What Makes This Film Worthwhile?
If you happen to find yourself browsing the horror section of your local video store, as I often do, you may or may not come across a little, unimposing-looking movie called "Deranged." The title is indeed overly simplistic, and so is the synopsis on the back of the box. But the film itself is something much, much more.It's too upsetting to be called a mere horror film, though not as intentionally over the edge as, say, "I Spit on Your Grave." There are no stomach turning, drawn out rape scenes to be repulsed by, nor any blood soaked revenges to revel in; no, the horror in this masterpeice lies in it's horrendously accurate and unsettling depiction of the schitzophrenic madness of a woman who truly deserves a better hand than the one life has dealt her.
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Poor Joyce...
Joyce has just gotten out of the hospital. She gets thrown an insincere party by her self-absorbed family, but being around them is slowly triggering her paranoid delusions once more. Several months pregnant, with her husband away on buisness, she retreats to the comfortable seclusion of her apartment. Her paranioa mounts, until she is soon attacked by a masked man. She murders him in self defense, but suffers a miscarrage as a result of the incident.And that's when her schitzophrenia really begins to take hold, making the delusions all the more real. She wears a pillow under her shirt to appear pregnant, keeps the miscarrage wrapped in a sheet in a crib, and keeps the intruder's corpse under a table until the neighbors begin to complain about the odor. All the while, she carries on conversations with family members who aren't there, relives the most painful moments of her life (immeasurably intensified through the magnifications of hindsight and paranioa), and sinks deeper and deeper into pure insanity. This film is excellent in it's unique way of story telling. We learn about Joyce's life through her hallucinations and flashbacks, and once Joyce enters the apartment, we spend the rest of the time there with her. There's no outside sub-plot, no added characters who are irrelevant to the story - - but there are plenty of twists and turns, nonetheless (one's rather obvious, but still worth having). As we learn more about Joyce, we discover all the unpleasantness of her past, and feel genuine empathy for her character. How often can that be said of a character in a cheap horror movie? There is no great reward for all her torment, mind you. That final biting note adds one last strain of gritty realism to an already unrelenting film. This movie truly is a harsh, harsh work that deserves much more respect than any film reviewer has ever given it. Definately an overlooked classic.
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