The movie was simply bad and not even "best in bad" type of campy. The movie has a needless 1950's prologue and epilogue. But let's not stop there, how about some 50's soundtrack music. Break out Peter Gunn. William Devane plays a Steven King type of author whose daughter has been brutally murdered by the alien. He tore her head off, although we really don't get to see any blood or gore. The police are baffled in what turns out to be a serial killer known as the Mangler Zombie. Cathy Lee Crosby plays the late night blond TV newscaster, long before FOX required them all to get implants and wear shiny lip gloss. She ends up with William Devane in a lame seduction scene. Oh BTW there is no sex or nudity to go with the no blood and guts. How it got an "R" rating, I couldn't tell from the movie.There is also an elderly woman who plays a Jean Dixon type of person who sees the alien killing in the future of a young wanna-be movie star whose name she doesn't know. She is upset that the inept secular police don't take her seriously.The alien, we are told, kills to get stronger, although there was no way of telling. We really didn't know why there was one lone alien predator in California. When the alien attacked two things happened first: 1) The lights went out. 2) The alien had his own theme kill whisper music like Jason...daaaark...nessss. Oh and one more thing, the alien had frickin' laser beams shooting out of his eyes.The movie is borderline camp, which is not where you want to be.

Since Casey Kasem had died a few weeks ago, I've been watching various movies he made in his lifetime in chronological order. I'm now at 1979 when he played a police pathologist doing his take on some alien body mass to his fellow officers. Most of the film is about some murders committed by this zombie investigated by reporter Cathy Lee Crosby and author William Devane. Character actor Keenan Wynn provides some good humor as Ms. Crosby's boss. There's also some suitably eerie music and atmospheric sound effects and angles though some of the visual effects are really cheezy! Still, I highly enjoyed this so on that note, I say give The Dark a chance.

As a kid I really enjoyed this movie a lot, for reasons that completely escape me now. I watched it later in my adult life and I just saw a very uneven film that seems to make no sense. I would find out that the film is that way for a reason and the reason is the film was supposed to be a film about a sort of zombie that is roaming and killing people in Los Angeles; however, due to the science fiction craze during this time they decided instead to try and make it an alien. Not sure when this decision was made, but it was done somewhere midstream or later! Still, while I did not enjoy quite as much as I did as a kid, there is still some interesting things going on and the cast is full of people you have seen before, but probably do not know their name. Well, I knew Casey Kasem's name as he has a very bit part in the movie as I am guessing some sort of forensic expert. Other than that, I could not tell you who was who, only that I was sure I had seen a good deal of them in other things. The film also has a television quality to it as it almost does not seem like a film and considering it was rated R, it is rather tame too. Not too much gore in it and no skin to speak of.The story has a killer on the streets of Los Angeles who only kills at night and only takes out one victim per night. This, for reasons unknown, sends the city into a panic even though I am guessing the freeways take out more people than this killer. Well the father of the first victim wants action and he kind of wanders around not really doing anything besides flirting and eating take out. The cops, well they are all over the place trying to stop the killer because the citizens are going insane with every death. I mean, it kills like three people and everyone acts like it is taking out a thousand people a night. A psychic seems able to predict this fiendish creatures moves, but will anyone listen to her in time to stop the creature as it grows stronger with every kill! So I would say that a good portion of the film was done before they decided to turn their zombie into a laser eyed alien. For one, it would have made sense for the psychic to have some sort of connection with it if it was a zombie or something else that was from the spirit realm, but not an alien. A lot of the shots early in the film when it unleashes its eye lasers looks like it was added in and was an afterthought, while you can tell the shoot out at the end the alien slant was firmly in place. I think the zombie one would have been fine, though that shoot out at the end was the highlight of the film. It just did not make sense for it to be an alien and most of the scenes it is obvious that it was going to be a walking corpse deal.So the film had its moments, but overall it was just a bit too much of a mess to be considered good or even okay. This film could be looked upon as a reason you should never switch what you are making while your making it. The film also could have used more of the monster, because at times it literally disappeared from the picture and you would almost forget you were watching something with a monster and just think it was an old cop television show or something. That car chase for example, just really did not seem to fit in with the whole crazed zombie or alien theme. It's worth a look though if you were like me and seen it in your youth and you want to revisit it. The return trip was not as good for me, but it had a few good moments to it.

Disjointed. Suspense that proves to be wasted. Maybe with a bigger budget...but then again probably not. The citizens of Santa Monica, California are fearful of the dark of night. A series of decapitation murders has Detective Dave Mooney(Richard Jaeckel)baffled and under watchful eyes. Roy Warner(William Devane), a writer of bloody crime novels, is the father of one of the first victims. He also has history with Mooney; it was the detective that sent him to prison. Warner wants answers; so does TV reporter Zoe Owens(Cathy Lee Crosby). A police pathologist(Casey Kasem)finds "The Mangler" to be gray and of supernatural origin. The finale is weak and leaves you wondering why you sat that long for almost nothing. Also in the cast: Keenan Wynn, Jacquelyn Hyde and John Bloom.