The Creepers

Sometimes there comes a description so horrendously milquetoast that you're almost legally required to make fun of it, and this is one of those times. The description on the back of this box is so fucking dull, so mundane, so very goddamn generic that it felt like wheoever wrote it only did so because nobody else would bother to do it. Kind of like when you're in a science glass and you wind up doing the entire groups work. My favorite part of the blurb, however, has to be the segment that's not about the girls who're murdered but more about the residents of this 'affluent' neighborhood, who are now, as it describes "puzzled and frightened by the horrible crime that has been committed", because the qualifier of them being affluent almost makes it seem like the crime itself is less of a concern and more that they want to figure out who to uninvite from this years potluck.

The Creepers plot, as described by an IMDB user, is as follows

After one schoolgirl is raped while taking a short cut through the local woods, and another is murdered in the same woods a few days later, the local police are baffled. With the help of a reporter from one of the local papers, and against the wishes of a psychologist at the local hospital, a young teacher at the school the girls attended uses herself as bait to lure the perpetrator out.

Released in 1971, under the title "Assault", which is likely a far more accurate name (I mean what the fuck is THE CREEPERS?), the movie stuggled to be released in the US because sometimes, I suppose, we do air on the side of good taste. In fact, for the U.S. release, the film was edited to avoid an "X" rating. Then, in the early 1990s, the uncensored version was given an "NC-17" rating by the MPAA, but was never officially released in the U.S. It was also apparently called "In The Devil's Garden" which is, admittedly, a cooler title than "Assault" but a more artistic title than "The Creepers". On a humorous note, this film was released by The Rank Organization, a a British entertainment conglomerate founded by industrialist J. Arthur Rank in April 1937, which really couldn't be more appropriate.

So, here we are again, with another awful movie with multiple titles, which means there's multiple box art! So let's take a look at some, shall we? I did some minor digging and I found two that I think warrant being discussed.

While the artwork on the first box is decent enough, it's also baffling in its context. I thought these girls were murdered in the woods? Why is she alive? And why is she reading a book? This looks like the box art for a schoolgirl who got sucked into a witch cult, not about a schoolgirl who was murdered. And yet somehow, that one's better than this alternative, which takes the same 'girl in woods' angle, and yet does it WORSE.

Once again, like in the previous post, they simply reused the art on the front for the art on the back, but this one lacks all the spookiness and tone that the first box had, not to mention that piss yellow, which really doesn't fit anything. Also, judging by the color of her face, she looks like she's already dead, and yet she's clearly alive, struggling to survive. It's like the people making these boxes were just given a general vague 'yeah some girls get killed in the woods' statement and then ran with that. The art on this box isn't bad by any means, but it lacks any of the life or creativity that the previous one had, and it comes across as the most bland, uninspired image one could imagine.

But fret not, because this third one is here to fix all our problems.

Now this, my friends, this is box art. And while this one does give a more supernatural vibe, it ultimately is the only one really worth its salt. I mean, the colors, the font, the imagery, all of it is wonderful. Now we finally get to see this supposed schoolgirl getting attack, which was, you know, the whole point of it to begin with. Somehow the other boxes completely missed that altogether. But this thing, this is a true masterwork. Sure, it's just seemingly a photo, instead of a painting or something, but at least it's visually interesting, and, ya know...on subject.

I still think "In The Devil's Garden" is the best title, and what they should've gone with, even if it doesn't sound remotely associated with the concept of the flick, but that's neither here nor there, because most of the artwork associated with it also doesn't match up, so who cares really. Semantics.

The only thing really wrong with this final box is that it looks more like the killer is a sentient scarecrow coming from the corn field to end the life of a rather innocent schoolgirl. I mean, don't get me wrong, he's just doing what scarecrows do, but I highly doubt there's either corn or scarecrows in the movie. Though, that's not to say a horror movie featuring killer scarecrows who stalk schoolgirls couldn't be made, and in fact I'd argue it SHOULD be made, if only because it'd be so ludicrous you'd have to be completely cold to not enjoy it.

You know, often when you're given a movie with multiple box art, all but one is bad. This time around, however, I find myself far more forgiving of the others. Sure, they aren't really on point, but they're well made enough, and their biggest detriment - aside from being willfully ignorant of the image they're meant to portray - is being tied to a name as stupid as The Creepers.

I don't know what grows in the devil's garden, but I'd sure rather picnic there than have to watch anything called The Creepers.