Volumes could be written about what this film lacks; plot, compelling diologue, catharsis, acting... But a quick synopsis of what the film does have should dissuade anyone wishing to view a real horror film from watching this wet sock of a movie.
Let's start with Ernest Borgnine. Yes, that lovable, teddy-bear of a man who has charmed us in TV's McChale's Navy, and Peckinpah's The Wild Bunch. When we first meet Borgnine's character, he's standing alone on the streets of a ghost town looking every bit the part of a western rancher. But before the film's over we see him dressed in the dark robes of a satanic priest, and in an unflattering spandex costume that makes him come off as an obese hermaphroditic version of Wonder Woman. Several times in the film, roused into a charismatic fever by his Satan-sermons, Ernie ads the final touch: he turns into a goat.
Then there's William Shatner. Dressed like an itinerant farm laborer in the most Hee-Hawish straw hat you ever saw, he shows up with a .45 in one hand and a sacred amulet in another, projecting a "get behind me, Satan" attitude. He lasts about five minutes. But in that time he manages to shoot a few of Ernest's goons (which apparently causes them to leak rainbow sherbet), get tied to a cross, branded like a cow, share a passionate kiss -tongue included- with his own mother, and get stuffed into a what looks like an old watermelon full of lost souls.
Then Tom Skerrit comes in with his girlfriend and Eddy 'GGGgrrrreeeeennnn Acres Is The Place To Be!' Albert. Together, they cause some more sherbet leaks, then break the watermelon. This does two things. It causes Borgnine to to yell, "SEIZE THEM!", which a high priest of Satan has to say at least once in such a movie. It also causes a cold front to inexplicably appear in that little Arizona ghost-town. It rains, and all the Satan-goons melt. Whether they melted because they are Goons-of-Hell deprived of their holy watermelon, or just because they live in Arizona and are unused to precipitation is not explained.
The movie ends with Tom Skerrit lovingly embracing, and crying on the shoulder of, Earnest Borgnine. If only Borgnine had been a goat in that scene, the movie would be priceless.
Let's start with Ernest Borgnine. Yes, that lovable, teddy-bear of a man who has charmed us in TV's McChale's Navy, and Peckinpah's The Wild Bunch. When we first meet Borgnine's character, he's standing alone on the streets of a ghost town looking every bit the part of a western rancher. But before the film's over we see him dressed in the dark robes of a satanic priest, and in an unflattering spandex costume that makes him come off as an obese hermaphroditic version of Wonder Woman. Several times in the film, roused into a charismatic fever by his Satan-sermons, Ernie ads the final touch: he turns into a goat.
Then there's William Shatner. Dressed like an itinerant farm laborer in the most Hee-Hawish straw hat you ever saw, he shows up with a .45 in one hand and a sacred amulet in another, projecting a "get behind me, Satan" attitude. He lasts about five minutes. But in that time he manages to shoot a few of Ernest's goons (which apparently causes them to leak rainbow sherbet), get tied to a cross, branded like a cow, share a passionate kiss -tongue included- with his own mother, and get stuffed into a what looks like an old watermelon full of lost souls.
Then Tom Skerrit comes in with his girlfriend and Eddy 'GGGgrrrreeeeennnn Acres Is The Place To Be!' Albert. Together, they cause some more sherbet leaks, then break the watermelon. This does two things. It causes Borgnine to to yell, "SEIZE THEM!", which a high priest of Satan has to say at least once in such a movie. It also causes a cold front to inexplicably appear in that little Arizona ghost-town. It rains, and all the Satan-goons melt. Whether they melted because they are Goons-of-Hell deprived of their holy watermelon, or just because they live in Arizona and are unused to precipitation is not explained.
The movie ends with Tom Skerrit lovingly embracing, and crying on the shoulder of, Earnest Borgnine. If only Borgnine had been a goat in that scene, the movie would be priceless.