Cold Fusion Video Reviews

• Written and directed by Jon Killough
• Starring
  • Mary Jackson
  • Scott Spiegel
  • Susan Rothacker
  • Floyd Ewing Jr.
• Produced by J.R. Bookwalter

Within the next month or two, Tempe Entertainment will be releasing the remastered tenth anniversary edition of Skinned Alive; the screener copy I got was a “pre-release” version from the remastered 16mm originals but with the sound not yet remastered.

The premise is a natural for “outlaw” video: The crazy Crawldaddy family (somewhere between the criminal kin in The Goonies and the clan in The Hills Have Eyes) travel around in their beat-up van, killing isolated people and tanning their skin to make their leather goods. This family is as follows:

- The paraplegic, one-eyed mother who insists on being called Daddy (played, surprisingly enough, by Mary Jackson, who had a recurring role as one of the Baldwin sisters on The Waltons — try to imagine that sweet old lady killing people while spewing profanity!);

- brother Phink (Scott Spiegel, co-writer of the first two Evil Dead films, and director/co-writer of From Dusk Till Dawn 2) as a wanna-be fashion plate who arches his eyebrows at every conceivable occasion, and who takes a liiiittle too much interest in his sister; and

- sister Violet (Susan Rothacker, with no other credits), the blonde ‘n’ bitchy driver of the family van/mobile tannery.

We start out with a couple of blood-spewing murders (including the writer-director Jon Killough as a hitchhiker — who, frankly, deserved his fate for trying to hitchhike on the most isolated road in Ohio); then, while running a fat businessman to ground, the van conks out, and the Crawldaddy clan has to stay in a nothing town overnight as their van is repaired.

Although this film was shot in 16mm rather than on video, the budget doesn’t seem to be otherwise greater than a standard Tempe production. Locations are largely limited to an empty field and two suburban houses, and practically everyone involved in the production also has an on-screen role (including producer J.R. Bookwalter as a Jehovah’s Witness who picks the wrong house to witness to).

Effects are very bloody and largely effective (except for one scene, in which Phink and Violet carve up the JW — the skin is very obviously wax), the music is amusing, and the acting’s about what you’d expect: very enthusiastic, if none too polished.

However, while I wish I could give a good a review as I did for Bloodletting, I can’t. There’s a lack of plotline that wore on me. There’s also a lack of sympathetic characters; everyone killed had already annoyed me past caring by the time of their demise. The nominal hero, a heavy-drinking cop recently booted off the force, is introduced late, and even then the only reason we know we’re supposed to root for him is that he’s going through a messy divorce with a megabitch (who’s not only taking the house, the car, the kids, and all his money, but has been boinking her lawyer since her first visit). And injustice of injustices, neither megabitch nor her slimy lawyer are among the body count!

The other big deficit is, well, a lack of leathergoods! I mean, the family supposedly survives by tanning human skin in their van (which stretches credulity right there) — but they have no wares! In fact, the only leather seen in the whole movie is Violet’s black leather bra, and even then no attention is drawn to its possible original wearer.

I also have to point out that the final twist is a not-too-successful attempt at a Night of the Living Dead-style downer ending.

It would be a fun flick with a bunch of friends (especially after the sound is remastered), but it doesn’t overcome or draw strength from its low-budget status as Bloodletting does.