Did You Get the "Point?"

I am a bit notorious for not accepting recommendations for posts here at Poseidon's Underworld. The chief reason being that I barely can find time enough to blather on about the things I already want to! Another reason is that I will not devote said time to a post unless it's about something that I'm very much interested in. But sometimes an idea will be submitted and it's right up my alley, so to speak, so I'm eager to dive in and investigate. Such was the case with today's featured movie, the hooty Point of Terror (1971.)  I could tell within minutes (I chuckled out loud twice before the 4-minute mark) that this crazed bit of celluloid was going to be something I wanted to profile here. While it surely fails to reach the benchmark of movies of this ilk (will anything ever top Dinah East, 1970?? I really doubt it...), there was enough here to warrant some attention. By the way, the poster for this film couldn't be any less representative of the movie's content if it tried (in fact, I think that's what they were trying for.)

The movie gets off to a vivid start with a title sequence involving a flagellating vocalist heaving around in a manner not unlike Tom Jones (with without Mr. Jones' inherent animal charisma and peerless delivery.) For many folks, the terror would be palpable just in this scene, but I found it deliciously tacky and amusing.

The fringe-laden singer in question is played by Peter Carpenter. Carpenter was an aspiring actor with a considerable sense of confidence who produced and came up with the story for this starring vehicle. It was the second of two that he pulled off, back-to-back (the other being Blood Mania, 1970, which I have yet to see.)

Next we meet our protagonist lying on a towel along the beach. The first thing that struck me was his obvious eyeliner and mascara. But that scarcely prepared me for what came next...

I straight-up thought that Carpenter was lying on the grounds beneath the mansion on The Beverly Hillbillies and that Miss Donna "Elly Mae" Douglas was on her way down to visit him! Dyanne Thorne is the actual lady in question and I chortled out loud as she "sexily" made her way down the pathway, tripping slightly at least once.

You have to love the outre early-'70s choices in hair and costuming. Thorne comes upon the sunbathing beauty and relays the fact that he's on her beach. She lives in the house above.

As someone who believes wholeheartedly that leading men in movies should always wear as little as possible, I appreciated Carpenter's selection of swimwear.

Remarkably enough, though Thorne is beyond flirty, he opts to make his way back home instead of nailing her right there next to the surf. Before departing, he informs her that he is the entertainer at the Lobster House and that she ought to catch his act sometime.

With this, she flings off her towel and exclaims that she is available for a visit from him, too, with "no cover, no minimum!" (Interestingly, I don't recall any scenes in the film of Carpenter smoking - but there may be - yet he gathers up his cigs and lighter here.)

From high above, we see that Thorne's disabled husband Joel Marston has - gasp! - caught his wife speaking to another man and has seen said man walk away from her! (BTW, there's an opening credit: "Custom Motorized Chair - Everest and Jennings!")

Yes, Virginia, there really is a Lobster House.

Inside we meet these two bartenders, who are forever going back and forth with one another in a game of will they or won't they. The blonde chick has the distinction of making even the mundane line "Hi Sally!" come across as unconvincing. Ha ha!

Sally, a Lobster House waitress, is played by Paula Mitchell. She is Carpenter's main squeeze at the moment (for the moment!) and has a rendezvous with him in his ratty dressing room.

When she tells him she needs to get "back on the floor" he takes it literally and pounces on her for a little pre-show activity!

In the audience out front (well, actually on stage with him, practically!) is Thorne, who's come to see his performance. He proceeds to hilarious slink around and shake his ass in her face during the song.

This happens in so many TV shows and movies... the headliner comes out, sings ONE SONG, then bows and is done for the night! Lunatic. As for him, if he really wanted to represent the gyrating heartthrob, another button or two needed to be open on that shirt.

Turns out that Thorne's husband is a high-level record exec and that she is calling many of the shots since his accident. So Carpenter has her back to his pad in order to play her a record he previously cut, which didn't exactly take off.

She's not dismissive of his voice, per se, but doesn't like the arrangement nor the lack of backup singers on the track. Speaking of arrangement, I took notice of his in these white pants. (Carpenter had been a pants salesman prior to beginning his acting career!)

The two start to canoodle a bit, but she decides to leave. He shows some noticeable side bulge as she departs.

Thorne is barely out the door before Mitchell appears. He expresses his elation to her that Thorne is interested in helping him get a leg up... with his music career.

