Endplay

I think it’s fair to say that the only thing intriguing and suspenseful about this is the movie posters itself. Intriguing for why it was made to look like this, and suspenseful until you come to the bottom of that, which we will attempt to do right now, and boy lemme tell you, there’s SO MUCH MORE to this poster than meets the eye!

Endplay was an Australian film released January 1st, 1976, and was an adaptation of the 1972 novel of the same name. Ah, January 1st. Nothing like starting the new year with an amazingly bad movie, you know? It just sets the tone for the next 12 months! Actually, despite the box art and premise, which we’ll get to in a second, this film did surprisingly well in Australia!

So let’s talk box art, yeah? It’s minimal, like the last post, but surprisingly has a lot still going on in it. I mean, for one thing, we have a basically naked chick laying on the floor, bleeding to death. I’m assuming, judging by the nearby knife, that she was stabbed. And yet, this is in direct contradiction to the arrow sticking out of the title of the movie, which for some reason is also bleeding? I didn’t know text bled, but that’s kinda cool I guess. And in the background, just to further complicate things, we’ve got a lone wheelchair and a large hunting bow with a quiver of arrows beside it.

So, was this woman stabbed or is the knife a diversion? Did she stab herself because she didn’t want to get shot with arrows? Maybe they shot her with an arrow first and THEN stabbed her? But who is the killer? See, they left out one very important part of this poster, and that’s the person supposedly responsible for this mess! Where’s the killer?! Or is the movie about a murderous sentient wheelchair come to extract revenge on all able bodied people? Because that…

…sounds pretty awesome, actually, all truth told. Can we get THAT movie made, please?

The colors of the background are, yet again, sepia toned. The box art color of choice, apparently. So, who wants to hear the premise of this movie? Trust me, you wanna hear the premise of this movie. Let me copy/paste it from wikipedia for you real fast, okay?

Hitchhiker Janine Talbort is picked up and murdered by an unseen assailant. Mark Gifford, a merchant sailor on leave, then disposes of the body, attracting the suspicion of his wheelchair bound brother Robert. The police become suspicious of both brothers, who are rivals over their half-cousin, Margaret.

So, first off we have a hitchhiking lass who is murdered, and from what I can tell, is never once brought up again and who’s death and entire contribution to this film, is getting the lead cast introduced into the movie. Then, for some reason, her body is disposed of by someone entirely different, because I guess the guy who killed her had better shit to do. Hey, murder is hard work, alright? He’s a busy man, he can’t be bothered to do every part of the job! It’s time consuming! And what really makes this blurb pop is the end line, “the police become suspicious of both brothers, who are rivals over their half cousin, Margaret”. Like, okay, so we have a murder committed by someone else entirely, that’s then, for some reason, left on someone else entirely, who’s wheelchair bound brother gets suspicious of because I’m guessing he thinks his brother murdered her? But then both brothers wanna fuck their half cousin, apparently? This film has it all! Murder! Incest! Inconsistent plots! What a hit!

I also love the other tagline on the poster, “Gripping until the bizarre end!”, as if this thing wasn’t bizarre to begin with. You’ve got an incestuous, wheelchair bound, bow hunting movie here, man. Own it. That’s BIZARRE.

Frankly, I’d be more interested in a movie where a sentient wheelchair murders able bodied people, but hey, that’s just me.