Without Warning (1980)
One thing that can be said for the 1970's and 1980's exploitation cinema,is that it kept alot of older characters in work. From the town drunk to the local mayor to the washed up town sheriff right down to the hooker with a heart of gold, any B-movie actor who had an alcohol problem or drug addiction to feed was always gainfully employed in some low budget slasher or sci-fi hokum. With a cast not to dissimilar to Jack Sholfder's Alone in the Dark (1982 ) which would re-unite Jack Palance and Martin Landau together for that 80-s slasher. The plot of Without Warning (1980) is not to dissimilar to Predator (1987) Umm Kevin Peter Hall even plays the alien here also. A skinny tall alien with a big bulbous head strolls the back woods shooting starfish like objects with teeth onto people that get in his way.The OAP cast are grumpiest argumentative bunch this side of Last of the Summer Wine,Jack Palance as Joe Taylor ,Martin Landau as Fred 'Sarge' Dobbs,Neville Brand as Leo ,Ralph Meeker as Dave and Cameron Mitchell as a gun nut toting father who gets his early on in the film.Amongst all the wrinkles is a very fresh faced looking David Caruso,an actor ive never really cared for,for some reason he never ever seems to smile.Also in amongst all the B movie faces is some talent behind the screen,Dean Cundey who was director of photography on pretty much every decent horror movie that came out of 1980's and Greg Cannom no slouch either who seems to have done effects work on every film ever made since. This probably explains why this low budget monster flick works so well , when others have fallen by the way side,its a nicely paced barking mad film,of course the alien is pretty kept hidden in the dark for most of the film apart from the face off between him and Jack Palance at the end.Greydon Clark the director worked with Al Adamson as an actor and also directed Black Shampoo,not sure if that's plus or what? but hey if you wanna kick back and enjoy the 80's again you could watch alot worse.
1/2 out of 5