Pieces
Alternative Titles: Mil gritos tiene la noche; One Thousand Cries Has the Night;
Director: Juan Piquer Simón
Year: 1982
Starring: Christopher George; Lynda Day George; Edmund Purdom; Jack Taylor; Paul Smith
Context:
Steve Minasian, one of the main men behind the scenes of the 1970s and 80s horror industry apparently offered Juan Piquer (who later added Simon to his name for commercial reasons) a thirty page treatment titled 'Jigsaw' which the director then drastically changed and built upon. However, Piquer's name is generally omitted when discussing the writers in favour of producer Dick Randall and the legendary Joe D’Amato (ANTHROPOPHAGOUS, EROTIC NIGHTS OF THE LIVING DEAD) under the alias of John Shadow.
In a 2002 interview the director stated that he wrote the initial screenplay as well as coming up with “improvised dialogues and entire scenes because the screenplay was too short" and because he "wanted to improve the story to take advantage of some locations”. Further to this in the same interview Piquer Simón would go on to add that to the best of his knowledge D’Amato had no involvement at all but it is possible that he was involved in the initial treatment under the alias.
The film was first released in the UK on video by Avatar in a heavily cut format lasting just 71 minutes. Because of this however it never became caught up in the whole video nasty furore, and as such never gained the wider recognition (or should that be infamy) in the UK because of it.
You may already be aware of director Juan Piquer Simón thanks to directorial efforts such as the adaptation of the Shaun Hutson novel SLUGS as well as THE RIFT and EXTRA TERRESTRIAL VISITORS. However Dick Randall is less well known but chances are you would have seen something that he has either produced or been involved in with key films including THE FRENCH SEX MURDERS, THE GIRL IN ROOM 2A and SLAUGHTER HIGH. Additionally it was due to Randall’s involvement at the time with a number of kung-fu films that the Bruce Lee imitator Bruce Le (subtle difference eh) was shoehorned into this film although this also helped to bump up the meagre running time.
Speaking of casting, you might recognise THE LOVE BOAT’S Christopher George (CITY OF THE LIVING DEAD, GRADUATION DAY and THE EXTERMINATOR) who co-stared in this alongside his wife Lynda Day George (MISSION IMPOSSIBLE TV series). Additionally the film features notable actors Paul Smith (MIDNIGHT EXPRESS, POPEYE), Edmund Purdom (THE FIFTH CORD, DON'T OPEN TILL CHRISTMAS) while Jack Taylor (THE GHOST GALLEON, THE MUMMY'S REVENGE, THE NINTH GATE) rounds off an impressive cast list.
Meanwhile, often debated is the look of the killer. This is actually based on The Shadow and not as initially suspected by many the Italian gialli or German krimi films. Finally don't blink or you'll miss Juan Piquer Simón in his small cameo role as a police crime-photographer.
Synopsis:
On a Boston campus, young girls are missing out. Missing out on hands, feet, arms and heads as a certain puzzled psychopath, forty years down the line, carves a bloody swathe through the female college population. Only one tough cop has the stones to bring him in but can he track down the slayer before all the girls are mincemeat? [Taken from the Arrow DVD release]
Review:
Pieces is one of those early 80s films that cross the boundaries between the giallo (mysterious gloved killer) and the slasher (the nature and style of the killings) - it is surely no coincidence that the same year Fulci's THE NEW YORK RIPPER and Argento's TENEBRAE were also released straddling these boundaries. Although the film itself was promoted as more of a straight horror, no doubt this belief of mine is skewed thanks to the marketing pitching it in the realm of Hooper’s seminal classic THE TEXAS CHAINSAW MASSACRE despite being miles away in terms of tone, on screen visuals and artistry.
From the start of the film you can tell what you are getting (living up to the fantastic 'It's exactly what you think it is' tagline). Within a few minutes we witness a child in Boston, 1942, piecing together a jigsaw of a nude woman with a hairdo from the seventies and a touchtone phone - instantly we know that realism is not home in Piquer's constructed world. The young child after being reprimanded by his mother for his perverse puzzle hacks her up as the film wastes no time in getting the violence started and the ineptitude of the police highlighted.
