Ten Days of Terror!: The Shout

Film: The Shout
Format: Streaming video from Tubi TV on Fire!

As a genre, horror encompasses a lot of possible ideas and can go in a lot of directions. It also mashes up well with other genres. The Shout is an odd little film, though. There are definite horror elements here, but this is much more a love triangle with some horror elements. It’s also a film that relies heavily on the idea of an unreliable narrator, and works in a way to help us forget that that narrator is not only unreliable, but actually exists in the context of the film.

The framing story of The Shout is a cricket match. Robert Graves (Tim Curry) is asked to be one of the scorekeepers for a cricket match. He is paired with a man named Crossley (Alan Bates), who begins telling him a story about ostensibly himself. At the very least, in the story we see unfold, it is Crossley in the role of the Crossley in the story. It’s eventually evident that the cricket match is happening at an insane asylum and it’s unclear whether or not Crossley is one of the inmates.

Off the Diving Board

Film: Deep End
Format: Video from The Magic Flashdrive on laptop.

When it comes to films about sexual awakenings, there is no real way to pigeonhole what’s possible. Much sexual coming-of-age films are comedies, and rightly so, since there is comedy both light and dark in the sexual fumblings of the inexperienced. But there are much darker tales as well. Sex itself can be pretty dark business; there’s a definite connection between sex and death and between pleasure and pain. Deep End is a film that explores this darkness and does so in the context of the sexual awakenings of a young man.

Mike (John Moulder-Brown) is a 15-year-old school dropout who gets a job in a public bathhouse. The idea of a public bathhouse is exactly what it sounds like; while some of the clientele may go there for a bath or a swim, what’s really sold is a little something-something on the side by the attendants like Mike. He is taken under the wing of Susan (Jane Asher), who is about ten years older than he is. It’s implied that some of the clients will tip heavily for sexual favors, and Susan makes an agreement to switch clients with Mike depending on the preference of the bather. His baptism into this world of bathroom sex is immediate—his first client (Diana Dors) tips him significantly for allowing her to violently thrust his head into her chest while she talks about soccer players.