Review of Out of the Dark

"Out of the Dark" is an unknown & obscure, but surprisingly good late 80's thriller/slasher that massively surpassed my expectations. Sure it's unoriginal, predictable and derivative of approximately a dozen of other movies, but at least the pacing is stable and the level of suspense is admirably high throughout. It's too easy to point out all the clichés and little defaults, but it's much more fun to enjoy the nicely grim atmosphere, the adequate performances by familiar B-movie actors and the vivid killer clown character Bobo! Horror queen Karen Black stars as Ruth; the Mother Goose of a phone-sex agency L.A., inventively named Suite Nothing, but lately her girls are being terrorized by a psychopath that calls himself Bobo the Clown. Even more disturbing is that Bobo actually stalks the girls when they return home at night and butchers them in various sickening ways. And I do mean sickening, like the poor girl who's bludgeoned to death or another one who's literally hacked up in a bathtub. The cynical cop Lt. Meyers sets up a trap for Bobo, but this only results in more violent killing. Myers is convinced that the hunky photographer (and boyfriend to one of the phone-sex girls) is the culprit, but there are other suspects like the perverted accountant Stringer and Ruth's drunken ex-husband. "Out of the Dark" is quite similar to the streak of misogynist-thrillers that came out during the late 70's and early 80's. They were movies in which a perverted and sleazy male individual, who never bothered much to keep his identity a secret, targets all women because one woman wronged him. These were generally vile and hugely exploitative films (like "Maniac" and "Don't Go in the House") plentiful of sleazy and sadism, but without much depth. The creators of this particular gem at least tried a little harder. There's a lot of effort to keep Bobo's real identity hidden and no less than two stereotypical male characters are killed in order to keep the ratio with murdered girls in balance. It's a particularly praiseworthy gesture towards feminism to kill of 1) a fat and lazy Hispanic bastard and 2) a voyeuristic copper. Bobo himself is a genuinely creepy character with an uncanny mask, eerie voice and a marvelous sense of sadistic humor. He's one of the best killer clowns out there in the horror industry, and for that reason alone I find it bizarre that "Out of the Dark" isn't wider known. Because it was the eighties, there naturally also is some gratuitous nudity (in the form of a steaming sex-sequence) and a lot of sexual innuendo. The numerous fragments from the phone-sex conversations unceasingly use terms like "throbbing", "tool", "muscle", etc… By the way, it's pretty hilarious that the phone sex girls dress sexy and put on tons of make-up just to talk to guys they can't even see. As briefly mentioned already, "Out of the Dark" is a delight for fans of B-movie actors. Karen Black is terrific, but there are also great roles for Bud Cort (as the suspicious accountant) and Tracey Walter as the sardonic cop. You especially should keep an eye open for cameo appearances by Divine ("Pink Flamingos") as a disgusting Police Detective and Paul Bartel ("Eating Raoul", "Death Race 2000") as the sleazy motel owner.