Laura, has Grandpa's number, and knows about his evil powers, though we never learn how she came to know. Before you know it, she is done in by a heart attack, locked in her room, panicking. Poor Mrs. Rule! But Mildred gives it all she's got!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
Grandpa is removed to a hotel, because Fran, the new wife finds him evil. This does not stop him from telepathically instructing Judy to place the family members in their beds, in a sleep induced state from which they cannot awake. Then, via candle, she lights the doll house on fire, but sets the actual house on fire. She tries to awaken everyone, but can't. and no one can hear her, as she is deaf and mute. But the voice of her mother, Laura, in conflict with Grandpa, comes into her consciousness, and with her help, she gets the family out of the house, which burns, but they are safe.
Grandpa goes out in a blaze of glory, lighting a tea kettle on a stove, which ignites into an explosion which destroys. him. But who did it? Laura, from beyond? Or Judy, in the present?????????????
It is actually Judy. But whether she intended or not is up for grabs. The cookie icon of Grandpa was left inside the house, which burned. The other cookie figures, like the people,
got out.
So, was it accidental, or not?
Not enough info is ever given but the acting is marvelous, the psychological underpinnings brilliant, (one can sympathize, up to a point, with Grandpa losing his beloved only daughter) and then there is that butch walk of Jodie's, which must be seen to be believed!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
No surprise she went on to do "The Silence Of The Lambs!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!"
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