The Manitou (1978)

[alancomp 1]

I had a dim memory of this one until a recent viewing, and I think Paul, June and Jason could use a Tony Curtis-starring horror film featuring interdimensional Native-American laser and ice battles, stairs-destroying old lady falls, fetus tumors and a one-scene appearance by Burgess Meredith that suggests he didn't so much have a script as he was around the set that day and Tony asked for a favor.

 

But I'll let Roger Ebert's review explain why this would be perfect for HDTGM:

 

The plot can easily be summarized, but first this announcement: If you happen to be drinking hot coffee at the present moment, please set your cup aside, because elements of the scenario might cause you to begin shaking with helpless laughter and you could spill the coffee on your rug, dog, cat, mate or newspaper.

 

All set? “The Manitou” stars Tony Curtis as a phony psychic whose former girlfriend (Susan Strasberg) is hospitalized with a tumor on her neck. The tumor is unusual, doctors determine, in that it seems to contain a human fetus. They try to treat it with radiation - assuring, of course, that it will develop into a monster - and then Curtis decides to take his own measures.

 

He starts out by consulting nonphony psychics, and goes on to discover that Strasberg is, in all likelihood, the unwitting host for a 400-year-old Indian medicine man. Indian folklore has it, you see, that everything in the universe has its own spirit, or Manitou, and that medicine men have such strong Manitous that they can just sort of grow on people.

 

Curtis enlists the help of John Singing Rock (Michael Ansara), a contemporary medicine man, who agrees to help fight Strasberg's tumor. A moment's thought, and he'd refuse to: What happens 400 years from now when he wants to be reincarnated? Anyway, Curtis and Ansara and the whole hospital staff counterattack, while the Manitou, born as a monster, turns one entire floor of the hospital into a sub-zero environment with icicles hanging from the ceiling.

 

The battle between the good guys and the Manitou involves earthquakes, attacks by imaginary lizards and the illusion that Susan Strasberg's hospital room has disappeared and that she is floating in interstellar space. Meanwhile, Ansara gets a mean cut on the face (not so bad, considering that he could have been dumped into interstellar space, frozen to death or eaten by a lizard). And attempts are made to counterattack: Since everything, even man-made objects, has a Manitou, Curtis and his friends decide to turn on all the hospital's high-powered electronic equipment at once, enlisting the combined Manitou-force of all the gadgets in a fight against the evil Manitou

 

Anyway, it's very bad, but in a very good way. Absolutely bonkers. Highlander II The Quickening reminded me of it!

[NathanGordon 1096]

This is one of those crazy 70s horror films that TCM likes to sneak in their late night schedule. I've seen it twice there in the last year. A great cast that totally commits to its insane plot, but the whole thing is kind of turgid and slow paced in the way horror films from that decade seem now. The last 20 minutes or so with the hospital fight are totally nuts and worth watching.