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THE NIGHT CALLER (1965)
Disregard the generic title. This British sci-fi import was released in the states as Blood Beast from Outer Space. Now that is a title! You would never know it from the candy coating, but this is a wry, imaginative film. It certainly surpassed my expectations. I was just in the mood for a cozy sliver of psychotronic delectation. The storyline is deceptively simple. When a meteorite crashes near a laboratory (it's quite convenient, really), a team of scientists examines the strange quark* and deduces that it must be a transmitter of some sort. Their hypothesis proves to be correct. It isn't long before the device is tied to a string of missing girls. I know what you're thinking, and yes, the alien is from Ganymede, Jupiter's largest moon. They're always from Ganymede.
The Night Caller has a laconic sense of humor. Having said that, the funny stuff isn't forced. The dialogue is tapered, and we get strong performances from our leads. A young John Saxon stars as the central savant. The film takes a sharp left turn at the halfway point, which very nearly gave me whiplash. I was worried that the script wouldn't recover from such a precipitous about-face, but the sequence of events keeps the viewer guessing. Sure, the resolution is a tiny bit anticlimactic. I can't complain because of how much I enjoyed the journey to the resolution. A diamond in the rough, to be sure. Apparently, there is a colorized version available, but the crisp black-and-white photography feels right. So check out The Night Caller. Even Leonard Maltin liked it.
*I definitely misused that word. Don't tell anyone.
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