The Demon

The Demon (1979) from Tuna

The Demon is an indie Horror/Thriller made in South Africa. As the film opens, the bad guy (let's call him the demon) breaks into a house, leaves the mother with a plastic bag over her head, and abducts the 14-year-old daughter. The father and mother hire a psychic detective (Cameron Mitchell), who will use his ESP and hopefully solve the case. He gets an impression of a building, sketches it, and the father goes there, only to be killed. When Mitchell gets back to the house, the wife shoots him. We never see or hear about any of these people again, except the demon.

Now, the demon kills a few more people, and then starts stalking two pre-school teachers. Why? Who knows? We never learn anyone's motivation in this mess. The entire sub-plot about the kidnapping/attempted murder/psychic has absolutely nothing to do with the rest of the film, and could be chopped out in its entirety without changing the plot one iota. Of course that wouldn't leave enough running time for a feature film.

That isn't the film's only liability. The DVD version is pretty clearly mastered from a VHS copy, and many scenes are very dark. The audio is not at all good, the video quality is primitive, the director made absolutely no use of the exotic African location, and the action sequences were either off-camera or were bloodless and inexplicit.

DVD INFO

Bare-bones
Poor 4:3 transfer

NUDITY REPORT

Zoli Marki shows breasts and buns changing for a hot date, has the first sex in the film, and so, of course, must die per genre convention. Her credits seem to be primarily in German films.

Jennifer Holmes is the star, only shows breasts and has sex second, thus gets to live, and do in the demon. She spent most of her career on TV, most notably with two years as a regular on Newhart.

The Critics Vote ...

No major reviews online

The People Vote ...

IMDB summary. IMDb voters score it 3.3/10. The low scores are consistent among all demographic groups.

The meaning of the IMDb score: 7.5 usually indicates a level of excellence equivalent to about three and a half stars from the critics. 6.0 usually indicates lukewarm watchability, comparable to approximately two and a half stars from the critics. The fives are generally not worthwhile unless they are really your kind of material, equivalent to about a two star rating from the critics, or a C- from our system. Films rated below five are generally awful even if you like that kind of film - this score is roughly equivalent to one and a half stars from the critics or a D on our scale. (Possibly even less, depending on just how far below five the rating is.

Our own guideline:

A means the movie is so good it will appeal to you even if you hate the genre.
B means the movie is not good enough to win you over if you hate the genre, but is good enough to do so if you have an open mind about this type of film. Any film rated B- or better is recommended for just about anyone. In order to rate at least a B-, a film should be both a critical and commercial success. Exceptions: (1) We will occasionally rate a film B- with good popular acceptance and bad reviews, if we believe the critics have severely underrated a film. (2) We may also assign a B- or better to a well-reviewed film which did not do well at the box office if we feel that the fault lay in the marketing of the film, and that the film might have been a hit if people had known about it. (Like, for example, The Waterdance.)
C+ means it has no crossover appeal, but will be considered excellent by people who enjoy this kind of movie. If this is your kind of movie, a C+ and an A are indistinguishable to you.
C means it is competent, but uninspired genre fare. People who like this kind of movie will think it satisfactory. Others probably will not.
C- indicates that it we found it to be a poor movie, but genre addicts find it watchable. Any film rated C- or better is recommended for fans of that type of film, but films with this rating should be approached with caution by mainstream audiences, who may find them incompetent or repulsive or both. If this is NOT your kind of movie, a C- and an E are indistinguishable to you.
D means you'll hate it even if you like the genre. We don't score films below C- that often, because we like movies and we think that most of them have at least a solid niche audience. Now that you know that, you should have serious reservations about any movie below C-. Films rated below C- generally have both bad reviews and poor popular acceptance.
E means that you'll hate it even if you love the genre.
F means that the film is not only unappealing across-the-board, but technically inept as well.

Based on this description, this film is an F. The only thing noteworthy about it is the nudity, and with the poor video quality, even that is mostly ruined.