Then, with his head in her lap, he tearfully recounts the struggle he's had and how he's running out of time to make it as a hit vocalist.

With that, the two head outside for a moonlight swim. There's some odd continuity here (and this movie was edited by a true pro, Verna Fields, who only a few years later was chiefly responsible for the suspense in Jaws, 1975.) Carpenter grabs his trunks as he darts out the door, but then is seen taking off his pants and the trunks are somehow under them! (But he put the pants on back at the Lobster House...) And she's butt-naked. Why did he even feel the need to have the trunks. Anyway... they make love on the rocks without ever going into the water.

Back at Marston's place, he's all bent out of shape about Thorne's lack of proper management of their recording company while he is incapacitated.

He interrupts her poolside chit-chat with pal Leslie Simms to berate her for her lack of initiative with regards to the company.

Simms, by the way, becomes a sort of ever-present fixture, helping to comment on characters or introduce new ones to the story, often with wisecracks. 

Her funk-a-liscious getup may be a bit of an eyesore, but it seems to have inspired Walter Matthau when it came to his cameo in Earthquake (1974) a few years later!

Once they are alone, Marston and Thorne continue to argue over the company, their marriage and the fact that his first wife was viciously murdered in the home, paving the way for their tormented union. 

Thorne pays a visit, champagne in tow, to Carpenter's home, but is startled to find Mitchell there. She cattily dismisses the redhead while Carpenter is in the shower.

He asks for a towel to be handed him and I completely thought she was going to give him the teensy, ratty one that's wrapped around the champagne (!) rather than the patterned one. Ha ha ha!

In any case, he takes a moment to dry off with it before wrapping his ass-ets up, which Thorne eyes hungrily.

She's all ready to enjoy some bubbly...

...but he wants some concrete evidence of her investment in him as an artist first. He presses her to make a call and sign him on to her label before proceeding any further, which she does.

That taken care of, he can lose the towel again and get down to their other "business."

He starts in right away laying down tracks, a process in which she is highly involved.

He also continues to perform at House of Crabs Lobster House, which Thorne attends with her buddy Simms along to see what all the fuss is about. Simms thinks Carpenter is using Thorne, but she explains that they are using each other...

...and that they are! Not only is he laying down tracks, he's laying the boss's wife. I loved the elaborate 'do Thorne had here, though it's only seen briefly before getting wet.

Once more, Carpenter shucks his white pants as he prepares for a moonlight dip.

Carpenter helps her with her bikini top and the world is treated to the sight of her voluptuous ta-tas.

The two engage in a whirling, psychedelic swimming pool sexcapade which brought to mind the hilariously over-the-top later one in Showgirls (1995.)

Cut to 4:00am and the couple is somehow not only all dry, but dressed up and with their respective hairstyles perfectly set! (BTW, there's an opening credit that reads "Outdoor Furnishings - Brown Jordan!")

Seriously... you've been rutting like otters in the pool then in the middle of the night get all gussied up?! (BTW "Hairstyles by Jimie!")

Just after Carpenter finally leaves, Marston comes wheeling out to holler at Thorne for her blatant indiscretion. They get into a huge fight and we suddenly realize why she's dressed the way she is...

She takes on the role of matador and, using a red & black tablecloth, starts leading him on, like a bull in the ring. Finally the poor sap winds up in the swimming pool! (Ross Hunter would have appreciated the way the cloth is perfectly coordinated to her outfit!)

We keenly discover that Marston's voracious over-acting is not quelled even by being submerged in the water!

At Marston's funeral, a whole new wrinkle is introduced when a mysterious blonde suddenly appears midway through the service (and, natch, catches Carpenter's eye!)

After the service, Simms informs Carpenter that the young lady (Lory Hansen) is Marston's daughter with his first wife.

She proceeds to tell him that the young girl had been shipped off to a European boarding school at the first opportunity and that the two of them hate one another.

That evening, Thorne slinks over to Carpenter's pad for another lovemaking session, but balks when he brings up the subject of them marrying each other. She says that she just got out of a stifling seven-year union and has no interest in heading down the aisle again.

She assumes a haughty position on the sofa and declares that he will be with her on her terms as she has his record contract and its fate in her hands.

Needless to say, this doesn't sit well with the irritated man.