Fast forward forty years to 1982 (why they decided they had to go back forty years we'll never know - perhaps this was to try and push as many red herring characters into the same age bracket) and we realise that our young child now grown up is still harbouring some weird desires as the black gloved antagonist has kept his mothers bloody possessions not just as a trophy but almost as a conduit for what he has in mind. Quite why the police handed those pieces of clothing back is a mystery, but very little in this film makes sense and you just have to roll with it.
In this period it also appears that the level of police competency hasn't improved as after a very odd female skateboarder interlude we witness a (the same?) woman being attacked by a chainsaw on the campus grounds of a University. In broad daylight. Despite the chainsaw welding gardener Willard being nearby, there are no witnesses. Very odd.
This just highlights how batshit crazy this film is, random scenes seemingly added to boost run times (just wait till you catch a load of the Kung-Fu Professor as played by Bruce Le), a killer who walks around campus unnoticed carrying a seemingly endless supply of chainsaws (although it is possible he only has one and the police never take it away for evidence) , multiple red-herrings and all this is set in a University where they have a waterbed training room!
And once you meet the main characters things do not become any more sensible. Paul Smith is fantastic as the man mountain and very creepy gardener/handyman Willard but really should be walking round with a sandwich board proclaiming 'SUSPECT', thankfully Professor Brown is a little more subtle despite also always being nearby the scene of a crime. Then we have the Dean, a reserved fellow who needs to be kept in the loop at all times and then there is the student Kendall. Although a little young and a bit of a Casanova he, in what has to be a cinematic first, is deputised despite being labelled as a person of interest. Which leads us nicely to our police force - of the three main characters we will focus on the two most incompetent. Inspector Bracken, played by Christopher George, has to be the dumbest policeman alive. For example, a woman is chopped up and there is a bloody chainsaw next to her with bits of flesh stuck in it. Pretty safe to say that is the murder weapon...not for our Inspector who needs to call in Professor Brown to verify if it could possibly be the murder weapon. The mind boggles. His wife, portraying, again surely a cinematic first, a world tennis champion and an undercover cop isn't much better but at least she get's to utter the immortal and poetic line "Bastard! Bastard!......Baaaaassstttaaaarrrrd!"
There are so many potential discussion points in this film it becomes hard to articulate but it is all tied together competently through the narrative of a killer collecting body parts as he builds to recreate either his mother (it is after all her clothing he is using) or the woman in the jigsaw. Whichever is the correct answer it almost seems irrelevant. If any of this sounds terrible to you, believe me it isn't. The film just works on every level of absurdity from the ridiculous lines to the outrageous gore and I guarantee if you are on this site then you will be loving this film from start to finish.
PIECES is unashamed trash giving the audience both what they expect and what they want from the horny campus with plenty of flesh on show to the very violent gory deaths. And despite Piquer Simón over estimating his surrealistic flourishes he still manages to stay true to his vision of a grand guignol film, one that does not shy away from naturalism and reality regarding its onscreen action and because of that it is a very fun and entertaining watch on not only first but repeated viewings.
If you don't already have it in your collection I urge you to pick it up as soon as possible with the Arrow release being particularly worthwhile although Grindhouse Releasing have a 3 disc blu ray release due out in Febuary 2016.
Version Reviewed:
We watched the unrated 2011 Arrow Video Films DVD release. Featuring new alternative artwork the release also came with an informative collectors booklet featuring brand new writing on the film by Stephen Thrower.
On the disc itself is an introduction by Jack Taylor, a piece entitled 'Pieces of Jack: An actor's experience of Spanish Splatter' , whereby Jack Taylor is interviewed about his career and the film itself. Taylor comes across as a very charming man with fond memories and a genuine love for what he was involved in and those with which he worked. Also included is 'Pieces of Deconstruction: Looking back at a grindhouse gorefest' which is a little longer at around 23 minutes and is your standard talking heads about how and when people saw the film and their thoughts on it's sheer absurdity. Its fluff but it is enjoyable fluff and worth a watch. A trailer and audio commentary with Fangoria's Tony Timpone is also included.
