Something Evil

Something Evil is a 1972 horror television movie starring Sandy Dennis, Darren McGavin, and Ralph Bellamy.

Directed by Steven Spielberg, the screenplay was written by Robert Clouse.

Synopsis

A married couple with two young children move into a Pennsylvania farmhouse that turns out to be inhabited by demons. Darren McGavin portrays the TV producer husband, while Sandy Dennis plays his actress wife. Popular child star Johnny Whitaker co-stars as their oldest child, who becomes possessed and begins to torment his family and their friends. When the mother begins to sense that something may be wrong with her son, her husband and friends think she is going insane.

Summary

The movie was made to capitalize on the success of the novel The Exorcist, which had yet to be released as a movie. Despite its common storyline, Bill Butler's unusual camera angles and Allan Jacobs' quick cuts give Something Evil its distinctive and disturbing results^{[citation needed]}. By never fully showing the "monster," a technique editor Verna Fields would employ to good effect in Spielberg's Jaws (and previously used by Spielberg in 1971's Duel and Ernest Walter in 1963's The Haunting), Jacobs' editing transformed what would otherwise have been an average made-for-TV movie script into a successfully chilling film^{[citation needed]}.

Filming locations

• Golden Oak Ranch - 19802 Placerita Canyon Road, Newhall, California, USA
• Studio City, Los Angeles, California, USA

Song

The movie features the "Apple Bar Candy Song" by Charlie Marie Gordon. It appears in the film performed by Laurie Hagen for a commercial Darren McGavin's character is filming. The song has been spoofed several times.^{[citation needed]}

Video release

Something Evil has never been released on video, and remains one of the few Spielberg films still unreleased.

Cast

• Sandy Dennis as Marjorie Worden
• Darren McGavin as Paul Worden
• Ralph Bellamy as Harry Lincoln
• Jeff Corey as Gehrmann
• Johnny Whitaker as Stevie Worden
• John Rubinstein as Ernest Lincoln
• David Knapp as John
• Laurie Hagen as Beth
• Herb Armstrong as Schiller
• Margaret Avery as Irene
• Norman Bartold as Mr. Hackett
• Sheila Bartold as Mrs. Hackett
• Lois Battle as Mrs. Faraday
• Bella Bruck as Mrs. Gehrmann
• Lynn Cartwright as Secretary

External links

• "Something Evil" at the Internet Movie Database