He turns the tables on her and says he will report the death of Marston to the police as, not the accident they believe it to be, but a murder, with Thorne as the perpetrator.

They achieve a sort of stalemate for the moment.

Down at the Lobster House, Carpenter runs into a completely sauced Simms who informs him that Thorne has gone away on a trip.

Forced to take the shit-faced Simms home (she's now installed at Thorne's place), he comes face-to-face with young Hansen for the first time since her father's funeral. 

He takes her horseback riding, followed by a candlelit dinner at his place.

And soon enough he's moved on to her as a bedmate!

Hansen excitedly lets Simms know about the hot young man in her life.

But Simms is unnerved to discover that the man is Carpenter. She is compelled to inform Hansen that he had been fiddling around with her stepmother until just recently.

Carpenter has a whole new set of plans in mind and they don't include his cramped dressing room at Lobster House or his old flame Mitchell.

Hansen and Carpenter elope to Tijuana and then head back to her father's house. (I cannot tell you how relieved I was to see Carpenter in flimsy pajamas without briefs underneath as so many actors did. I find that practice distracting and unrealistic.)

Unfortunately, step-mama's back and she is not at all pleased with the way things have turned out!

She tries to convince Carpenter to stay married to Hansen, but "take care" of her on the side as well. Remarkably enough, he's against the idea.

She isn't really one to take no for an answer, so the two of them engage in a wild tussle, intertwining with each other even more than the garden hose on the ground beside them! This is as far as I will go in divulging the plot, but should you wish to partake, the whole movie can be seen here in a great print!

Carpenter was quite a character. First appearing in Russ Meyer's Vixen! (1968) when the director saw him in a photo with a girl he was considering, he set his mind on becoming a leading man. Lots of people do that, but he actually made it happen, such as it was. He played opposite Thorne in the 1970 sexploitation flick Love Me Like You Do, then proceeded to produce the two vehicles for himself. But then just like that, he disappeared from view! There is much speculation about why he evaporated (he was rumored to have died, he may have owed money to loan sharks, etc...) but for whatever reason he went into real estate and was out of the limelight altogether. In 1996, he died of AIDS at age 56, taking almost all the knowledge about his later life with him. 

Despite his death from AIDS, he was known to have had many a girlfriend (not that straight men couldn't also contract the disease.) We may never know his story, but it's clear from these stills what image he wanted to project to the potential audiences of Point of Terror. None of these pictures suggest anything terrifying!

Thorne was no slouch when it came to being a character either. Initially a buxom comic actress, she eventually segued into sexy window-dressing parts, then into softcore projects (one being an "adult" version of Pinocchio, 1971, directed by Corey Allen!) In 1975, she played the title character in the notorious Ilsa, She Wolf of the SS and her place in cult culture was forever assured. She reprised the character three further times in projects of varying decadence. A pragmatic woman, who had a happy marriage from 1975 until her death from pancreatic cancer in 2020 at age 83, she was philosophical about the direction her career took.

Apart from a brief guest role on My Three Sons, this is the only credit for the pouty-lipped Hansen. It's even harder to find out more about her than it is the elusive Carpenter. 

Of all the folks involved in this movie, Simms had the longest, most enduring career. In fact, she still works as a character actress today! (She's had parts on the new version of Perry Mason and appeared on This is Us as well.) Having worked on Carpenter's Blood Mania, she was hired for this second flick and proceeded to a legitimate career in the business thereafter, albeit in mostly minor roles.

Marston also had a long career on screen, first appearing in small, often uncredited, roles in 1949. He played many a military man in movies and on television, rarely getting the chance at a larger role like this one. He worked up through the mid-1980s as an extra, appearing in the Star Trek movies. He also worked several times on both Dynasty and The Colbys, sometimes as a party guest or, more notably, at the murder trial which introduced Alexis to the world as a member of the jury. He died in 2012 at age 90.

Mitchell was just beginning an acting career, having popped up on Bonanza and in The Love Machine (1970.) Though she continued to act occasionally, she mainly became involved in doing research for costume designer Danilo Donati and married an Italian photographer, which led to some work as a translator turning Italian scripts into English. She also worked for Bob Guccione's film production company which made Caligula (1979), but didn't ultimately make a planned "Catherine the Great." She is still with us today at 74. Which brings us to...

The End!