The Undertaker (1988 film)

The Undertaker
Directed by Franco Steffanino
Produced by Frank Avianc
Steve Bono
Written by William James Kennedy
Starring Joe Spinell
Rebeca Yaron

Susan Bachli
Music by J. Eric Johnson
Cinematography Richard E. Brooks
Edited by Larry Marinelli
David Szulkin
Production
company
Double Helix Films
Distributed by Double Helix Films
Code Red
Release dates
November 1988
Running time
89 minutes
Country United States
Language English

The Undertaker (also released as Death Merchant) is a 1988 slasher film starring Joe Spinell and directed by Franco Steffanino. The film was completed in November 1988,[1] but was never released for the public and existed only in an incomplete form. The Undertaker was later reedited for a DVD release by Code Red in 2010. The film is considered a cult classic, due in part to both Joe Spinell's involvement and its troubled production. This was Joe Spinell's last film before his premature death in 1989.

Plot

A mortician named Uncle Roscoe (Joe Spinell) attends community college by day and murders women for his personal use. His nephew Nicky, his professor Pam (Rebeca Yaron) and her roommate Mandy (Susan Bachli) begin to suspect Roscoe, but little do they know that the undertaker has now taken a special interest in them.

Cast

Production

The film was made on location in New York, New York and was produced by Double Helix Films. Filming for The Undertaker was completed in November 1988.

Release

The film was never released to theatres or to video, and the only known copy belonged to Joe Spinell,[2] who died not long afterward. The film circulated as a bootleg for years, before Code Red released an edited version of the film on DVD in October 2010. The release was padded with other public domain films to increase running time, was titled Death Merchant in the opening titles, and scene were both cut and rearranged from the bootleg version.[3]

References

  1. "The Undertaker: Release Info", www.imdb.com, retrieved June 5, 2013
  2. "The Undertaker (1988): Joe Spinell's Lost Slasher", www.retroslashers.us, retrieved November 26, 2016
  3. "The Undertaker", www.dvdbeaver.com, retrieved June 5, 2013


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