Sssssss
| Sssssss | |
|---|---|
 | |
| Directed by | Bernard L. Kowalski |
| Produced by | Daniel C. Striepeke |
| Written by |
Hal Dresner Daniel C. Striepeke |
| Starring |
Strother Martin Dirk Benedict Heather Menzies Richard B. Shull Tim O'Connor Jack Ging Kathleen King Reb Brown |
| Music by | Patrick Williams |
| Cinematography | Gerald Perry Finnerman |
| Edited by | Robert Watts |
| Distributed by | Universal Pictures |
Release dates |
|
Running time | 99 minutes |
| Country | United States |
| Language | English |
| Budget | $1,030,000[1] |
| Box office | $1 million (US/Canada rentals)[2] |
Sssssss (released as Ssssnake in the UK) is a 1973 horror film starring Strother Martin, Dirk Benedict, and Heather Menzies.[3] It was directed by Bernard L. Kowalski and written by Hal Dresner and Daniel C. Striepeke, the latter of whom also produced the film. The make-up effects were created by John Chambers and Nick Marcellino. It received a nomination for the Best Science Fiction Film award of the Academy of Science Fiction, Fantasy & Horror Films in 1975.
Plot
The movie begins with Dr. Carl Stoner (Martin) selling a mysterious creature in a crate to a carnival owner. It is later discovered that the creature is actually part-man/part-snake, the result of one of Stoner's bizarre experiments. College student David Blake (Benedict) is hired as an assistant by Stoner, an ophiologist. It transpires that Stoner's previous assistant had mysteriously left town without telling anyone (Stoner explains that he had gone back home to attend to a sick relative).
Unbeknownst to David or anyone else, Stoner is a delusional man, convinced that humanity is doomed and is attempting to prepare for what he believes to be the inevitable by working out a method of transforming humans into reptiles that can survive pollution and any other ecological disaster that would wipe humanity out.
Stoner begins David on a course of injections, purportedly as a safeguard against being bitten by a snake in his lab. David's skin slowly starts to change and even peel like a snakeskin. David begins a romance with Stoner's daughter Kristina (Menzies), although her father objects and insists that she not have any sexual relations with him.
When David wakes up the next morning he looks in the mirror and looks in horror as he screams, so he calls doctor Stoner. Later Dave now fully dressed is on the bed as he clenches his sheets with his hand as we see that his hand is grey and slightly scaly. Kristina visits a carnival freak show and is horrified when she sees a bizarre "snake-man", whom she recognises as Stoner's previous assistant, Tim.
Distraught, she races back home to save David who is currently mutating into a king cobra, brought about by the injections that Stoner has been giving him. Stoner is bitten by a real king cobra from his lab and dies, just as David's transformation is complete. Kristina arrives home and finds her father dead with the real cobra next to him. The police then arrive and shoot the king cobra before heading to the lab where a mongoose is attacking David's neck, attempting to kill him. But the police do not have a clear shot, and as Kristina screams David's name, the movie ends abruptly, leaving their fates uncertain.
Cast
- Strother Martin as Dr. Carl Stoner
- Dirk Benedict as David Blake
- Heather Menzies as Kristina Stoner
- Richard B. Shull as Dr. Ken Daniels
- Tim O'Connor as Kogen
- Jack Ging as Sheriff Dale Hardison
- Kathleen King as Kitty Stewart
- Reb Brown as Steve Randall
- Ted Grossman as Deputy Morgan Bock
- Charles Seel as Old man
- Ray Ballard as Waggish Tourist
Production
The film's executive producers were Richard Zanuck and David Brown, who went on to produce Jaws.
The venomous snakes in the film were not defanged during production. Five King Cobras were imported from Thailand for this feature, ranging from 10–15 ft in length. They were recently caught in good health from the wild with full venom potency. The "Snake Park" milking scenes were real and meant to mimic what Bill Haast did at his Serpentarium in Florida daily. About one ounce of venom was collected during each take with no harm to the snakes. A different cobra was used for each take. The filming of this part of the movie took most of a day, as the cobras spent most of their time trying to escape the fenced enclosure rather than rising up in the traditional cobra attack mode.
Release
Home media
Sssssss has been released on DVD, both by itself and in a collection that also includes The Funhouse, Phantasm II, and The Serpent and the Rainbow.
In Japan, there was a VHS format release, and a DVD was released on April 7, 2010.[4]
On January 7, 2016, Scream Factory announced on their Facebook page that it will release the film on Blu-ray in April.
See also
References
- ↑ Tom Weaver, Interviews with B Science Fiction and Horror Movie Makers: Writers, Producers, Directors, Actors, Moguls and Makeup McFarland, 1 Jan 2006 p 228
- ↑ "Big Rental Films of 1973," Variety, 9 January 1974, p. 60.
- ↑ Howard Thompson (1973-08-02). "The Boy Who Cried Werewolf (1973) 'Sssssss' and 'Werewolf' Blend Horror". The New York Times.
- ↑ "【DVD】怪奇！吸血人間スネーク2010/04/07発売". Allcinema.org. Retrieved 2013-02-23.